Weird wanderings and other sorts of balderdash

Travelling around in Seoul has definitely contributed to the most titillating compilation of bizarre stories and eclectic experiences! I've been in Korea for about 2 months now (whoa already!) and thinking that I only 2 full months left makes me sad because the time seriously flies by. I've met some awesome people and done some pretty awesome things along the way. I've tried all sorts of crazy food (delicious, but sometimes odd) and have met some even crazier people. I haven't really been focusing on school though :P it's definitely very difficult to do with so much to do around you all the time. I've also started working as an English tutor at a cram school in Ilsan, which is a suburb of Seoul. It's a bit time consuming but I get paid pretty decently so it's all good. Money seems to fly out of my wallet here. Everything is super cheap but there's just so much to do that it all seems to equal out monetarily in the end.

I'm desperately trying to organize a trip down to the southern part of the peninsula sometime soon, particularly Pusan or the Cholla province (if you're really curious as to where that is, look on a map -- it's mad far from Seoul) and Jeju Island, naturally. Apparently it only takes 2 hours to drive around the entirety of the island of Jeju! The weather in Korea has gone from zero to sixty in terms of cold to warm. It's freaking HOT now -- I don't know how I'm going to survive the summer months here! It's not only hot but disgustingly humid. It's pleasant now because it hasn't gotten sickeningly hot yet but I have a feeling the time is not too far off :P

I wish I could post my pictures but unfortunately, my computer is being a douchebag and deciding to not let my memory adapter work. However, do not despair. I will find a way soon! In the meantime, above is a picture taken by my new (Canadian!) friend, Michelle of me at Yonsei's wicked cool Amplitheater, which they use for these inter-school cheering competitions, called Akaraka and for general concerts and other ish :)

I hope everyone is doing well (I don't even think anyone reads this anymore since I suck at frequent updating) and hope that everyone's final exams kick ass! My midterms are only just starting -_-;;; I miss you all so much!

Much love,
SoCho

Me English no good

Sooooo yeah my English seems to be deteriorating as the days go by :( Speaking Korean for the majority of my day kind of drives me crazy and it's funny because I don't think it's improving at all *sigh*

Hopefully, some of you have had a chance to see the pictures I posted on my Facebook. Those were from when I first arrived in Korea and my aunt's family took me sight-seeing. I was too lazy to write captions or tag any of them so use your imaginations :)

School life has started here at Yonsei and the first week was pretty much a joke. International students REALLY like to party and *sigh*.. I am one of them. Whoever thought that Sunday night was a big clubbing night in Korea? Go figure. Last night, I ended up going to a club in a big clubbing area in Korea called Hongdae and it was really quite amusing to watch the Koreans dance the way they do. It's all upper-torso and no lower body movement -- very TECHNOLOGIC muhahahaha :) A friend and I caused a ruckus with our "unorthodox" dancing :P

I've been spending embarrassing amounts of money since I've been here but the good thing is that I'm really close to getting a job at a cram school that's willing to pay me $30/hour just to read books to children in English and to teach them basic grammar *thumbs up*. Amazingly, $30/hour is on the lower side for job seekers such as myself.

I'll try to post more pictures soon but apparently, my computer doesn't feel like complying with my upload demands.

I'll have to keep this post short because I'm too tired after only 4 hours of sleep (fucking Korean clubbers and their inexorable stamina) so goodbye for now! I'll write again soon :)

Much love,
SoCho

Apologies and soaked livers

Hello all. Sorry about not posting for so long but this week has been crazy and the computers here seem to be very fickle and sensitive about opening Blogger on their browsers. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't *shrug* But much has happened since my last post so here is my latest update:

I moved into the International House, which is the residence at Yonsei University for international exchange students, on Monday the 23rd and myyyy fuuuuuuucking god, it has been a whirlwind since then. It's been a week and I think my liver took the worst beating of its life, not to mention the rest of my body. I think I've gotten a total of 14 hours of sleep this entire past week and my brain is in a state of perpetual obscurity! However, in the slew of all this debauchery and confusion, it has been a wonderfully fun week :) I met a lot of cool people and life in Korea is pretty fucking awesome. The part of the city that Yonsei University is located is called Shinchon and it's an awesome place to explore and just party! There are a lot of neighbouring places like Hongdae and Eedae and then random places that you can go by subway (which is a super complicated web of endless lines) and you never run out of things to do.
I've met some cool people and some uncool people but it's been good times nonetheless. My swearing in Korean seems to have improved an exponential amount in the past week since once everyone gets drunk, the only thing they like to do is swear in Korean to native Koreans (which creates a bit of tension HAHA).
The I-House is pretty convenient but my window faces this huge construction site that is right in front of the residence. It's beautiful to wake up to a gray metal wall and the view of a red crane lugging concrete around. The noise is even more beautiful.....NOT! The only reason why I haven't hit a bitch yet is because I have the most awesome earplugs. My roommate hasn't been so lucky. She's a Japanese girl who speaks only Japanese and limited Korean so our communication is a bit lacking but she's a complete sweetheart. It makes me feel even worse when I walk into the room every day at 5 am, smelling like soju (Korean alcohol that is similar to vodka) and like I just spent all day working at a cigarette factory. I have a feeling that she's already pinned me as an alchy (sp?) HAHA :)

Ive taken a lot of pictures so far but I just haven't had the patience to sit down and upload them all but since today is Sunday and I've deemed it my lazy day, I shall attempt to do so on Facebook. I hope everyone is having an awesome time at their respective places in the world and you shall hear from me again soon!

