Museum and Ewah Shopping

I'm going to try to recap the past 48 hours to the best of my ability because I think I have early onset Alzheimers or something lol.  Saturday morning/afternoon were spent frivolously.  I did nothing, accomplished nothing, and I think I got dumber watching dramas lol.  Saturday evening, however, I got out of my dorm and was actually productive! That evening, I went to the National Museum of Korea, and let me tell you, it's enormous.  There's apparently a main exhibit center that houses the permanent collection and a west wing that houses the special exhibitions   There's also a performance theatre and a Pagoda Garden that was just gorgeous. Entrance into the main exhibition hall is free and even thought that building is only 3 stories high, it's really like 10+ stories because each floor was gigantic.  The artifacts date back from neolithic to Joseon, Shilla, Goryeo, Goguryeo, etc time periods/dynasties.  I spent hours there just to hunt down the pieces I was suppose to be commenting on for my art class and some of the artifacts were really interesting.  Here are some pictures of the museum:

I really wanted to find the Dragon Falls (sad excuse for a waterfall btw. it doesn't look like the picture and it's worse than our little waterfall at Imperial Garden lol) and went down some trodden path following the sound of flowing water but that ended up being a dead end.  On the way out of that wooded area, I swear I heard footsteps behind me or something.  Needless to say,I skedaddled out of there as quickly as I could and I definitely won't be going down any scary horror movie looking trails again.  I wandered into the park that's right beside the museum (y-something family park) and it's pretty amazing.  There are ponds and apparently on the other side  of the park there were ecological wastelands.  I walked around that area for an hour or so and found the I'Park mall!  The I'Park mall is where I got my cellphone and it's on massive shopping mall. 

Unfortunately, it was closing up when I got there so I went to the E-Mart downstairs and got some really nice smelling hand sanitizer (yay for clean!). By the time I turned on my cellphone to check the time, it was already past 10 and I think the train stops running at 11 or something like that so I was freakin out because I was appx 1 hr. away from the Anam Station (my dorm stop fyi).  Fortunately, I got on one of the last trains on that route and made it home.  Oh! I saw some people filming a mug scene on Anam Street.  I sat there and watched it until they packed up.  That stabbing/mugging scene took many shots and it was interesting watching the actor scream out the actresses names 5X's because the director wasn't happy with how he screamed it out the time before lol.  I bought some cheese chips from the mart afterwards and let me tell you, cheese flavored anything in Korea is basically sweet and smells rancid.  There is no real cheese here so to those who like cheese and want to come here, you are forewarned.

The Ewah Women's University and the Sinchon areas are 짱 for shopping.  Seriously, because there are so many stores targeting women, it's like shopping paradise for me. They have stores solely for shoes, clothes, accessories, and jewlery.  There's even a store sole for condoms...I wonder what that implies lol

haha...it says "be safe" on the window

As I was walking around, I stumbled across the famous Issac's Sandwich Place.  It's a little hole in the wall shop with a red sign but they make the best sandwiches.  I only got the cheese sandwich (like a grilled cheese with an omelet inside) and it sound simple but sometime simple is the best.  I walked around that area for forever and saw the Charlie Brown Cafe. I thought I could find it again later but to no avail, I lost it.  I walked around in the same giant circle about 3X's and got frustrated to I settled down at a Smoothie King to study for one of my midterms.  I got the cutest bows at Ewah and I  am definitely going back to get more ^^

Giant shoe:

My bow! I feel like Minnie Mouse with such a giant red bow lol

Unfortunately, I saw like 5 million couples hand in hand and I can honestly say, I'm mildly jealous.  Just looking at them being all lovey-dovey makes me sick because I sometimes feel bitter about being single.  My one shining hope is that things happen in due time and I can't force anything.  Anyways, back to Ewah, there was a streetside jazz performance and they were amazing.  They interacted with the crowd and the vocalist was really good.

