Day 6- Bandanas and Belonging

So, today was the day of the water park, Caribbean Bay. To those unfamiliar (I was until recently), CB is one of the largest water parks in the world and has both outside and inside components. It had a few tub slides that you go down in groups of four and some indoors tube and body slides and a Lazy river intertube thing and whatnot. Sort of standard as far as water parks go. Though to its credit, the one thing that it had that most water parks do not is a wave pool that generates a 8 or so foot wave every 5 minutes or so.

However to stay in the wavepool, one needed to rent a lifejacket. Yes, seriously. This prevents anyone from riding the wave in, which I was dissapointed and prevents most peoplee from crashing into each other. Boo. If there is no real chance of injury what fun is it? :P Oh, Disney's Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach..you have ruined me for all water parks. That being said, I had a great time anyways.

This was probably due to the people I was with. I was with Brian (actual spelling of the previous mentioned Brian's name) and his roommate June (he is in my Language class as well). We also tagged along with Jin (sorta the male RA who is the head of our floor) and these three girls (Inya, Claire and Hadin) who are both Korean and Hanyang Students. Unlikee Jin, they are volunteers but are part of the staff nevertheless. They are also 21 (which is young for most Koreans in the program) and were incredibly nice. I asked for them to each me some Korean while we were waiting in line for one of the tube ride and they were enthusiastic and understanding.

The tube rides took four people and there were eight eventually in our little party (Me, Bryan, June, Claire, Hadin, Inya and later Miranda and another kid whose name I cannot remember). So, CHI (Claire Hadin and Inya), realizing that they needed a counter weight for the slides to go somewhat fast, grabbed me quick and dragged me up with them. It's so nice to feel wanted. :) Haha.

The girls were really nice and just made me feel like part of the group. That's one thing that I have to give to Hanyang, not just because of the girls but due to Jin and a number of other staff at Hanyang..they definately make people, including introvert losers like me feel really welcome. Props, guys!

An interesting thing was that a huge number of Koreans at the water park were wearing MLB caps. It was especially jarring to see someone with a Yankees hat walk arm and arm with someone with a Red Socks hat. When Brian asked them about it, they basically didn't understand and walked away. Later I asked one of the girls in our group, Hadin was wearing a Giants hat and I asked her about it. She explained that she wasn't a fan, but apparently MLB hats are quite fashionable in Korea, even though people wearing it won't follow the team or in the case of Hadin even know the full name of the team on the hat (to be fair, it was the newer Giants logo with only a few letters on it). So, that was interesting to say the least.

Also...bandanas. No one could walk in the wave pool without having one, so I reluctantly forked over some won for a cheap bandana. Apparently the reason for having everyone wear bandanas or caps is so that their hair doesn't clog up the drain. Weird reasoning, I know, but it's their house, their rules. I respect that.

Went out for dinner that evening, which delayed me posting this until the following eveing. So...expect todays post sometime later on.

-Reven