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Published: October 30th 2008
Try and beat this view!
Sunset over Busan Harbor from my roof!Well it's true. I'm another year older in a country where you don't need any help getting older! I guess I should probably explain the Korean birthday system and you'll see the benefits of working under the Western system. You see, here, when you are born you are 1 yr. old right out the "door" as they say. Then, as in my case for example, a few months after being born, New Year's rolls around making me 2 years old in Korea while back in the States I'd only be 2 months old! Then after that first New Year's, everybody turns another year older only on New Year's Day...the whole country has the same birthday! My students have told me that people do celebrate their actual day of birth, but not in the same way we do back in the U.S. and you'd still be the same age the day after your birthday party (unless you were born on New Year's which would be lucky because then you'd be your actual age!) So while I was celebrating my 26th birthday, when my students ask how old I am, I have to say 28!!! Not fair!
As it turns out, the
My birthday rooftop shindig!
My studio apartment was like a clown car... first people I met on this adventure happened to be twin sisters who share my birthday! There was no way we'd let our birthdays pass without a big to-do! I happen to have a gigantic rooftop (it could easily accomodate 200 people) with a complete 360 view of the Busan skyline (remember I'm on a little island off the coast,) Young-do island, the Namhang bridge which is dressed in rainbow lights that change colors every few seconds, and then out to Sea towards Japan. How could I not take full advantage of this? Insert fact here: Korean law states that Koreans are not allowed to gamble which means all the casinos in Korea are for foreigners. OK so we want to have our Korean friends with us also so we decide to invite everyone to my roof for birthday fiesta #1. It was a gorgeous night and a lot of fun but eventually the 50-degree temps drove all 25 or so people into my little studio apartment for a couple hours before we made the inevitable decision to go to a norae-bang for some singing (I told you that's how all good nights end!) We sang our little hearts out
Mmmm...so what's this?
Sampling the ubiquitous "street meat" as they call it, appetizing! Nampo-dong in Busan and then wandered to Nampo-dong, a usually hoppin' area with restaurants, shopping, norae-bangs, theaters, it's where they have the Pusan Int'l Film Fest., though at 4am not so busy, or opened for that matter, so at the end of the night we found ourselves at a 24 hour McDonalds...just like at home (though this one is across the street from a delicious dumpling restaurant and not Wrigley Field, but you get the idea.) Little did I know but that delicious meal would have to carry me through the rest of the weekend!
Saturday night. After spending the day on the go, shopping for accessories for the evening, then rushing home to get ready for the glitz and glamour of the Lotte Hotel's Casino, it was finally time to see if I had what it takes to make it at Blackjack. I took a taxi and the driver spent the entire ride discussing foods that Koreans like to eat with soju...sashimi...pork bulgogi...the list goes on, I like drivers with something to talk about! I arrived a few minutes before the rest of the group so the concierge and I talked about his upcoming plans to visit America, specifically (and this will make you all proud,) Las Vegas. It's nice to know that when people think of the first thing they want to visit in the U.S. it's Vegas! I even tried to convinve him to see California since it's close, but he said "No time!" Kinda funny but apparently Koreans want to gamble and they're willing to spend a lot of money on a plane ticket just to get to someplace where they can! Back to the story, so we all take the escalator up to the casino and I was a little "under-whelmed" They checked all of our Alien Registration Cards to make sure we weren't secretly Koreans who had gone to extreme and disturbing lengths to sneak into a casino and then we were off! Or so we thought. We walk in with our Korean won burning holes in our pockets and we find the casino to be about as lively as the early bird dinner at a nursing home...not very. They had a roulette wheel with a few men standing around placing bets, no poker anywhere in sight (good for me since I didn't have the little cheat card that tells me which hands beat which...possibly a sign that I shouldn't be playing for money), a Baccarat table, slots, and maybe 2 blackjack tables, all the others were unmanned. Hmmm...all this excitement, slow down, get ahold of yourself!!! After ordering some cocktails, we looked so swanky, the group split up, some headed to the Roulette wheel while the rest of us hovered around the Blackjack table with the lowest minimum (I told you we looked classy) hoping they would notice us and open another table. Finally it was time and the 3 casino worn Japanese men, cigarettes hanging out of their mouths, scooted down to make room for some unsuspecting Westerners. I'll spare you the details of the next 2 1/2 hours, it was an emotional roller coaster, it was good and it was bad, but in the end the house always wins let's just leave it at that.
Our next (and last) stop for the night was a bar in Seomyeon. Seomyeon is a huge area filled with office buildings but also tons of restaurants and bars, markets, norae-bangs, food vendors, the Lotte Department Store (and hotel and casino), and it's always a good option when you're looking for something to do. I've spent hours shopping in the street markets and in the indoor market, and they have an infinite number of good places to eat, especially BBQ. This place is BIG! Of course it wasn't difficult to find a place to go drinking and that's exactly what we did, finding a place where you get free flaming shots on your birthday. It took quite a while to set up and then the bartenders cleared a path in the crowd and blew fire!!! We had to practically kneel on the bar to reach the top of the shot glass pyramid to drink our tasty b-day shots with a straw (they had recently been set on fire...glass may have been a tad on the hot side). All in all a good time, Sunday was basically spent recouperating with a few movies and chicken wings at 9 o'clock at night...ahhhh a good weekend!
Back at school, some of my students gave me birthday presents and the most adorable notes and cards! I got a little "Vocabulary" notepad to help me learn Korean, perfume, lollipops, and of course chocolate, but hands down my favorite thing was the cards they wrote me! "Happy Birthday! I prepare some present for your birthday. I hope you like it. And I want to be your good student, bye bye!" Super cute!!! I must admit that I have some favorites here. The girl who wrote that card is a 5th grader who always comes to see me and is a pretty good English speaker; last week she was the one who asked me to teach her the song "Summer Nights" from the movie "Grease" but she already knew most of the lyrics! She's always smiling, really eager to learn, and apparently also likes Stevie Wonder songs (she kept asking me to teach her some of those too!) She entered an English speaking competition and would come to me with pronunciation questions or just to recite her piece. She was great! I think she was also the one to tell everyone about my birthday because her older sister came up to me with her friend and sang "Happy Birthday" to me in English! The students are so precious, some speak pretty well and usually attend "hagwons" (language schools) after school and others don't speak any English and had no desire to but just by me being here it has stirred a curiosity in them and those who want to learn are learning even faster! Many of the teachers here don't speak English so it has been a challenge to connect with them, though I attended a grape-eating get together (literally we just ate grapes!) the other afternoon and have been able to talk with a few of the teachers so it's a slow process but it's moving along. I also got to "bond" with the principal after he called me into his office to track down some sources online, that he needs for writing his dissertation. I spent the whole afternoon sending emails to professors, downloading a few articles, and ordering some seriously old education books for him before he asked me to edit his dissertation (luckily he just started so it was only a few pages). Of course since I did him this favor he asks me to sit down and then he gives me a case of Vitamin C drink and a "very, very nice" manicure set minus the nail clippers. Upon realizing the missing tool, he takes the clippers from his kit and puts them in mine. Nice. Then he tells me to USE the kit right there in his office!!! The secretary brought us coffee and I'm sitting there filing my nails...uncomfortable would be a good way to describe it but at least I know I'm in good with the principal, I mean why else would he be so concerned about my nutrition and cuticle health? Anyway, this weekend is Halloween Korean-style and it promises to be hillarious since they don't do Halloween here and I'm dressing up as one part of the Korean pop band, the Wonder Girls...stay tuned!
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