My First Trip to Seoul

So I was having a terrible week last week, so Spencer came up with the great idea of us going to Seoul for the weekend. I wasn’t too sure on the idea because I was unemployed and broke, but he was persistent and I ended up agreeing with him to go. We were planning on leaving early that Saturday morning, so the Friday before I had a student show me which subway terminal was Itaewon and which was the Bus Terminal so I could navigate my way around the subway system. We decided the trip would be an overnight trip, so I packed my roller bag with 3 changes of clothes and we set out the next morning on the 8am bus ride to Seoul. The bus was 2.5 hours, so we got there about 10:30.

So we get off the bus and head in to the terminal. I decided to inspect my bags and pack away my ipod so I had less things in my pocket. Unfortunately as it turned out, somehow my brand new, less than 30 day old Amazon Kindle turned out to be cracked. I have no idea how the hell that even happened because the heaviest thing in my roller bag was a damn shirt. So right away this put me in a foul mood. Either way, Spencer and I started looking for signs to the number 3 subway line, and eventually made our way to the terminal. To get in to the Subway we had to go down about 4-5 stories underground, but first we needed to buy a ticket. We waited in line for one of the ticket terminals and were relieved to find out that English was an option. Unfortunately for us, this being our first time and also having the pressure of a long line of Koreans waiting behind us, I got a little gun shy on the terminal and couldn’t figure out how to buy a ticket to Itaewon. I regrettably had to have someone help us out.

Let me step aside for a second and tell you that the Subway system in Seoul is everything people say it is. It is incredible. It is unbelievably huge (there is almost 350 miles worth of track and you can even take a subway to Incheon which is about 30 minutes away by car) and dirt cheap. Most trips are only 1000 won (less than $1) and there are tons of maps to help you get where you are going.

Ok, so back to what I was saying. So we rode the subway for about 25 minutes making one line change to arrive in Itaewon. Itaewon is basically THE PLACE for foreigners to go in Korea. I had set up some really high expectation based on some raving by my friend Maya, and at first I was a little disappointed. It was a bit smaller than I anticipated. And I definitely didn’t feel like I had left Korea like she had sad I would. Spencer and I wanted to try and find a hotel to drop our stuff off at. We had heard you could find cheap “love motels” everywhere that were really cheap and could be rented out by the hour if you wanted, but didn’t immediately see one, so we thought we would check out the Hamilton Hotel first. This place was NIIICE. It had a huge lobby where a man greeted you at the door and carried your bags for you. We went in to find out how much a room cost, but it turned out to be booked solid for the night. By this time it was already 11am and I wanted to catch the Red Wings at Coyotes game two, so I set about trying to find a sports bar that would have the game. The first bar we went to didn’t have it, but they told us the general location of a bar that might, so we went exploring. Luckily I found the place, and it was all Americans! Even the bartender was American. I was pretty stoked about that. Luckily they had the game on, so Spencer and I sat down and ordered a beer. We both had skipped breakfast that morning so we decided to eat at the bar. Spencer ordered a hamburger and I ordered nachos. Both of these meals are pretty uncommon in Korea so we ended up paying a bit more than we would have liked to for the privilege, but you find out you are willing to spend more than you think you are when the comforts from home are rare. Unfortunately for me the Coyotes lost and that put damper number two on my day…so I was pretty bummed. At this point I was really sick of lugging around my roller bag and looking like some tourist asshole (which is kind of ironic considering almost everyone in Itaewon could be considered a tourist…even if you had been living there for 5 years) so we set out to find a hotel. The second hotel we found was a place called IP Boutique Hotel (http://www.activehotels.com/1/1/3548689-ip-boutique-hotel-itaewon.html). It was this nice ass 4 star hotel. We checked out the price and it turned out to be 165000won a night ($148). We decided to splurge since it was our first time and all, so we got a nice room on the top floor with half a zebra painted on the wall. It was niiice. Everything was really classy. The bathroom was all glass (which was a little weird because if you were standing there was NO privacy what so ever). Heck, the toilet was even this super high-tech number with heated seats and a button I accidentally found out shot a jet of water up your…undercarriage. We threw our stuff in the corner, picked a bed and turned on the tv. Spencer got a phone call from this girl Stacy I had met the night before. By sheer chance she had planned to come to Seoul that weekend as well, but through some miscommunication she ended up missing her friends. We convinced her to still come anyway, so we waited in the hotel room until Stacy arrived. When she did, we sat around the hotel room a bit chatting (as we do a LOT now that we are all such good friends), but after a while we decided we wanted to go explore. Stacy had really wanted to see Namdemun which is this huge market area. As it turned out, the place friggen burned down a few weeks prior, but the open air market was still intact. Once we got there, I noticed the place looked familiar. I am a big fan of a show called “Three Sheets” which is a show about drinking cultures around the world. This guy, Zane Lamprey, literally gets paid to fly around the world and get drunk. Best. Job. Ever. Well anyway, in season 2 he visited South Korea, and I was sure this was one of the places he visited. Sure shit, no more than 5 minutes into exploring the street I saw the same street vendor featured in the show!! He goes by the English name “Kevin” and you could tell he gets asked for pictures a lot because as soon I noticed who he was the other street vendors started laughing. I had Stacy take a picture for me and she filmed the whole interaction. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJDhQPMafnM . So after exploring Namdemun for a while (I bought some delicious dumplings, 5 for 2000won and a remote control helicopter for 25000won) my friend Allie Wenzel from high school called. She lives in Seoul and since I was in the area (finally…after 4 months) we decided to get together for some drinks. Stacy wanted to meet up with this guy Jose she had met on her plane to Korea so he gave us a general area he was in and we decided to take a taxi to find him. We ended up meeting Jose and a friend of his at a place called Wa Bar.

