Weekend in Seoul

Last weekend, most of the fresh Wisco English teachers in SK headed to the Hongdae district in Seoul to blow off steam from the first week of school. We were a little burned out from the first week of giving the same presentation over and over again. Goes a little something like this: 
Me: "Good morning class!"
Students: "Gerd moaninguh classuh?"
Me: "Welcome to English class! My name is Mr. Quinn and I'll be your teacher for the semester. Any questions?"
Students: Gurfriend! Do have gurfriend?!
The first week was particularly exhausting because we had to give this same shpeal about ourselves over, and over, and over... It will get better once the actual "teaching" begins. But alright alright enough talking about school. This post is supposed to be about Seoul, not school. So as you can see, I (and the rest of us) was in some serious need of R&R in the form of fraternizing with fellow English speakers.

Julie and I left Seongnam on Fri around 7 and got to our hostel, Mr. Kim's Guesthouse, after a good hour or so on the Seoul Metro. We grabbed a little bottle of soju for a $1.50 from the local Buy The Way and met up with our fellow UW amigos. We sat around the hostel for a while sipping soju and swapping silly stories. It was very relieving/comforting knowing that other people had many of the same confusing/frustrating/strange moments (like not having a bed for a few weeks) that I've experienced. It's funny how little we actually knew going into this program. Anyway, we left our hostel around 11 and headed to the Hongdae main drag where all the restaurants, food vendors, bars, and other 20 or so UW people were at. We met up with the whole group and headed to a 'Ho Bar'. No, it's not a place where Hongdae floozies hang out (actually not entirely sure about that), but the general term for a bar where you can grab cheap drinks before hitting the nightlife. It was nice actually being able to drink and socialize with other UW kids since we are scattered all over the Gyeonggi province. Other than Julie (score), I don't see any other UW kids during the week.
In brief the 1st night included:
-eating "chicken" on a stick for dinner and tipping 40 cents only to receive utmost gratitude and shock, and a free kebob later in the evening
-playing "how hard can you punch?" and "how hard can you kick?" arcade games on the street for a good 30 mins with other UW dudes. I let some drunk Korean have a go on my dime, which cost me less than 10 cents, and he was so thankful he wanted to buy me a drink somehwere. My creep detector went off and I politely declined.
-watching a young American soldier play tonsil hockey with a Korean girl for 3 periods. The game seemed to go into overtime...
-new buddy Eric unsuccessfully trying to get past the VIP-section bouncer at a so-so hip-hop club. The bouncer wasn't taking any of our "American charm"-bait....or speaking to/looking at us

The next day we walked around and checked out some sites surrounding the area. Hongdae is home to Hongik University. They must have a decent Art School there because there lots of hip shops, cafes, artwork on the street, and art galleries. We all happened to stumble upon some book event in one of the art galleries and they were giving away free food and beers. Free beers! On a random floor in an art museum! We didn't belong...

Olivia and I shamelessly drinking free beer in an upscale art gallery

We ended up just walking around the rest of the day and really enjoyed our day in Seoul. 

 Weird street performers. I felt like we were in the movie Pan's Labrynth.



That night, we...

...went to a bar/club named Oi that totally could have been described by Bill Hader's character, club kid Stefon, on SNL. I will read you a description a la Lonely Planet: "...imagine an all-white Hobbit-land interior of caves, platforms, ponds, and small bridges: that's the dreamy atmosphere of this quirky club-cafe where you can chill out over a hookah pipe and cocktails. And over the summer they host crazy water-pistol parties." Soooo we couldn't NOT go there. Also when we went it must have been vampire night because all the waiters and bartenders were dressed supercreepy. It was awesome!

...hit up a 24-hour noraebang called Luxury. The name didn't disappoint. For those of you who don't know, I am currently a huge fan of the noraebang. It's a private karaoke room that you rent out. It's like having Karaoke Kid (bar in Madison) all to yourself! Who wouldn't love that?! They also were giving out free ice cream (to cool your singing voice?). Here's a pic from the outside....

 

...went to a taco street vendor owned by a couple of dudes from Austin, TX. They teach outside of Seoul like we do, but head into the city on the weekends to sell pretty good carnitas tacos to drunk kids. Supply meets demand: capitalism tastes good.

And that was basically our first weekend in Seoul! I probably forgot some other funny things that happened but I should finish this post cuz it's getting pretty loooong. Chau for now!