Last Days and Thailand & Malaysia: Round 2

As most of you know, we managed to wrangle about 80-90% of our owed money from our school. Between finishing early, his reluctance to pay total amounts and months of unpaid pension (he decided to report to the government that we finished working for him in September so he didn't have to pay the remaining of our pension) we are out thousands of dollars, but there was/is nothing more that could have been done. 

The last day in our apartment was a sad one. We had everything but our bags and a few boxes packed up and sent home or given away and Mr. Snakeface boss came to check the place before handing over our cash. He decides when he got there that all the furniture had to be moved out (furniture that was there when we moved in) and WE had to pay to dump it. There was a lot of arguing and back and forth over the furniture nonsense but we got it sorted and spent the rest of the day with him and two other Korean dudes moving every last thing in that apartment up and down 19 floors to the basement dump. After it was all said and done and it was time to lock our door one last time, I had a nice cry looking out at our amazing view over this city that in a very short time would no longer be my home. We reminisced about all the parties and good times that were had over the past few years, took one last look at this empty space that was our home for 2 1/2 years and locked the door.

We spent a few days on friends' couches and then were finally off on our much needed vacation. We flew to Langkawi, Malaysia (northern west coast of Malaysia) for one night, then caught the ferry to Koh Lipe, Thailand (southern west coast of Thailand) the following day to spent 11 days lounging on one of those beaches you see only on postcards or calendars. Immigration was a concrete building with a palm-thatched roof and getting stamped and through basically took place right there on the sand. The entire island is walkable so we just walked to the other side where our bungalow was waiting for us. It was basic, stifling hot, had no air conditioning or hot water...but it did have a hammock and was about 15 steps from the most turquoise water I've ever seen.

Al under the mosquito net

It looks much dingier than it actually was. It was squeaky clean.

We soon got into the routine of doing absolutely nothing. Wake up, coffee (for Al) and tea (for me), beach, lunch, hammock book reading, beach, dinner, sleep. Not always in that order, but mostly what the days consisted of. Once we took a walk up into the jungly mountain part, where some of the local people live and on the way was a temple:

We then saw some roosters and then a few baby chickens squaring off and fighting:

And then saw a bit of the local scenery up in the hills:

Another day we hired a longtail boat and some captains to take us on a snorkeling trip. 

I. Love. Snorkeling. There's so much going on under there.

Sup Nemo

Parked on this beach to have our lunch

That water is about 6 feet deep there

One of our boat drivers

Stopped at a different island that had swings all over the place...

...And tree limbs...

...that someone had put pretty corals on.

One evening, I saw the sickest sunset I've ever seen in my life. Never, ever, ever have I seen anything like it. So Lion King. 

We arrived at the sunset beach and I was like so pretty! Little did I know what was coming.

Starts peeking under the clouds...

omg...

OMG!!

This is not real.

:-O

NAAAAAAAASOWHENYAAAAAHHH
 MAMABEATSEBABAAAAHH

Picture of me taking a picture

We ate some good food...

Coconut banana pancake

Coffee, Thai milk tea and fruit (obviously)

Breakfast

Tom Kha. Kind of like a coconut lemongrass soup with lime leaves, bamboo shoots, chicken and veggies.

We even found some kitties! The path from our bungalow to the main walking street had a dump pile of roof metal and one night we walked by and there were kittens in it! So each night we would look for them on our way to dinner and play with them. 

I got a few $9 massages, but other than that it was mostly just laying around on the beach or meandering down to the walking street. 

Every restaurant or store is open air

This was a sand spit on one end of the beach

One of the most serene, (undoctored) pictures I took

Seems legit

This little kid stopped outside our bungalow and just played with the plants

When I get the settings right, my camera is capable of amazing things!

The main walking street...before I got a tan

The tide went down really low one night

Nuts.

Love this picture

This was about as crowded as the water got with people swimming

Shake and pancake stand

As our week and a half was coming to a close, we decided to use our last night for a movie. SE Asia is famous for "TV bars" I guess you could call them. They have TVs and cushions and pillows all over and they play movies and shows all day and night. We got some fries, picked some pillows and watched "Get Him to the Greek."

