Extracurricular

My first few weeks here in Korea have been pretty filling. I make it a point to go out and do stuff on the weekends cause, hell, what else am I gonna do? Sitting around the apartment, while certainly something I'd do back home, feels like wasted opportunities here. I really should make the most of my stay since I'll only be here for a year.

The first weekend, from what I can remember, was bar-hopping. I first checked out a foreigner bar called O'Briens. It's this little Irish hole-in-the-wall with a pool table, a small stage for performances, some couches, and darts. Pretty cool place that I don't mind going to again for a kick-back.

The next night I went to Gwangalli Beach, which is, in two words, fucking awesome. I took a couple of pictures if you wanna see the view. It's a long beach lined up with bars, restaurants, etc. Right out in front is the beautiful Gwangan Bridge, which oddly looks similar to the Bay Bridge from afar. All around is lights, lights, lights with people walking up and down the boardwalk until the wee hours of the morning. I specifically went to a bar called Thursday Party, another foreigner hang-out. It's a pretty cool place; definitely a lot more livelier than O'Briens.

The next weekend I checked out a place called Vinyl Underground. True to it's name the place plays a lot of non-mainstream stuff like electronic music and punk. I went that night specifically cause I heard they were playing Electro/Tech/Funky House. Overall a pretty fun night, I definitely danced my ass off. It was nice to meet some people who were into the same kind of music as me.

The following night I checked out a place called Rock and Roll Bar (or something the rather). Another foreigner hang out similar to O'Briens.

Sunday I climbed a mountain. Yeah, pretty out of the blue. I went with a group of foreigners on a 2 1/2 hike up and 2 1/2 hike down, with plenty of stops here and there; along the way we passed a Buddhist temple, which was pretty cool. Getting to the top of the mountain definitely felt like an achievement. I was pretty much hobbling up the last mile or so. But the view was definitely worth it. You could see all of the city of Busan, the Pacific Ocean beyond and other cities in the area as well. To celebrate our victory we did...well what everyone else here does! Drink soju! For those who don't know what soju is, it's this vodka-like drink that's around 15% alcohol. You can drink a lot and get really, really drunk (not speaking from experience or anything). I took some pictures of that trip, I'll upload when I get the chance.

Hmm what else? Last weekend I went to Gwangalli Beach again, then this club called Club Foxy, which, costing 15,000 won to get in, was basically not worth the trip. It was a very nice club but not really my scene (music-wise and people-wise). Gotta try a little bit of everything though.

Last Sunday I went to Songjeong Beach with some foreigners for some swimming and whatnots. Pretty cool place. They had a surf shop nearby that rented out wind-surf boards, which I definitely want to check out on a more windier day.

That's been pretty much the highlights of what I've been doing outside of work. During the weekdays after work I usually just lounge around, buy groceries, or just walk around to explore my area a little more.

Definite plans for the future include: taking the bullet train to Seoul and ferrying over to Japan. Both are reasonably priced so I hope to do it more than once.

An-nyeong-hi-gye-se-yo for now.