Much love,
SoCho

Confounding revelations

I spent my first full day out in the heart of Seoul, South Korea and I must say that the funniest thing I noticed was that the city is struggling to be young. It may sound weird or maybe I'm just not articulating myself correctly but the city is really quite interesting. There is such a profound difference between high school teenagers and those who are beyond that stage in their lives. It's almost as if there is this internal buzzer that activates as soon as they leave high school, telling them that they need to grow up. This in itself is weird because in my experience, Korean high schoolers (or really all levels of schoolers) are the most mature and independent youths I have ever encountered and it's all due to their nature of schooling. Who knew there was a higher level where they were expected to look and act accordingly to "young adult" behaviour? And then there are those are past the peak of young adulthood and are considered to be too old to be acknowledged by the youth. Some oldies accept it while many of them try to find their lost youth by dressing like them. Needless to say, it is definitely an interesting dynamic.

On another note, I completed a whole slew of errands and am now technologically HOOKED UPPPP. If any of you want to call me (which I'm positive you won't because let's face it, I'm now even more long distance than I was in Toronto), my new Korean cell phone number is (010) 9339-7135. I spent the day out with my cousin, SaRang, which means "love" in Korean and we visited her campus at Korea University, which is one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in South Korea, and it really is a sight. I didn't take any pictures because I was a loser and left my camera at the apartment but I'm sure they would've looked like the ones you can see on their official website HAHA :) My uncle is definitely very insistent on "showing me the ropes" in Korea and keeps asking me questions like, "Do you know what this is? Do you know what that is?". It's sweet in thought but I think he thinks that I know nothing about Korean culture or anything relating to Korea at all :P

Today, my uncle is taking me to a place called InsaDong but I have no idea as to what or where it is. It's apparently a tourist place where you can sightsee a bunch of things. The great thing about Korea is that when you walk down the street in the heart of the city, the grandness of it all really hits you. I'll be making sure to take photos today and I'll post them as soon as I can.

Much love,
SoCho

SoCho has arrived!

Hey Korea, the SoCho has finally arrived, schwinggggg! It's currently 9:04 a.m. in the ROK and I didn't have a single problem falling asleep last night. Looks like jet lag isn't going to be much of a problem (double schwing)! The weather is not cold whatsoever (chilly, at best) and there's a tiny, single layer of snow on the ground which is nothing compared to Canada and its icy depths. I'm currently in the process of trying to reconfigure my courses but since it's morning, everyone else in the whole freaking ROK is trying to get on as well.

The flight here was a looooooong ass trip and it was full of weird Thai women trying to touch my legs with their bare feet and weird Japanese businessmen filming me with their handheld video cameras. However, it was interesting and entertaining so WHATEVER.

My aunt's family is pretty much almost exactly the same as the last time I saw them approximately 9 years ago. Of course, my cousins have grown up and one of them is the same age as me and the younger just got into university this term so all is well. They have a yappy dog named Cherry and it has thus far humped my leg 17 times in total since arriving at their apartment last night at 12 a.m. It's a small little puppy too, I admire its resilience.

Well, I am off now to eat a fulfilling Korean breakfast and then I am off to explore! Talk to you all soon :)

Much love,
SoCho

OHAYO GOZAIMASU!

Just as the title eludes, yes, I am in Tokyo Narita airport at the moment. I must make this entry very quickly since the timer on my internet time says "10 minutes remaining". I'm currently in a shower station (yes, that's right) in the Tokyo airport and debating whether I should actually bathe since I just got off a 12 hour flight and have 5 hours to kill. It's either this or the smoking room and both sound equally appealing. I just did a frantic search on the internet to register for courses, which was definitely not easy considering that all the freaking instructions were in Korean and it takes me much longer to read it and then process it :P On a connecting note, BOO ERNS to my exchange university for having extremely limited spaces for their course registrations. Looks like I'm going to be learning about North Korea... a lot. Yes Paul, I think your concise description of North and South and their respective bad and good traits was quite succinct and it REALLY helped me understand the difference... NOT. Haha but no actually, I'm sure I'll have many tales to regail you and everyone else with in regards to my classes.

Soooo in the time it took me to write this post, I've decided to take a shower in these famous airport showers (which are like hot springs, it's pretty wicked) and then buy myself a $3.00 pack of cigarettes and smoke my hours away :)

Much love,
SoCho

Taking off...

So as Jay has so eloquently done, I've decided to create a blog where I can keep all my friends updated on my travels and adventures in Korea. I hope this blog serves as a decent portal and liaison from my life to yours and hope that you guys can enjoy my adventures along with me. In 24 hours, I'll be on a plane out of Toronto, on my way to Vancouver, Tokyo, and then finally Seoul and I couldn't be more excited (and not to mention, panicked - I haven't started packing - eek!). I'll soon be immersed in full Korean country, time to turn on the Asian! I'm sure that in due time, a number of pictures will emerge with me presenting the "peace" sign and I know that you guys will enjoy this A LOT.

Anyhow, speaking of packing, I better get to it so this will be the conclusion of my first post. I miss all of you guys and I hope you're all doing well in your respective locations! The adventures of SoCho will begin very soon and I hope you all enjoy :)

Much love,
SoCho