The last day we took the 4pm ferry back to Langkawi to catch our 10pm flight to Kuala Lumpur where we would spend two nights. Al isn't a big fan of Malaysia, but I don't mind it so I was pretty excited to spend a whole day in a new city. 

We spent the afternoon in the markets and then went a little outside the city to the Batu Caves, a Hindu temple of sorts set in and around massive limestone caves...complete with an enormous golden god statue. 

Outside our hotel

At the Batu Caves

It was a loooong way up

So many layers of paint

Indian ladies visiting the caves. Saris are some of the world's most beautiful clothing.

We decided we wanted to go see the Petronas Towers at night, so we relaxed at the hotel for a bit....then it started pouring the rain. And I mean pouring. Thunder, lightening, the whole shebang. It was really nice, actually, because I haven't heard a thunderstorm in so long, but there went our chances to see Kuala Lumpur's most famous landmark. Oh well! The rain let up a bit so we crossed the street to the market food court, ghetto in the daytime, even more ghetto at night. I got a "sesame chicken and rice" from one of the vendors, sounds safe enough, yes? No. It came looking like it was covered in blood, clotted blood, and I still have no idea what kind of sauce that was. I didn't eat much of the chicken, though the rice was steamed with coconut so I ate that instead. Al had some weird Chinese noodle dish. We had a good laugh about our gross last ever dinner in Southeast Asia and headed back to our air-conditioned hotel room, leaving for Busan very early the next morning. 

It's 1:32am as I type this which means I have exactly one full day left in South Korea. We fly out at 4pm on Thursday to Tokyo, giving me only tomorrow and maybe Thursday morning to finish the millions of things still left to be done. 

On to Tokyo!

My Love/Hate Korea List

I'm now approaching the T-minus two weeks mark upon leaving this country for the beaches of Thailand and I couldn't be more excited about it. But I also couldn't be more sad about it. When I move to a new country, I'm all wide-eyed in the beginning and everything is wonderful and different. But then slowly, very slowly, things start to become irritating and every day there is something to make me facepalm and go "whyyyyyy!??!?!" Perhaps I'm jaded. Actually, I know I am. But don't get me wrong, I like to think of myself as a very open minded person and I'm more than willing to accept and embrace differences in other cultures outside my own. One has to in order to do what I do. But at the end of every year, I find myself focusing on the negative things instead of the positive because I'm itching so badly to escape. I'm somewhat of a vagabond and thoroughly enjoy moving from place to place, but I'm not one of those who could permanently desert the comforts that the United States offers. I've done this for a long time, and I'm ready for some cushy living for a while. After living in South Korea for two years and three months, I think I have a pretty good grasp on how things work and what I (and most other expats) love and hate about this...interesting...piece of earth.

So here for you, I've compiled a list of things that I will miss and things that I will most definitely not miss about this place I've called home for so long. In no particular order...


Things I will miss

Public Transportation: Something that America seriously lacks and needs to get with the rest of the world on is public transit. I understand that America is incomprehensibly vast, but something needs to be done. The subway system is cheap, efficient, and easily gets me wherever I need to go. And taxis, oh taxis! I have a love/hate relationship with taxis. They are really cheap here and probably every 3rd car driving down the street is one so there is never a problem of hailing it and getting where you need to go. However, I have no idea how anyone in this country obtained a driver's license and taxi drivers can be exceedingly dangerous along with everyone else on the road. I've had drunk ones, ones that are falling asleep, most run red lights and speed as though they are being chased by a T-Rex. But, on the other hand, it's reliable and there is never the question, "Alright, who's DDing tonight?"

Paris Baguette and other various bakeries: There is some kind of delicious pastry heaven on every block. Paris Baguette is the biggest chain around here and there are numerous other brands along with the mom and pop ones. They sell sandwiches and cakes and cinnamon buns and cream puffs in these carb utopias and it's a constant struggle to resist gorging myself daily.

The "Bing Bong" buttons: At most restaurants around here, the customer service is mediocre at best because there is no tipping. They don't need to be nice or overly friendly so they just aren't. So instead of coming to your table periodically to see if you are in need of anything, there is a small button at the end of the table that you press if you do need something. It makes a "bing bong" sound and the waitstaff comes running. GENIUS. No waiters or waitresses coming to your table when you have a mouthful of food asking if you'd like more coke. If you want more coke, you BING BONG. Though I imagine it gets pretty annoying...

