A week ago on Saturday, Graham, Ryley and I headed down to Seoul to meet up with Jonny from Canada and go to the LG Twins game against Hanwha, and then go out in Seoul and stay at Jonny's overnight.
We stopped at Quizno's before heading to the game because we didn't feel like having Burger King, and Graham said the KFC at the stadium was more expensive. Sandwiches in hand, we met up with Jonny, his Korean girlfriend and a Korean guy who went by the name Chris. It started to rain a little bit so we made the choice to sit behind home plate under cover, which made it my third different seating area in as many games, and I think there's maybe only one other place left to sit, but those seats cost more than W6,000.
The Twins lost 8-0 against Hanwha's best starter, who Graham said is the best pitcher in the country, and is the national team's ace. After the game we went to the Kongdae area where Jonny lives and dropped off our stuff before heading out to dinner, where we were joined by another of Jonny's Korean friends, who goes by the name Sasquatch.
From dinner we went to a bar called "Ho Bar" where Ryley and I
dominated a darts tournament, and Chris and Jonny's girlfriend left us.
Our dart dominance had inspired the others to want to play pool, so
Graham, Sasquatch, Ryley, Jonny and I headed to a Family Mart to pick
up two 1.6L bottles of Cass and a bottle of Soju, and then off to the
pool hall.
In Korea they play a different style of pool, where there are no pockets, they put a few balls on the table and then they have to hit a ball off three rails and then hit another ball, and there's some sort of points system. The point is, they think pocket pool is for women, so the pool hall was full except for one table, the pocket pool table, that no Korean would touch. The pool hall owners knew Jonny and Sasquatch so they gave us coffee and juice and snacks to help balance the alcohol, and we spent a while there very cheaply before heading off again.
By this time, I was lobbying to go to a noraebong (singing room), but Jonny insisted that we couldn't go without girls. Thus, we ended up in another bar hoping to find some girls to go to the noraebong with us. This bar was more like a dance club, with a DJ and a dance floor but there weren't many people dancing, either because it was too late at night and they were all too drunk (there were 2 people who were completely passed out) or the club just sucked.
Being the only foreigners there, we drew some attention, and Ryley was getting looks and giggles from girls so we told him he needed to get some to take to the noraebong. After he and Jonny made fools of themselves on the dance floor, the DJ finally played Billie Jean (which we requested) and Graham, Sasquatch and I joined them where we all proceeded to make fools of ourselves. None of the Koreans got up to dance with us until the end of the song, and Graham lost his faith in humanity.
The Koreans that did get up were a girl and her boyfriend, and they got up right at the end of the song, but Ryley took advantage of the situation to join them at their table with one other couple and two (presumably) single girls. The rest of us watched while Ryley talked to them, all of us (except Jonny) hoping that he would convince them to go to a noraebong with us.
After a while, Jonny was too drunk and decided we had to go, and seconds after saying that he didn't want to shut down Ryley's game, walked over and told Ryley that we were gonna leave. Thus, we left the bar with no girls, and decided to walk Jonny home and then the rest of us would go to a noraebong without him.
The first noraebong we found we wanted to know if we could drink inside, and Sasquatch said no but we still made him ask. He talked to the two men standing in the doorway and informed us that they said no drinking. Graham pointed out there was another one about 30 feet away and Ryley said, real slowly in a "sayonara, sucker" kind-of-way: "well, ahn-nyung-hi, geh-seh-yo!" (which is actually the proper way to say goodbye to a person staying when you are leaving) and we all lost it in the middle of the street. Also by this time, it was pouring down rain off and on, so we hurried away once we had regained our wits.
The next noraebong we didn't even bother asking, we just filled our pockets with beer from a Family Mart and went in, where we proceeded to pay tribute to Michael Jackson in the drunkest way possible. Then it was back to Jonny's to sleep.
In the morning, we woke up to watch UFC 100 and the Mariners game at the same time on the internet. As I may have mentioned before, Ryley is from Ballard and Graham, although from New Zealand, is a hardcore Mariners fan, so we all were interested in the game. Once the sports were over and we had drank plenty of water and coffee, and also waited out the continuing rainstorm, we caught a break in the weather that allowed us to make the walk to McDonald's.
