Archive for ‘May 2010’

This past weekend I went to my first Korean baseball game. Although I'm not found of watching baseball on TV, I do enjoy seeing it in person. About 9 of us pre-ordered tickets to see the Doosan Bears (Seoul home team) play the Neksan Heroes. Some of us went to Korean Class so we got to the game late, but it was still really fun. It's the same rules as American baseball, but some of my friend are Scottish, so we had to explain the whole game to them. Let me tell you, Koreans love themselves some baseball. The place was completely packed, people even sitting in the walk ways because there were no seats left. And there was a huge scoreboard that announced who was up to bat, and the crowd went crazy for the batters. Everyone also had those inflatable tubes that you whack together to make noise. And the best part? The beer. You can buy beer from the shop outside and bring it in, or you can buy it in the stadium for, get this, the same price! Normally back in the states, the second you enter a stadium you are forced to pay double the cost of normal priced items. So it was great to be able to get cheap beer while watching the game. There is even a guy that goes around with some sort of tap system on his back and sells beer.

A few weeks ago I went down to Yoido Park after Korean Class with a bunch of friends. It's supposed to be a great place to see all the Cherry Blossom trees, so we wanted to check it out. But when we got there, there were hardly any cherry blossoms. The park was nice, and there were lots of people, but the only cherry blossoms we saw were on the way to the park, and not actually in the park. Great thing about Korea is that drinking in public is allowed, so we were able to find a spot, snack on some chips, and have a few beers right in the middle of the park. The only downside? It happens to be a big spot for couples to go, and just that morning I had to say goodbye to Daniel since he was going home. So although it was a fun park, it also made me a little sad. But on the bright side, we found wild bunnies! At first we saw one and we thought it belonged to a girl that was seen earlier with a bunny, so we tried to catch it. We probably looked retarded, a bunch of foreigners trying to chase a bunny through the shrubs. But then we found bunny #1's friend's and realized that they probably lived in the park.

After the park, the other girls and I went to Itaewon for dinner. By then I was starving and cold. We decided to go to an Italian restaurant that was slow and over-priced which kinda sucked. But the paninni was decent, and the wine was good, as was the company.

The next day the same group of us went to Shinseol-dong to go the the Korean Folk Flea Market. This place is absolutely huge, let me tell you. Two floors, all sorts of goodies! There's a huge antiques section with things like wooden furniture, pictures, jewelry, old school lighters, there was even a canon! Most of the stuff is pretty cheap, but it would be hard to carry around. Arlene got a cool wooden stool, and Kyla got a nice box. There were also some antique Buddhist items like sculptures, coins, medallions. Along with the antiques, there is a clothing and jewelry section, even a whole area that sells cheap alcohol! Arlene and I also found a guy who does stamp carvings. In Korea, when you sign important documents, most people have small wooden or plastic stamps with their names engraved on them, and they simply stamp the paperwork instead of actually signing. They were really cheap and the guy was super nice, so Arlene and I bought a bunch of them.

The whole place is really cool, and it takes some time to see everything. I bought a Korean storage box, some WW2 Korean Army shot glasses, some movies, and I even found an electric mixer for only $10! Also, really strange, in the street outside, there was a guy selling ginseng, soaking in soju, with a dead snake in it. Grace later told me that people drink the soju in the glass for "stamina" but it sounds disgusting to me.