THE BEACH: Busan summers are one thing I am going to ache for. Starting in April we usually start making our way down to the sand occasionally for springtime gatherings by the water, and by the end of May it's full blown beach season (for the foreigners anyway). From June to October there is a group of our friends at the beach nearly every single weekend. The only time at least a few don't show up is if they are out of town. Living by the sea has yet to get old and it's something I'm going to greatly miss moving to a landlocked state. No more will I constantly be sweeping sand out of my apartment all summer. Gwangalli beach might get pretty filthy and gross by mid-summer, but the memories I have of spending my time there are probably the most fond ones I have.

McDelivery: McDonald's has a delivery service here. Enough said.

Hana Kimbap: A local restaurant next to Al's school is called Hana Kimbap and the lady who owns it is just the sweetest. We eat there a lot. She knows our names and is always winking at us and refilling our sides and attempting conversation in her broken English and knows exactly what I want when I walk in there. Bulgogi dupbap is my favorite Korean food (sort of beef/rice/vegetable thing) and you can't get better than at Hana. I decided a long time ago that Hana is probably going to be my last Korean meal and I'll probably get her a card or something.

Walking: Busan is a walking city. Yeah it's congested with cars, but because it's a tightly packed metropolis, if you don't need to go far, you walk. The sidewalks are always packed with people going about their day to day business, just like New York City. I walk about 20-25 minutes to work and back every single day, and I've done that every single day for two years. When I went home for a visit last year I had forgotten what sedentary lives Americans lead. But in America, there is no opportunity to walk from place to place because you have to have a car. Everything is too far apart. Here, anything you could ever need is within walking distance. In the US, unless you live in a "walkable" city, which are few and far between, you don't want to be seen walking anywhere anyway. Do you think I want to be seen walking down West 2nd street in Weston or something? Nope. But it's something I'm really going to miss. Every time I leave the house having to get in a car and drive somewhere just to get something small is going to get old fast. I'm sure I'll have moments of "ugggghhh I wish I could just walk there and get it".

Healthcare: Oh, universal healthcare, how I love thee. I don't know how healthcare works in Japan and Korea, but it's something fantastic and magical. The taxes stay low, yet everyone has access to dirt cheap quality care. I've been to the doctor about three separate times here and each time it has cost me about $4 for the visit and usually around $1.70 for the Rx. Someone told me once that if you forget your insurance card and so don't "have insurance" it will cost $10 instead of $4. I'm not visiting a doctor in some hut either, it's a normal hospital like anywhere else. I will say that Asian Rx aren't as strong as those back home (a complaint of many expats), but they seem to get the job done alright, if anything alleviate symptoms somewhat. Koreans go to the hospital for anything and everything though like the wimps they mostly are, which is kind of irritating. Runny nose? Hospital for a shot. Headache? Hospital for some meds. Hungover? Hospital for an IV. In America, if you aren't dying, you man up and go to Target for some OTC meds and get over it. So anytime I've had a small cold, I'm not going to the hospital, it's a waste of time. But bronchitis? Yeah, I'll go...I guess that's worth my five bucks for a diagnosis and a weeks worth of pills. Get on board, America! I won't be able to afford it once I get back!

Nightlife: Would you like to party until sunrise? Well, ya can. Bars and the like don't close. If there is someone there, they stay open. Things closing at 2am is going to be a real downer; that's usually when we really get started here. And good heavens, the noraebang, or karaoke. Noraebang is my life on the weekends. It's not karaoke as you know it, either. You pay for a private room and it has screens and microphones and strobe lights and you and your private group sing until daylight. I think Nashville is going to have a pretty good nightlife scene but I don't see how it's going to compare to here.


Things I will absolutely not miss

The overall uncleanliness: Everywhere I look, there is litter. Korea is known for a lot of things, but being a clean country is not one of them. You probably don't remember, but I wrote a post living in Japan on how there are no garbage cans in any public place. The same goes for here, but for some reason Japan is squeaky clean and Korea is the exact opposite. Korean people don't seem to take pride in their city/country enough to not throw their garbage on the ground outside. And don't get me started on the spitting. Men and women alike hawk loogies all over the sidewalks. Literally, there are chucks of green and yellow constantly adorning the sidewalks. The spitting doesn't stop outdoors, however. It's also in elevators, building foyers and the subway station. I wish I were joking.

