This post is gonna be long. Prepare!

Heyyyy there!

It's been a while, hasn't it?

Not my fault! I've been getting moved in and ready and things are CRAZY here right now, but don't worry, I'm about to fill you in.

This is not going to follow a very fluid line, by the way. It's going all over the place.

But anyways, yeah, the first thing I want to talk about is tiny Korean cocoa puffs.

They might seem inconsequential to you, but if you had them, you would know what I'm talking about. They're like little perfect versions of the real cocoa puffs and they're SO good. I want to eat those cute little things every day. I had them this morning at breakfast - SK Global House (my dorm) is attached to a little shop area that has a 식당 (cafeteria) called Cafe Kkini where they have this great breakfast buffet for $5.00 (keeps me full for hours, seriously) including eggs, fried rice, breakfast ham, pineapple juice, TINY COCOA PUFFS!, milk, Americano (black coffee...which is literally $3.00 for a small cup here), lychee-like fruit, salad, toast, pineapple jelly stuff, etc. I am well-fed on the mornings that I get up early enough to enjoy this buffet.

Anyways, also in the shopping area is a GS25 convenience store, where I can get lunch for $1.00, and also a Caribou Coffee! It's so convenient. My dorm is the best.

However, there is a place called Burger&Shake that I despise. I will explain why.

I love milkshakes. I can't explain how much I love milkshakes. Korea is lacking in very few areas, but one of them is milkshakes. I was excited that there was a place named Burger&Shake next to my dorm, and went there pretty soon after moving in. Guess what? They don't have shakes. There are no milkshakes. At Burger&Shakes. What?! They have YOGURT SMOOTHIES. I don't want a yogurt smoothie! I want a shake! Like the one in your name! Burger&Shake! Ugh. Anyways, that and no good cheese, and expensive peanut butter. Other than that I love Korean food places. (Apparently Mexican food is terrible in Korea, but I don't eat Mexican, so it doesn't affect me.)

One of the places affected by the lack of good cheese is Pizza restaurants. American pizza places (i.e. Domino's and Pizza Hut) are pretty high-class here. A large pizza is around $30.00 a pop, which is pretty incredible. They have a pretty nice place here called Mr. Pizza, whose catch phrase is, get this, "Love for Women." Haha! Apparently they have "all the things that a woman can love" at their restaurant. Which is pretty true, because at the salad bar they have a yogurt station which includes tiny cocoa puffs!!! They truly do know what a woman like me needs. The cheese is kind of gluey, though, but I'm getting used to it.

McDonalds is MUCH better in Korea, by the way. But their milkshakes are very....meh. My recommendation? Go for the McFlurry instead.

I've started to get used to people pretending not to be staring at me on the subway. I go into "subway mode" which is basically me staring directly above everyone's head with a blank expression on my face, and makes me kind of blend in. Sort of. It's really interesting that in this country, if you're traveling on a bus or a subway with strangers who also happen to speak English, everyone assumes you're with them, even if you're across the bus and not looking at them. I was riding a bus the other day and when some other foreigners were getting off, the person next to me moved over as though making room for my simultaneous disembarkation. As though all foreigners have a hive mind and all must return to our White People nest together. Hahah. Another great thing about that same bus ride was the little kid sitting in front of me. He was hopping around in his dad's lap and staring around and sucking on his fingers and then turned and looked at me - and stopped. His eyes grew enormously wide and he sucked in a gasp. "아빠! 미국 사람! 아빠! 아빠!!! 미국사람있어요!!!!!" he starts shouting and pounding on his dad's shoulder. ["DAD! AMERICAN!! DAD! DAD!!! THERE'S AN AMERICAN!!!"] (Apparently all white people are American.) The dad tried to shush his kid, and so he turns to his mom and starts screaming the same thing. Everyone on the whole bus was pretty uncomfortable at that time and kept looking at me as though not sure how I would react (Does she know Korean? Does she know what he's saying?) So I turned to the little boy and asked "미국사람들 자주 봐요?" [Do you often see Americans?] and this kid FLIPPED. He starts jumping up and down and then settled down into playing peek-a-boo and making his hands attack me. He was so cute.