From McDonald's we left Jonny and headed to Technomart, an electronics market where I was hoping to find a small camera bag for short trips, but none of the vendors there had what I wanted. Graham also took a look at some clothes, making the required stop at the Nike vendor before we headed off to catch the bus home. At Jamsil where the bus stop is, there's also a decent sized bookstore, so I picked up a Korean-English dictionary. The best thing about the dictionary, besides the price of around W7,000, is that the Korean-to-English section is alphabetized by hangul, instead of the Romanized word, so that makes it a lot easier when I'm trying to look up a Korean word I see and I don't have to figure out how it would be spelled out.
After getting back to Maseok, Graham called it a day but Ryley and I met back up (after going home to shower and change clothes) along with Tim, Chris and Barney to go out to dinner. Of course after this we went to Tim's for a Louis Theroux documentary and then some Pro Evo 2009 soccer on the Playstation until it was time to go home and get a little sleep before school on Monday.
In Korea they play a different style of pool, where there are no pockets, they put a few balls on the table and then they have to hit a ball off three rails and then hit another ball, and there's some sort of points system. The point is, they think pocket pool is for women, so the pool hall was full except for one table, the pocket pool table, that no Korean would touch. The pool hall owners knew Jonny and Sasquatch so they gave us coffee and juice and snacks to help balance the alcohol, and we spent a while there very cheaply before heading off again.
By this time, I was lobbying to go to a noraebong (singing room), but Jonny insisted that we couldn't go without girls. Thus, we ended up in another bar hoping to find some girls to go to the noraebong with us. This bar was more like a dance club, with a DJ and a dance floor but there weren't many people dancing, either because it was too late at night and they were all too drunk (there were 2 people who were completely passed out) or the club just sucked.
Being the only foreigners there, we drew some attention, and Ryley was getting looks and giggles from girls so we told him he needed to get some to take to the noraebong. After he and Jonny made fools of themselves on the dance floor, the DJ finally played Billie Jean (which we requested) and Graham, Sasquatch and I joined them where we all proceeded to make fools of ourselves. None of the Koreans got up to dance with us until the end of the song, and Graham lost his faith in humanity.
The Koreans that did get up were a girl and her boyfriend, and they got up right at the end of the song, but Ryley took advantage of the situation to join them at their table with one other couple and two (presumably) single girls. The rest of us watched while Ryley talked to them, all of us (except Jonny) hoping that he would convince them to go to a noraebong with us.
After a while, Jonny was too drunk and decided we had to go, and seconds after saying that he didn't want to shut down Ryley's game, walked over and told Ryley that we were gonna leave. Thus, we left the bar with no girls, and decided to walk Jonny home and then the rest of us would go to a noraebong without him.
The first noraebong we found we wanted to know if we could drink inside, and Sasquatch said no but we still made him ask. He talked to the two men standing in the doorway and informed us that they said no drinking. Graham pointed out there was another one about 30 feet away and Ryley said, real slowly in a "sayonara, sucker" kind-of-way: "well, ahn-nyung-hi, geh-seh-yo!" (which is actually the proper way to say goodbye to a person staying when you are leaving) and we all lost it in the middle of the street. Also by this time, it was pouring down rain off and on, so we hurried away once we had regained our wits.
The next noraebong we didn't even bother asking, we just filled our pockets with beer from a Family Mart and went in, where we proceeded to pay tribute to Michael Jackson in the drunkest way possible. Then it was back to Jonny's to sleep.
In the morning, we woke up to watch UFC 100 and the Mariners game at the same time on the internet. As I may have mentioned before, Ryley is from Ballard and Graham, although from New Zealand, is a hardcore Mariners fan, so we all were interested in the game. Once the sports were over and we had drank plenty of water and coffee, and also waited out the continuing rainstorm, we caught a break in the weather that allowed us to make the walk to McDonald's.
From McDonald's we left Jonny and headed to Technomart, an electronics market where I was hoping to find a small camera bag for short trips, but none of the vendors there had what I wanted. Graham also took a look at some clothes, making the required stop at the Nike vendor before we headed off to catch the bus home. At Jamsil where the bus stop is, there's also a decent sized bookstore, so I picked up a Korean-English dictionary. The best thing about the dictionary, besides the price of around W7,000, is that the Korean-to-English section is alphabetized by hangul, instead of the Romanized word, so that makes it a lot easier when I'm trying to look up a Korean word I see and I don't have to figure out how it would be spelled out.
After getting back to Maseok, Graham called it a day but Ryley and I met back up (after going home to shower and change clothes) along with Tim, Chris and Barney to go out to dinner. Of course after this we went to Tim's for a Louis Theroux documentary and then some Pro Evo 2009 soccer on the Playstation until it was time to go home and get a little sleep before school on Monday.
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