Lack of variety: When it comes to shopping, grocery shopping in particular, there is just not much variety in items. Coming from America where everything is bigger and a Super Walmart is something to behold, grocery shopping can get a bit dull. It's just the same old things. Frozen pizza? Maybe two brands to choose from. Soups? Perhaps three or four. Canned vegetables? Only about six or seven to choose from and only one brand. Even local native things like kimchi or bean sprouts has only a few to choose from. I mean, a grocery store back home has an entire aisle simply dedicated to salad dressings. I believe the only thing I've seen a great variety of is Ramen...there's probably about 25 different kinds. And thinking of variety...

Seasonal produce: I know living in the US has spoiled me some when it comes to produce. I can go into any supermarket at any time of the year and get any fruit or vegetable I desire. Things vary in price slightly depending on the time of the year, but things here come and go with the seasons. Would you like some watermelon in November? Nectarines in March? Good luck. I can't afford fruit here anyway. It's outrageously expensive. A bag of 5 apples will set me back about $6, a pack of strawberries about $12 and avocados run about $3-4 each. 

The laundry situation: No one in Asia has a proper washer or dryer. No one has a dryer anyway. I'm SO TIRED of air drying my clothes on these metal racks that take up half my apartment. My washer takes about 45 minutes for one load and it's super small, it's in my kitchen and fits under the counter. Then I have to air dry everything which means it's all stiff and crunchy. I can't remember the last time I got to dry off with a soft fluffy towel.

Recycling: Call me an earth-hater, but I hate recycling. I would probably do it back home if I had proper cans for everything and on trash day I can just take it outside for someone else to deal with it. But I don't want to go out of my way just to recycle. I have to lug all my garbage 20 floors down and then separate it all in the garbage area of the basement which has the most foul odor ever. There is no such thing as a regular old Hefty trash bag. Doesn't exist. They have special trash bags that are kind of free-for-all you can throw anything in them, so that's what I use. But they are $13 for 10 of them. Bottles I'll separate just because I don't want to take up room in my very expensive trash bags, but other than that, anything and everything goes in those suckers because where I throw my trash isn't something on which I wish to waste my brainpower.

Nothing is customizable: Koreans, and really Asia, like things a certain way. If one tries to mess with that, they get antsy and don't really know what to do. Nothing can be changed around in restaurants, no substitutes or no "Have It Your Way" at Burger King. If you ask for no tomato on your burger, you're just asking for a blank stare. I'm pretty stoked to get back home and the made-to-order way of food ordering.

Someone is always in my way: This one is hard to explain to someone who's never been here, but Koreans (in general) unquestionably have no sense of awareness of their surroundings. I think I've mentioned this before on this blog, but they all walk inside a bubble that has roughly a 6 inch radius around their body. Anything that goes on outside that 6 inches they are blissfully unaware of. It's actually a remarkable thing to watch. Walking down the street, they seem to not be able to sense there are others around them, so they block you. In the grocery store, this is no joke, they will park their buggies right in the middle of the aisles while looking at shelf items, and I can actually stand there with my own buggy right in front of them and they have no idea that I am there to let me pass. I find a lot of it is just a completely lack of courtesy for anyone but themselves. It's a strange thing to witness, because for the most part they aren't mean, hateful people, they just truly are not conscious of others. The same goes for the driving. Imagine, if you will, this scenario, but in vehicles. It's a dangerous, dangerous thing and I'll be glad to get back to the safety of American roads.

It's cold or hot all the time: Yeah, yeah, I complain about the heat and the cold a lot. But it's one of those things that really has made my life more difficult over the years. The lack of insulation and their extreme nutcase attitude towards energy saving means that the summer heat nor the winter cold can ever truly be escaped. In winter, everywhere, even in some nicer restaurants, the bathrooms aren't heated and in some case the indoor areas themselves. Summer, I'm sweating trying to teach my kids the ABCs because no one will let me turn the air down below 77. Being comfortable, temperature wise, is one thing I am most looking forward to coming home.



I could list things for days, but I think this about covers the big things in my life. I finished working today and now have two weeks of packing up this apartment and really just enjoying my last bit of time here. Next stop: Koh Lipe, Thailand!  

