I met a girl in my building from Canada who lives two floors up from me who invited me to come out with her. So I met her, her boyfriend, and two very interesting England guys. We had Korean dinner and I wish I could remember the name but it was really good. I’m pretty sure it was like a pork stew kind of meal and it was really good eaten in lettuce. It was a little spicy, but not too bad. Then later we had them put cheese on it, which was quite good. The England guys, Carl and Nick were really funny! Nick was here visiting Carl for a month then going back to England. They showed me a video of Nick trying eel. Yes! I know! They eat eel here. The first thing that came to my mind was ewww!!! The video was so funny. So imagine Nick he’s about 6ft 1 I think, brown hair, skinny guy, really into his manhood, strong English accent, and he’s a physical education teacher. As I watched the video the eel was still moving on the plate. But it wasn’t alive. Weird, I know. At least that’s what he told me. So as he put the eel in his mouth, his face squinted like he had something sour and gross in his mouth, and he was waving his hands and arms like in his mind he’s thinking, “oh my gosh this feels and tastes nasty, why am I doing this?” I was laughing so hard my face turned read. I couldn’t stop laughing and Nick asked with his lovely accent, “Are you aul-righ?” Both Carl and Nick are both jolly characters. It was funny because Carl had mentioned he was getting in shape for football. My first thought was American football, so then I asked him, “Wait do you mean American football or football like soccer?” He told me like real football, which is soccer in USA. I’m hoping to go to one of his games.



The next day was hilarious! I went hiking with the England dude Nick and 3 Canadian guys I met through Nick. We went hiking up a beautiful mountain! It was scary and exciting at the same time. Especially for me because I’m afraid of heights. Bruno, one of the Canadians told me to embrace my fear. HA! Like I can get over a fear of heights. I don’t think you can really get over a fear of heights; it’s like in your subconscious. As much as I try I’ll always feel that jitter when I’m up looking down. UGH! I’m better than I was I think, but I still get jumpy and nervous. Nick kept on imitating me because I kept on saying, “oh man!” or “that’s a bummer”. Which of course is American talk. The most hilarious part was when Nick was acting ridiculous standing on top of a big rock where you can see a huge site of South Korea. An idea suddenly came to me where I don’t know why, but he reminded me of a bird. I told Kris, another Canadian guy I was hiking with in the group. And he started laughing and said “Ha! He looks like a flamingo!” Oh my goodness! I was laughing so hard. They were all teasing me because I was giggling for quite a while. The Canadian accent is interesting. I got into an interesting conversation with them about the difference between the Canadian accent and the Americans, well the northern Americans at least. Canadians say more ou- sounds. Where it sounds like ‘oo’ or ‘ou’ sounds. Some say, “I was out and about (‘a-boot’) last night. And sometimes they say I went out (‘ow-ouut’) last night. It was funny because Bruno didn’t realize till after a little bit of talking thinking the different sounds that we say. But some don’t all sound like that. I haven’t met too many Canadians to tell yet. A lot of then say ‘eh?” When they’re asking a question, rather Americans say more yeah or yah? After sweating up a storm, we parted ways and went home to clean up.



We all met later at an Indian restaurant, which was really neat! When you walk in there was a pile of red candles and you sit on the floor at the tables. The decoration was beautiful! I was sitting across from Nick, where he was acting ridiculous again. We were both imitating each other. I was imitating his English accent and he was imitating my American accent. It was quite a jolly time. He was doing a funny dance while we were sitting down. After that we went to a bar, dancing around. Then we went to a nori-bong (karaoke place). It was really fun! Man that was a late night, but really awesome.



They drink quite a lot here. Way too much! They party all night long which quite nutty. Koreans, not all, but a lot of them drink a lot of Soju, which is really gross. They have this man race of who can drink the most, which no offence to Korean culture is really ridiculous. I know it’s similar to that with the culture in England to. I mean honestly what do you really gain by drinking that much? Yeah, liver disease, then eventually die? Not the wisest decision. At the Indian restaurant I had two pineapple martinis, which were quite good. A Korean girl was with us and had big glass of beer. She came over to me and was going to pour the beer in my drink. Surprised by that, I said “Oh! No no no thank you. I’m really okay.” She was really respectful to it though. But it was a little aggravating because she asked me like 3 times “why you don’t drink?” I told her because “I puke and I don’t like to drink heavy”. But here you just have to understand that’s the culture, there’s this stupid expectation upon people that their going to drink really heavy. Yet, it’s ridiculously safer here it’s insane.



So I got a bike finally. I was biking to work a lot. I felt like I was 6 years old again in some ways because I haven’t ridden a bike in so long. But I’m starting to get the hang of things again. The main roads are smooth and they do have biking paths around some areas where it is smooth. I got a mountain bike, which I suggest, to those that come here unless you’re into pro biking. The roads are not really smooth on the sidewalks, when you ride to work or around the street to run errands. I felt a mountain bike was better because of the bumpy-ness I felt walking to work and so on. Bikes you can get used or new at a relatively cheap price comparatively to USA. Used could be I’d say $50 to $90 depending on the kind of bike and quality. New could range approximately $80 bucks all the way to $300. It depends on where you go and the kind of bike. You have to be careful getting a bike here because some Koreans have a tendency to overprice you because you’re a foreigner. They bargain here a lot. I made sure that I brought a Korean friend with me so they don’t overprice me. She definitely helped me get a good deal. When I got my bike I was so excited I went on a ridiculously long bike ride! So long that on my way back I got lost! Oy eh ve! O’Mona! Of course it happens to be. It’s really easy to get lost on bike paths because they go straight for a while then they curve into different paths. But here it’s great because you can always find a Korean to help you. I stopped at a group of people and said “Do-wah- juseyo? Ori yak?” and I pointed. Which means can you help me and Ori yak means ori station. I was basically saying in simple terms which way to Ori station. I spoke in Korean and this teenage Korean girl looked at me shocked I spoke Korean. HA! It was kind of funny. A Korean teenager boy was quite obnoxious actually and was imitating me saying Ori yak, which was really rude. I just ignored him and an older guy told me the right way. Then I found my way back home. There are definitely some obnoxious young Koreans here. They’re in every culture.