So we went in to Wa Bar and sat down. Jose’s friend as it turns out was from Racine, so Allie and I chatted with him for a bit about how great Wisconsin is. Eventually he went back over to the other side of the table where Stacy, Spencer, and Jose were playing drinking games. Allie, Allie’s friend who’s name is escaping me at the moment (which makes me an asshole because he bought me a beer), and I got in to a pretty heavy discussion about life, and high school, and how far things have come since Allie and I first met In Middle School. It was really cool getting to see Allie again since I don’t believe we have seen each other since high school. It was kinda nuts to think that it had been almost 10 years and we were meeting up in Seoul, which is over 5000 miles away from West Bend. Many beers were drunk, many jaeger bombs (at least the Korean version since energy drinks are non-existent in Korea) were downed, and eventually we changed bars. When we got back to Itaewon everyone was hungry and Allie offered to buy me a swarma (sort of like a gyro but somehow different). While we were eating I was approached by a moderately attractive Korean woman who kept staring at me. Eventually she leans in and whispered something I didn’t understand. I asked her to repeat herself and she said “Sex?” I, being quite drunk at the point responded with a “hellllll yes! Ole my oh?” (Korean for how much). She said $100 to which I said “nice!” and then went running back to the group to inform them I had just been propositioned. Despite visiting Las Vegas at least 10 times and living in Korea for 4 months I had never actually seen a real prostitute before, and even though I had no intentions on utilizing the services she offered I was quite stoked to be propositioned. She hung around a minute but then left once she realized I was talking about her to my friends.

So after a few drinks at the next bar, Spencer, Stacy, and Jose decided to go back to the hotel room. I told them I would meet up with them in a bit, so they left. Allie and I spent the next 20 minutes chatting about random things I won’t specifically name here and eventually we too decided to call it a night.

So by now many of you might be bored, and several of you might have even stopped reading by this point. Well, for those of you who made it this far, you are in for a treat. This is the part of the story where things get a little…fucked up.

So I made my way back to our nice ass hotel, and walked in to the room. Spencer, Stacy, and Jose were all drinking soju, and apparently somewhere between the bar and the hotel had picked up two more people. I sat down on my bed and started drinking with everyone as we listened to music (loudly) and talked. All of a sudden the new girl went running in to the bathroom. About a minute later her friend followed her in there. We could hear them talking. Now remember that the bathroom has walls made of glass, so we can see their feet and heads in the mirror opposite the bathroom. Eventually the talking stops and I notice that they are kissing. I point this out to Spencer who looks over and nods his head at me. Suddenly, I see pants falling to the floor and a half naked woman drop to her knees. My eyes go wide as I point this out to the rest of the group who are shocked by what they see. At this point I can’t tell if they are just so drunk they don’t realize the walls are made of glass…but over the next hour or so we are treated to what is essentially a live action porno in the bathroom. Without going in to graphic detail, they used every square inch of that bathroom, including pausing for a moment to hop in the shower. Eventually they came out of the bathroom to a loud applause from those of us in the room and they tried to play it off like they were “talking” I pointed out the glass walls and they didn’t seem to care. Everyone got in their respective beds (and the two randoms on the floor) and we decided to go to bed finally around 6am. To make things just a little weirder, the two random people decided to continue their little sexcapade on the floor in the full view of everyone. I was extremely tired at this point (and still quite drunk) so I went to bed…waking up only about 4 hours later. The two randoms were lying naked and uncovered on the floor. I decided to hop in the shower and get ready for the day. Eventually everyone woke up and we checked out of the hotel around 1pm.

We bid farewell to the two randoms, and Stacy, Jose, Spencer, and I decided to explore Itaewon a bit. We found this really nice Mexican restaurant (the best one in all of Korea we were told) and I had a chimichanga for lunch. It was glorious. Mexican food is unavailable in Korea save for Itaewon, so it had been a while. I was not disappointed. We made our way around the foreign shops where I picked up a bag of Cheetos (for about $5), a giant container of Utz’s cheezeballs (for $13), and a 12-pack of A&W root beer (for $15). I realize how expensive all this stuff was, but it’s really hard to explain what it’s like when EVERYTHING is different where you are. You find yourself much more willing to pay for just a few simple creature comforts. Actually…this feeling alone can explain the immense level of excitement and buzz you could feel in Itaewon around the giant banner that was advertising the first Taco Bell to be opened in Korea. For those of you back in the States, I am sure you are disgusted, but trust me when I tell you this…ANYTHING that reminds you of home out here is exciting…especially the little things. I’ve been making Root Beer floats all week with my A&W and it has been a nice comfort on these nights as I sit home and watch downloaded American TV.

So after we finished our shopping, we headed back to the bus terminal leaving at around 7pm Sunday night. Stacy and I chatted the whole way back, and it was a nice ending to an incredible weekend in Seoul. It was a nice escape from the bullshit drama of looking for work out here…even it was only for a day.