Anyways, back to Yonsei stuff. I am finally moved in and ALMOST completely settled. I was able to get my passport back today - I may be going to Immigration tomorrow to settle everything with my Alien Registration Card, depending on how soon I can figure everything out. Things are getting much easier! On Friday I'm going for my Dorm Residency-required chest X-ray and Hep-B scan. (Ya know, just in case I'm carrying highly infectious diseases.)

My roommate's name is Taylor. She goes to Baylor (haha it rhymes!) and she's really nice. She's from New Orleans. We're both clean people and like Korean dramas, and since we're both friendly I think we'll have a good year. I'm really excited! She was two days late moving in, so I was worried that she was lost somewhere but she eventually showed up, haha.

When I had to move in I was worried because I had so much stuff, but my friends Bomi, Changmin, Kevin, and Ryan got a van and helped me move everything! It was so nice! It was also really funny because I was the only person with an entire entourage coming with me. I got a lot of quizzical stares, but it was worth it because I barely had to carry anything, hahah. I gave Changmin and Bomi little maple syrups (and one for Dayoung but she wasn't there) because they have been such helpful people and good friends to me. They asked me what it was for!!! I told them "pancakes and waffles," which Changmin restated for Bomi (팬케이크, 와풀 - "paen-keh-i-keu, wah-pul") and they were both a little confused and very excited. I also gave thank you cards (be proud, Mommy!) and said thanks almost a little too much.

As a consequence of my giving gifts to them, they decided to take me out to dinner a few days ago to a naengmyun place that gives free Korean beef (Daddy would like this place, haha) for only $5.50. Delicious. Afterward we all got coffee, and they surprised me with a present! It's a little plant called 워터코인 (water coin) which is apparently called Pennywort in America and is a much-hated lawn weed that grows in over-watered lawns. Here in Seoul there aren't many lawns, so people haven't grown a hate for it. It's really cute!! There are long stalks and tiny button-shaped perfectly round leaves on top. They told me to pick a name for it, and I asked for ideas, and we came up with 몽쉘 (mong-shuehl) which is the Korean way to write "mon cher" ('my dear' in French - can also be taken as 'my expensive thing' if you look at it from a Korean grammatical standpoint). It turns out my little plant's name is pretty complicated. The Korean sound/ onomatopoeia word for "puffy" is 몽글몽글 (mong-geul mong-geul) and so mong-geul is somewhat like mong-shuehl in that way. 'My dear' stands for how it's a very cute plant and I love it, and 'my expensive thing' signifies how the little leaves look like coins (in America the name can also be 'water dollar'). Phew. That was a long explanation. Anyways, I love it!

Here at Yonsei I've been meeting a lot of great people, including Matt, Annie, Grace, Jagi and Chang, but the person who has been the most friendly and welcoming to me so far is Peter. He's like my older brother here and is always checking in and asking to hang out, and refers to me as his bro. He's really great. We all went out the other night to a bar and just hung out and chatted (in Korean it's called 놀다 - literally "to play") and had a good time. I'm getting to know a lot of people. I'm going to be meeting up with some girls I met when I went to HB (two of which coincidentally now go to Yonsei!) including Taehee, Jongmin, and Dongrim. The fourth of the South Korean visitors to HB is named Eunkyung/Jenna and I already met with her the other day. She bought me dinner! It was this really good fish dish (오징어 - cuttlefish) and then there was a stew afterward. We went for coffee when we were all done and just hung out and talked. It was a lot less awkward than I thought it would be.

Yesterday I met with Mia's friend's daughter Jiae and her friend whose name I (regretfully) cannot remember. She was really sweet, and so was her friend, but they aren't very fluent at English. We eventually were able to communicate pretty well once we felt less inhibited by nervousness, and they told me I have good Korean intonation for a foreigner (yay!...?) and we went to a restaurant called 콩불, which is an abbreviation for 콩나물 볼고기 (bean sprout bulgogi) and had bean sprouts fried with spicy sauce and greens and bulgogi and cuttlefish. More cuttlefish! I really like it. It was good and spicy. We had a really tasty peach drink and beer and water with the meal. I need to find out where to buy that peach drink because it's almost as good as tiny cocoa puffs.

Before I met Jiae, I was at Hyundai department store and bought a down winter coat with a fur-lined hood for $40 (yes, incredible deal) and some new running shoes for $50 (yet another great deal) because those are two things I've really been wanting. Korean winters can be harsh and my old running shoes had a few too many miles on them (gotta be careful not to injure myself with old shoes) so now I'm well stocked and feel very thrifty.

