Day 30- Hats and Burgers

So, I woke up later today due to lack of sleep prior and seeing no one else awake, I meandered off towards Wangsimni (which is the hot spot for college kids) and ate lunch at a local burger place called "Lotteteria." Lotte is a giant company in Korea spanning food and department stores (as we'll see later).

I had a burger, fries and a drink, standard attire. The beef tasted different than usual, but whatever. The beef here does taste different overall- not better or worse- just different. This is a shot of the interior of the Lotteteria. It was quiet mostly. I've noticed that kids here are a lot less...bratty? I mean, they may occasionally cry and be annoying to their parents but NOT to the extent in the US. Even though there were quite a few toddlers in the restaurant, they were all very chill and just sitting there quietly. It was quite striking coming from a place where squalling toddlers and children are just assumed to fill a niche in the American Ecosystem.

Deciding to take a rest on a street bench, I sat down and this older gentleman. He was nice, I guess. He started to talking to me in Korean and I didn't understand most of what he said, but I explained (in broken Korean) that I was a student at Hanyang and also from the US. He understood this and started to explain how he goes to Hanyang for medical treatment (to the point of me showing the medicine that he takes as a result). Eventually, I had to leave him, but he was quite pleasant.

I randomly decided to walk into a 7-11 and there I ran into Taylor (aka Fat Albert + Kanye...perhaps Albert West would be a better name? VOTE NOW!) along with two other students from the program. I walked up to him and greeted him. He seemed confused why I went to lunch alone and made the implication that I like going alone to meals and I didn't like people there. Gritting my teeth and almost saying that "Well, gee Taylor. It's not 'people' here, I don't like- just you." I merely smirked and said "No one else was around and I was hungry." He walked away in a huff.

What a joke.

Anyways, I headed back to the dorms and ran into Jim. He was going out to this Konkuk University stop and grabbing dinner there. Not wanting to stay in my room for the day (which led to me not typing up a story), I decided to go. I hoped that Taylor wouldn't end up with our group and thankfully that hope was carried out.

The other people in my group (other than Jim) were Nancy (Jim's girlfriend), Campbell, Libby and Miranda. Incidentally all people from my school. The other two people from my school, Taylor and Jane, were not especially missed by the others...and me.

We grabbed dinner at Valence Burger, a local burger place, which while it is pricey- they have arguably some of the best burgers I have ever had. The picture nearby is the "So Hot" Burger which includes BBQ sauce, tomato, cheese, chili, onion, pickles and the like. To the right are Garlic fries- fries covered in this garlic sauce and hot sauce. That picture was from a previous visit. The current visit, I kept with the So Hot and opted for Chili fries which came with cheese, onions and probably a pound of ground beef on it. Valance..you rock. Just...seriously.

We took the subway to the Konkuk University station and decided to wander about. The first thing we saw was the Lotte Department store (Pictured here). We saw that it was a huge building, but we questioned whether all of it was a department store. Then we got in.

Ten floors of clothes. Yes. Ten. And it wasn't just like Joe Department store. This was top of the line stuff and while I can't remember brands, seeing a pair of jeans for around W110,000 ($110) should give you an idea of what the prices were like. And we only really got to the fourth floor. The prices increased as we ascended the building and personally I'm kinda happy we didn't make it all the way up due to the store closing just so I could not seen stuff I couldn't afford would desire to purchase.

An added bonus was that given our party size (six), we ended up pairing up together quite often. More of a bonus was that 95% of the time, Miranda was chatting me up and or walking around pretty much in step with me. Yes, an ego boost to be certain. Again, I'm still amazed at this change as a month ago, she was pretty cold to me and I was more often than not irritated with her. And here we are a month later grabbing dinner, coffee and wandering the streets of Seoul together. Hopefully we'll end up going to Seoul Tower together (local sight) upon returning from China as the rest of the group (maybe except for Campbell) had already gone there.

Oh, and here's a picture of our group:

Far side of the table: Miranda, Nancy, Jim
Near side of the table: Empty Chair of Yours Truly, Campbell, Libby

Oh, and we all got hats. We randomly stopped by a street vender and the consensus was that all of a sudden we should buy hats. Not having made any rash purchases recently, I joined in (why not?). The end result was me wearing something that looks like a Gatsby hat (or Newsboy hat). Campbell ended up with a similar looking one, Jim had something that looked like a Boater and Libby and Nancy ended up wearing a BFH each (Big Floppy Hat). I'll upload the pictures when they post them to Facebook. Miranda opted out of getting a hat, saying that she's not a hat person and that it'd mess up her hair, but to concede to our goofy headgear, she bought (and wore simultaneously) two headbands that matched her shirt.

Later, we set off fireworks we had bought around Konkuk and drank down by the river. Good times indeed. Things are definitely changing. We'll just see what the next step is. Looking for the Orthodox church here tomorrow. I hope that I can find it.

-Reven