Korean School Owners Are...

Dicks.

There are a handful of you out there who know what a rather restless and depressing last few weeks it's been around these parts. For those who don't, here's the scoop: Korean academy owners (and business owners in general) are greedy, money hungry mongrels who try and get as much work as possible out of their employees for the littlest in return to those employees (teachers). Before we even came over here, our recruiter told us, verbatim, "contracts don't mean much to Korean people". Once we arrived, and over the last two years, we have heard countless stories of friends and friends of friends who have been screwed over in some way by their school owner i.e. not getting paid on time, not getting paid at all, too many hours, weekend working, no holidays, schools closing with no warning, firing at the 11th month of the yearly contracts to avoid paying the large lump sum at the end...the list goes on and on.

Al and I have had zero problems with our school for over two years now. If you might remember, we actually arrived here in December 2011. We've always known that our owner isn't exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer, but we have never once not gotten paid, not gotten our holidays, never had problems with time off, nothing. We've never had a warning or complaint from either of our schools. I've never been a second late in two years, nor has Al. All in all, it's been a pretty quiet two years when it comes to major things that could disrupt our lives. (me relentlessly complaining about the cooling/heating at my school doesn't count, that's just super annoying.)

Well, well, well, here it was, a few weeks ago, Al and I were happily counting down our days left here and our days left until vacation, when WHAM BAM, we were hit with the news that our owner has decided that we're the worst teachers at the schools and wants us out and gone at 11 months. Oh yeah, could this have something to do with the fact that the month we finish our contracts he owes us nearly TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS!? With our last two paychecks, two bonuses (severance), and two flights (a grand each they give us for flights), it tops out at nearly 10 Gs. That's not even counting two years of pension we've had accruing. Needless to say, when teachers leave Korea, they count on a very large sum of money coming to them...hence the reasoning behind the "11th month firing". It's a pretty common thing to happen, so maybe we're idiots in thinking that just because we've had a smooth two years that it wouldn't happen to us.

A little back story on MY school: It's an elementary school. The Korean school year runs March 1-March 1 (year round schooling...yay...), so that's how my semesters fall, but my contract ends askew from my school's semesters. Every March, my school would give the company I work for the run around saying that they didn't want to renew the contract with them and yadda yadda...but they always did renew. This year was no different. About a month ago, I started hearing the usual chirping around the office about them not wanting to renew. Well, if they didn't renew, my last day would be February 28, but my contract doesn't end until March 31...would I work at the main office with Al? Get a temporary job? If they did renew, will I still be able to work that last month? Lots of questions, no answers.

Nobody from the main office tells the Koreans at my school anything, and then they don't tell me anything. For weeks I questioned the situation but to no avail. Finally, a few weeks ago, I went to the main office and got my answer: That they wanted us OUT and weren't going to pay us ANYTHING! As I was "talking" to the owner (through a translator) and waiting for Al to get out of class, he was saying things like...I left class to go make copies once? So apparently..."Samanda! Teacher! Bad!" And using the excuse about my semesters not falling right and that they want a new teacher in there to start with the new school year on March 1 and loads of other nonsense. So it's gonna be like that is it? Our owner would grunt out a bunch of Korean and then translator would say, "He's just making excuses, but he said..." and then list a bunch of asinine things that Al and I supposedly did (I guess Al drank too much water or something?) which was his reasoning for ending us early. Mmmhmmmmm. How stupid do you think we are, pal? So when Al got out of class, he flipped his lid, as I knew he would, and I was on the verge of a full on panic attack. I mean, we have an entire month in Europe already booked, most nonrefundable, and here we are on the cusp of possibly getting no money to pay for it, so we may have to cancel. Great.

I also learned (from the translator guy, who is our age and Korean-American) that my Korean teachers have come to the main office on multiple occasions and verbally bashed me to a pulp. I am honestly not sure I want to know the details or exactly what they said, but he mentioned something about them telling the owner I'm "late all the time" and a myriad of other things that can't possibly be true because, well, I've never stepped a toe out of line.

We immediately employed my Korean bff Sophie to go with us to the labor board...with little result. They looked over our contracts and she told them the situation but apparently there was nothing in our contracts protecting us if something like this happened. I read it thoroughly and it seemed pretty solid, but the labor board said otherwise. Soph said that the best thing to do now was to just try and negotiate as much as possible out of him. That was two weeks ago.

