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Published: April 12th 2012
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Drinking in Sinchon
with Jerel & friends I'm not sick anymore! Woohooo! I've been going out and doing stuff and now I actually have something to write about on this blog. For starters, the Korean medicine seems to be the winner. After I made tea with the ginger roots and balloon flower buds the music teacher gave me, I magically felt better the next day. I don't know if it was just the illness running its course, or if it was the balloon flowers, but whatever it was, I am just happy to be healthy again!
I went to Seoul last weekend to say goodbye to Jerel. He had been living in Seoul, and I hadn't seen him yet, but he leaves today, I think. So, I took a train to Seoul by myself and then navigated the Seoul subway system to meet him in Sinchon. I took the wrong subway, and got lost for a while. Then, an elderly man walked up to me while I was purchasing my tickets and asked for money. He said it was for the train. I gave him a 1,000 won bill (about $1). Then, he started grabbing more bills!!! He grabbed two other 1,000 won bills, and kept saying
"kamsahapnida," which means, "thank you." I told him to stop, but either he didn't understand, or he was just robbing me on purpose. I finally got my things together and got my purse away from his grasp. Ugh it was awful! Lesson learned.
When I finally got on the right subway and met Jerel, we met up with some other friends of his and went out to a bar/restaurant that looked a lot like a club with no one dancing lol We drank some Cass beer and cocktail soju there, and then we went to a restaurant/bar known for its makgeolli. Makgeolli and Soju are Korean liquors. Makgeolli has the consistency of thin milk. It's white and goes down fairly smoothly. Soju reminds me of smooth vodka. Cocktail soju doesn't taste anything like soju, though! Anyway, we stayed up all night, and I caught the first train home at around 7 am.
On Tuesday, I went to Daejeon with my friend/Pilates partner, DongYun. We went to a bakery with some strange things in it, and then we went to a restaurant above it where I ate some Japanese curry. I had been looking around for it, too, so
I was happy to finally find it! So, I stayed the night with DongYun and her sister. We had a random facial mask party, then headed to bed. On Wednesday, we went to DongYun's cousin's wedding. It was pretty similar to a wedding in America, but the mothers of the bride/groom wore traditional Korean wedding clothes called Hanbok. They had a smaller, more traditional ceremony after the main Westernized wedding. Then, the bride and groom changed into Hanbok, too.
I headed back to YeongCheon after the wedding and got home around 8 pm. I didn't have to go to bed early, since Thursday (today) is my school's birthday, and school's out for the day. Yay! I slept in (finally!), chatted with Edward and Felicia (yay!), and then headed to the bank to wire some money to myself, by myself! Luckily for me, they had someone on hand whose English was really good.
After that, I had some coffee at Hands Coffee, and then headed to the traditional market to get some fruit. I totally got screwed over! I told this lady at a fruit stand that I wanted three oranges. I asked her how much it would cost,
Cherry Blossoms
The streets are lined with them! It's prettier than my photography skills will allow me to capture ;) and she clearly said 1,000 won (about one dollar). I thought this was a good deal, so I told her to give me three oranges. I paid with a 10,000 won note, and she filled a bag with TEN oranges, and didn't give me change. Either we had a miscommunication, or she was taking advantage of me. She made me pay 1,000 won PER ORANGE. Such a shitty deal. I could have gone to E-Mart and gotten them for 800 won each. I decided to ditch the market, and go get some dinner.
I went to a new pizza/pasta place and ordered a margherita pizza to go. Yay! There were a few language barriers, but I finally got what I ordered. Then, I took some pics of the newly-blossomng cherry blossom trees that line the main road in YeongCheon, and caught a cab home. Those are all my updates! I'll make another blog on Sunday, after I get a few more pictures. Annyeonghikahseyo!
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