I also went to cold stone and got a scoop of German chocolate cake ice cream. When i I went to order, I ordered in the Korean and the lady surprised me with speaking English with nearly no Korean accent. I was startled into not being able to talk at all. Maybe I fooled her into thinking I can't speak English. I guess I can pretend I just speak French, haha. (Although with my luck, she'd know French, too!) While I was walking around with my ice cream I saw something that was TOO adorable, but also very sad. A woman in the subway had three boxes with her - one full of chicks, one full of kittens, and one with a tiny puppy! The puppy was going for $70, the kittens for around $50, and the chicks for around $10. They were the most adorable things ever. However, most subway-sold items are either bootleg or made in China. These little animals were most likely raised on a baby animal farm in China where they basically make animals create mass litters of animals and then sell them with very little medical and pedigree regulation. So, although the animals were so so very cute, there was probably a lot of evil going on behind the scenes, which is so so not cute.

Recently I went down to 인천 (Incheon) to visit 인천대공원 (Incheon Grand Park) which was giant and beautiful. You could rent tandem bikes and four-person pedal carriages to ride around. There were a lot of big rocks and interesting sculptures and waterfalls/creeks, etc. It was gorgeous.

Yesterday I met up with Hyunjin in Anguk! We went around the area looking at little shops and jewelry and shoes, and had lunch at this place called 별다방 미스리 (Star Dabang Miss Lee) which is apparently a throwback to the older generation, where cafés called Dabangs would be the place guys would go to in order to hit on girls. We had some old-school lunch followed by these gummy fruit things for dessert. After walking around we got some AMAZING bingsu at a café that was once an old house and then converted into a coffee place. I had a really great time hanging out with her.

Anyways, that's all for now! I'm going to post a video of my room and lots of pictures!

If I think of anything else I forgot to say, I'll put it in a new post.

Oh, by the way, classes start tomorrow, and I have my Korean class placement test - gotta study!! Wish me luck!

Love,

Janet

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

빨리 - 빨래!

I started off my day with a walk to Paris Baguette for a creamy cloud cake thing. While I was there I saw a fly land on a loaf of bread, and I started laughing to myself, because in Korean, the word for fly is the same as Paris, and so by landing on that bread, the fly had created Fly[Paris] Baguette of his own. Bahahaha. ...My korean puns are hilarious, don't lie.

For lunch I ate pork and kimchi bibimbap and kimchi tuna kimbap, followed with a delicious milkshake from a place called Cafe the Air (a restaurant full of horrible English grammar). The kimbap was delicious - definitely will be going there again for that - but the bibimbap was just okay. It was lacking something. After lunch I hopped onto the bus to head back to Suwon to see Angie!

This time, I got on the FAST bus (which, consequently, did not matter since the traffic was so bad) and got off at the CORRECT stop, and did not get lost! It was great. I stopped in Home Plus, had a Lotte Bulgogi burger, and a donut from this place that is apparently originally in New York City. The donut was heavenly. So Angie and I split a second one. Let the fat feelings and the guilt begin!

Angie and I went back to her house and decided to do laundry! Unfortunately we had too much for her little washer to handle in the time we had available, and so...we ran off to the 24-hour laundromat! Today was my first time ever doing laundry at a Korean laundromat, and it was glorious. The machine supplies the soap and everything for you. All you do is throw in a ton of laundry, put in coins, and wait. For the dryer you choose (in 5 min. increments) the amount of time you want to dry your clothes for and pay the equivalent of 50 US cents per 5 minutes (highway robbery, in my opinion).

While I was there I read a Korean fashion magazine (so many cute and weird outfits) and accidentally killed a fly the size of my thumbnail, which resulted in the most gross gut puddle I've ever seen. I was horrified, and yet strangely fascinated at my awesome fly-killing powers.

Anyways, we had just finished washing and were about to put the clothes into the only available dryer of three when this young couple rushed into the building and stuck their wet clothes in. I was so mad. The wife also kept giving me a really mean glare, and then put all her stuff on top of the table I was reading at and shoved all of my belongings toward me to make room for herself. I was pretty livid. And THEN I overheard her whispering to her husband about "foreigners" and then the man tried to tell Angie and I to be quieter, even though we were barely talking at normal volume. I gave her my meanest face and after that she stopped making comments, probably because she saw the dead fly and realized that I was potentially a deadly assassin.