That's all for now! Must study for midterms ^^

Andy Warhol Lazy Sunday

So, today a group of friends and I all went to the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Seoul Museum of Art.  We got there around 1:30 and there was a massive line running all the way down the hill.  We got our tickets for about 12,000 won each and the exhibit was interesting at first but got kind of boring because the massive crowd made it rather unenjoyable after a certain point. Some pieces of art that really stuck out to me were the blacklight painting of Jesus at the Last Supper, Sylvester Stallone with his huge doe eyes (I think Warhol was gay), and of course his artistic take on Marilyn Monroe's portrait.  One thing that made me unhappy was this ajumma stepped on my left pinkie toe and i was wearing a new pair of flats so on top of trying to break them in, she inflicts massive pain on my left foot.  And while I was in the bathroom, I stabbed myself trying to tear the toilet paper on the plastic teeth that separate the paper from the entire roll.  So yeah, I was not a happy camper at the end.  Here are some pictures we took at the exhibit:

The Museum:

Inside:

With the famous Campbell's soup can:

No, your eyes aren't deceiving you, these statues were designed to look like they're squished.  It gave me a headache looking at them:

Afterwards, we all went out to eat some Korean food and I had bibimbap.  It's starting to grow on me now.  I used to only like dolsot bibimbap but the one in the metal bowl is tasty as we.  Kimchi is also becoming more and more delicious.  The juk restaurant had the best kimchi I've had so far but apparently there's this soup place near the school that JP and Anna rave about.  I will have to go there and judge myself ^^

We parted ways after eating and JP and I went out to explore.  We got some ice cream before our mini-expedition and I must say, coffee flavored avacado ice cream is simply divine (even though it doesn't sound that great).  The packaging was quite elegant as well:

We randomly started walking and ended up in the enormous Namdemun Market.  JP had to leave to meet his dad later on so I went off on my own into Shinsegae.  Everything in that department store is expensive and I was so scared to even touch the clothes.  The sales associates were eagle eyeing me and when I went into a store they stuck to me like glue, which was kind of annoying.  I then learned to go into a store with the "I can buy anything in this store, so buzz off!" mentality and just kind of ignored the stalker sales associates.  There are actually some good finds if you look hard.  I saw a couple of cute shirts for $9 but decided to pass because I'm on a budget.  I basically took the escalator up all 14 floor and browsed through each floor.  That took a good 2.5-3 hours to do so.  On the 11th floor, there are a bunch of restaurants and a Sky Park.  Here are some pics of the park and some of the plastic food models at a restaurant:

At the basement level, there was the grocery section and I went around eating all the free samples. Free gourmet food? Hell yeah!  Some of the basic groceries such as milk, fruits and veggies were reasonably priced.  Not as cheap as Homeplus but pretty darn close.  There were some more restaurants and snack stands down there as well.  I got some delicious legit shikkae (cold rice drink people usually enjoy at a jimjilbang) for 1000 won ($1) and there were things like pastries, mandoo, coffee buns, etc that looked so appealing but I was too full to even think about buying them.  All the snacks weren't ridiculously priced as I thought they'd be...in fact, some of the prices were the same as street food pricing.  Here's the first sushi conveyor belt I've seen here. Plates were $1.50-$5 each

A steamed bun place.  It smelled wonderful:

Afterwards, I went back to CJ because my feet were killing me. I watched a Taiwanese movie called Hear Me and loved it.  The almost whole dialogue was in sign language and the simple yet moving plot brought me to tears and made me laugh later on.  I really recommend it to anyone looking for a touching movie. That's all for today! Will write later!