We then had a meeting with him, he was trying to do this and pay this much and we wanted this much and back and forth and back and forth. He then said he needed to think things over and pushed us to the following Thursday when we would get our yes or no and get it settled. Thursday came, he went to Seoul. Moved to Friday. Not back from Seoul. Moved to Monday. (I didn't sleep well). Monday came, Al said it was best if he handled it alone because our owner always gets really titchy when I'm around (he is always telling me how beautiful I am, creepola, perhaps I make him uncomfortably horny).

I was on pins and needles and Al walks in the house at about 10:30 with mostly good news. Here's the sitch: We will be getting roughly 90% of our money. My last day of work is NEXT FRIDAY. Al's is March 14th. We will get both our flights and a pro-rated severance, which will cut off only like a hundred bucks for Al and a few hundred for me. Obviously we'll get our last two paychecks, plus Al will get 14 days worth of pay in March.

The Europe trip is saved! Although, we might cut a bit off the end and just not go for as long as we planned. A shame, but something that might have to be done. Also, we have to be out of our apartment three weeks before our flight out of Korea. So we're looking into getting a flight to Thailand or somewhere down there for a few weeks because 1. We'd have to sleep on a friend's couch for three weeks because we're homeless 2. We'd be bored out of our minds 3. We'd be spending money left and right keeping ourselves entertained 4. It's wayyyyyy cheaper to live down there day to day than it is here 5. Our sanity would be tested. We wouldn't be able to stay in the same place with one another; apartments here are the size of your bathroom at home and I don't want to sleep on a couch and impose on people for three weeks. To give you an idea of how cheap Southeast Asia is, it will actually probably be cheaper to buy a flight down to the beaches of Thailand for a few weeks rather than stay around here. Still not sure yet, we're gonna figure it out in the next few days.

Things at my school are tense. Seriously, seriously tense. I know that they bad mouthed and lied about me to the owner, but they don't know that I know. I am very, very cold to them and frankly, I don't care. They're the ones who are late all the time anyway (really, always). Because there's no one there to unlock the door when I arrive, I've had to crawl through the office window more than a few times or sit outside in the frigid hallway until someone finally arrives. It's getting hard to keep my mouth shut, but now is the time to mind my Ps and Qs; I have a lot of money on the line.

The kids have a short week and a half "vacation" from now until the new school year on March 1 which means my hours are back to the morning ones. It's not so bad I guess, just still really cold. I haven't had time at all to mentally prepare myself to leave this job I've had for so long. I mean, this is my work and my home. Since I had the idea that I would be finishing March 31 for so long, the news that I had a very short time left has kinda taken me be surprise. I love those kids (most of them) and I can't believe I'm done next Friday. I'm really gonna need to try and find some subbing work or something until Al is done. Blah.

So...that was pretty long winded! But, now you know!

Happy Lunar New Year...or Chinese New Year...Whatever! Happy 4 Day Weekend!

Because the Asians like to celebrate an additional New Year that the moon dictates instead of the one that the earth and sun dictate, we got a four day weekend. Known as "Sollal" here in K-Land, it's one of the biggest holidays of the year where all the families get together and eat lots of food and do traditional things a.k.a. a living hell for most of them. My lady coworkers are nearly in tears every "family" holiday because there is so much expected of them from their mother-in-laws (cooking, cleaning, getting yelled at...) while the single Korean ladies have to endure endless questioning on just why oh why they aren't married yet. One of my single coworkers actually skips every holiday with her family for the SOLE reason that she doesn't want to be questioned relentlessly about her marriage status despite the fact that she's *gasp* 30. 

We expats, however, get a relaxing holiday, and this one was filled with four days of unusual 60+ degree weather. Thursday and Friday Al and I just chilled and Saturday we all had a BEACH DAY! The last time we were all at the beach was probably October, so this was fantastic. We brought our beach blankets (and extra blankets to stay warm) and the boys played football all day. Fabulous.

Sunday, Al and I decided to head down to the southern part of the city along the coast to Chinatown, because we've never been there. Turns out "Chinatown" is more of a long street that should be more appropriately named "Russiatown". Not only was there very little Chinese anything there, it was basically a big sign that said "Chinatown" and then a bunch of shops and restaurants with Russian names. If someone knows the story behind it, please, let me in, because I don't get it. Mostly everything was closed anyway, so that was unfortunately somewhat uneventful. 

We took the subway two more stops to Nampo, a favorite area of ours. It's a trek and a half to get there from our house, like 40 minutes or more on the subway, but we like to go. There's a very long, wide street with semi-upscale shopping, where at the end you turn right down a dirty alleyway and come out in knock-off central. This tightly packed, mile long extravaganza has anything and everything, but mostly fakes of every shape and size. Now, don't get me wrong, if you know me well you know that I believe that knock-offs should be banned from earth, but that's mostly towards bags, jewelry, shoes...the big items. Do I have a Lacoste hoodie from there because I'd rather pay $50 than $150 for pretty much the same exact quality? Yeah. But if I can't afford $1,300 for a genuine Chanel quilt bag, then I'm not going to spent $150 on one in Nampo to carry around like I'm better than everyone. Gross. 

Once we got to the end of the nice shopping area, we decided to turn left because, well, we've never turned left down that way. We ended up discovering an entirely new area of Nampo that we've never been because, really, we just stick to the same old same old. Al and I...we don't generally go to new places around Busan. I'm not sure why. We've just not gone out and "discovered", so Sunday was a real treat. We found new streets, new restaurants and Lord Almighty, the Jagalchi Fish Market. The Jagalchi Fish Market is a seafood spectacle unlike any other. It's a huge building that looks like this inside... 

...With every type of sea creature imaginable available for purchase. As you can see...

I had no idea what most of it even was, let alone how to eat it. This place is quite a knock on the senses, especially the nose. I saw a woman skinning eels alive in one quick stroke; they were still bloodily slithering around afterward. I immediately wished I hadn't witnessed such a traumatizing event as I very much like eel sushi. It's all I'll be thinking about next time I'm in a sushi joint and order my regular unagi. 

After we finished roaming the smelly building we went outside to a deck, which overlooks the water and what I assumed to be a fishing boat marina. There were lots of people out and about because of the nice weather, kids feeding seagulls, a band was playing...and two homeless men fighting each other. As soon as he spotted it, Al yells, "bum fight!" and then one of them gets knocked out and falls backwards down some steps. Someone was attempting to break it up, but it was clear they were sloshed and were having none of it. Since I brought my camera along with me, I spent a lot of the time still testing out settings and trying to get some good pictures of the marina...and some I did!!

              

I love love love this picture

We decided to lose ourselves down some more side streets we've never seen as we worked our way back to the Nampo subway station. We found another great shopping/food street that I for sure want to come back to.

Once we were back to the main shopping street and were walking back towards the station, we passed a clothing store that people were running out of and was quickly filling with smoke. A fire! It had apparently just started as the shopkeepers were running in and out with their phones calling the firemen. The whole area was soon filled with black smoke as it was rolling out of the front door. Of course we, along with tons of others, stopped to watch it all unfold. The fire trucks showed up not 5 minutes later (7 of them, by the way) and began to put it out. I never saw any flames, though, just billows of smoke. We happened to be in the right place at the right time for all the action today! First a bum fight, then a fire. 

Instead of going home, we went into the big Lotte department store across the street to look for some food. The way department stores here are set up is that usually on the first floor there are tons of food counters. They cook in the middle and there is counter seating all around it. We found a Japanese ramen one, in my top 5 favorite foods ever, and it hit the spot. 

Says "ramen"

Tonkatsu Gyoza Ramen. Heeeeeaveeeennnn

After a long day adventuring to new places, we headed home and fell asleep at 9:30. The next day, Monday, was the first day for the kids back from vacation, which means my hours changed back to the normal 1-6:30. I hate, hate, hate waking up early in the morning, but getting off work at around 2 every day was great. As much as I detest waking up early, I'm still a person who would rather just get in and get out. I always hated in college when I had evening classes, because I just have to wait around all day knowing I have an obligation later in the day. Sucks. But now, I get to sleep in as late as I want again, but I get off at 6:30...which really isn't bad. It was God awful having to take my morning coffee poo at school instead of home, anyway. Onward to March 31!