Thai food and roomie

Today was a rather cool day. I woke up at the crack of dawn to bid on a DKNY Be Delicious perfume on ebay. It was not a random decision to buy it. When I was browsing through some department store a while back, I was sniffing perfumes (cuz I like to do that?) and they were selling that one for $60! I really liked the scent so I've been mulling for weeks about it and decided to get it. Anyways, I won it for $30 and after my momentary "I won it!" high, I decided to buckle down and learn the Sino-Korean and natural Korean numbers. Now, I know my numbers pretty well and don't how to ask "olmayeyo" (in english: how much?) over and over again when I'm at a store (so embarrassing. Then my roommate Yoon came right as I was about to leave. I thought that having a roommate would totally put a dent in my flow (did I just make up a new phrase? lol) but I think she'll actually get me to shape up. I'm somewhat messy on my own and now I have a reason not to be a slob. Only thing is she said she shores -__-

Oh well, I guess it's a good thing I brought a box of earplugs :) Anyways, she's a native Korean who's a freshman at KU majoring in Public Affairs and she seems really nice. Within the few minutes we met each other she invited me to her family's house next weekend for a homestay experience. Yay! Well, I left on a mini adventure to find a Thai restaurant. I've been craving Thai food like crazy the past couple of weeks (working at a good Thai restaurant 2 months before this trip definitely had an impact on what I crave) and after some research on the internet, I found this place called Yum Thai near Apujeong. The atmosphere was really nice and they had Thai ballads and traditional music playing. Also, the owner greeted me in Thai when I came in (when everyone came in in fact) and was surprised when I greeted him back in Thai. I guess they're used to a bunch of Koreans coming in all the time. Anyways, the food was okay, not the best...but I want to go back for some Som Tum and Pad Thai. The other table beside me ordered it and it looked absolutely scrumptious! I then went shopping for lotion, conditioner, and hairdye at the local Watsons across the street. I definitely want to change my hair color back to it's natural color but they didn't have it at Watsons so I stopped by the subway Etude House and got stuff there. These "face and beauty" stores (Skinfood, the Face Shop, Etude House, Tony Moly, Banila Co., etc.) all give LOADS of free samples even if you just buy one cheap thing, like a $2 bottle of nail polish. I like that type of marketing. I wish America would adopt it lol. Anyways, that was my day. I'm going back to Apujeong tomorrow to check out Rodeo Dr. and take lotsa pictures!

WWL!

bridging cultures day 1

WoO! I’m finally back at the hotel. Today was a somewhat tiring day but I’ve learned quite a bit and I’m finally not so socially isolated anymore. Well, I woke up in a sweat because the heated bed was literally baking me, got ready, and left by 8 to Café Come On. Mr. Swift provided up with delicious strawberries but I didn’t want to seem like a pig so I refrained from eating a whole lot. We then headed to Yoo’s Family house and listened to this old guy’s lecture on Korea’s culture. The gist I got from it was that Koreans strive to be one with nature (circle, triangle, and square/ houses in between river and mountain to draw good energy), the history of the floor heating system (kitchen), and a story about a gentleman and his four wives. It was a little boring, some parts were redundant, and he was hard to understand. After the lecture, some high school students majoring in English came to read us some ancient poems and we were filmed! The show is going to air on EBS on 3/5/2010 so I’ll try to tune in on that and see my movie-star self lmao! Then, we made are own lunch. I owned in the veggie chopping and we had legit bulgogi and kimchi puncheon(sp?). We then went to some park/mountain thing and met some elementary school kids who were our tour guides when we were hiking. My guide was named Chelsea her English was REALLY, and I mean legit American-y good. I really miss her. She was so entertaining and educational. Thankfully, I got her contact information. She even said she wanted to give me a tour of a palace if I was going to stay there longer. We then went to Dongdaemun and looked around. I got my first taste of street food and I figured out I do not like street chicken, I do like to buy fuzzy socks, and it’s hard to find my shoesize (the biggest I can find is a little too tight for me).

Just got back from dinner and it was rather fun! The restaurant was set in the middle of a maze in Insadong but it was delicious~ I bought some postcards to mail as well. I’m so excited! I wanna mail em!

Also, we got a lot of questions answered by our resident coordinator and just had ridiculous conversations about random things. I basically love all the people in the program right now! I don't know, but we all just get along so easily. And we've only been hanging out for a day! Anyways, one of the delayed students arrived today and she seems nice. Gotta go borrow the guy’s internet (can't get it in my room for some reason) so I can post this! WWL!