Anyways, eventually a dryer cleared out, we finished the laundry, and now I'm back here writing to you from a porch in Suwon!

That's all for now, I'll talk to you guys later!

Love,

Janet

Korean Shirts

Some of the shirts I've seen in Korea are hilarious, and many are very interesting. Maddi even saw one that said "Cokehead Bullemic"!

I've compiled a list as follows (typed as seen, caps, punctuation, everything):

No One puts Baby in a Corner

Loud pipes save lives

Keep it Neil

Keeping it Neil

Presentation Panthers

NGLiPTHx FIGHT

Don't be JEALOUS

I <3 TrIAngles

Fresh Seriousness - Morale - PROSPECT

Play the music UGrz tone

THIS SHIRT IS PURE

Triple GGG - Frank Bottling - Works Refreshing

23 - Be of Good Cheer

Armadillo Christmas

More to come later!

WesKo and Groceries!

A korean refrigerator full of delicious!!

And the door! (Why do I love food so much?)

Photo from the Wesleyan Korea meetup!!! We're so attractive! :D

The Korean Singing Washing Machine

Every electronic in Korea makes really cute noises, but this washing machine really takes it to the next level. I love laundry!!

오랜만이에요!

Well, my mom called me yesterday and informed me that I haven't blogged for about a week, so I figured now would be the time to catch everyone up!

I had decided to make my blogs more infrequent since most of the stuff I do in Korea includes studying, going out to buy a snack, seeing the same people and doing the same things with them, and more studying. I figure enough has happened by now that I can update you!

On Monday, as we all know, I went to the Embassy to drop off my passport to get it renewed. I was able to use my credit card conversion-charge free! (They accepted in American dollars.) However, I was informed that I would have to send in two phone numbers and my two photos by mail later. I also accidentally took the government's copy of my charge receipt, and so they emailed me to send that in too. That would be fine, except I have NO idea how to use the 우체국 (post office) in Korea. More to come on that later!

On Tuesday I met up with Bomi, Alex, and Dayoung, per usual. The only eventful thing that happened there was that I forgot my umbrella and a thunderstorm started and so I had to borrow their very fashionable umbrella to take home (a nice brown-on-brown combination). I'm starting to realize that my shoes will never be dry in this country.

On Wednesday was the WesKo (Wesleyan Koreans) meetup at the Seoul Club! Yay! I was so excited to meet new freshmen, see old alums, and hang out with my current Wesleyan friends. We all got free t-shirts, too! (They're pretty cool-looking, actually.) Korean size smalls are a little smaller than American smalls, by the way. My shirt is pretty fitted. (Good thing I'm eating so many vegetables and walking everywhere!)

At the meetup I sat with Jeffrey, Jamie, Gaeun, Gayin, Matthew, and John Fong, who had just arrived from Hong Kong that morning! Gayin, John, Jeffrey and I had met up at the subway and taken a cab to the club together so my arrival wasn't as awkward as I had thought it would be. I felt a little weird being the only non-Korean there (perrr usual) but then two non-Korean '08 alums showed up and I felt a little better. Gaeun and I grabbed a glass of wine and socialized, and then the food was served. I had a hot dog (mmm USA!) and a salad, corn on the cob, beets, and little cream cheese things for dessert. It was pretty good. Probably because it was a hoity-toity country club. Anyways, I got to meet two alums that I've been hearing a lot about lately, Charlie (Cheolhyun) and Moon (Moonsik) who graduated around the time I came to Wes. Charlie was wearing a Cleveland Indians baseball cap! YEAH CLEVELAND!! So we talked about that a little. It was Moon's birthday, which caused everyone to joke about him planning it for his birthday so that he could have a free party, haha (he was one of the main coordinators). Moon said he'd add me to WesKo Facebook group so that I could feel included. Yay networking!

Anyways, at the end we all posed for a picture together. It turned out pretty well, I'll attach a copy in my subsequent photo post.

On Thursday I woke up and planned my classes for Yonsei! I'm taking Korean Language, Korean-Japanese Relations, Comparative East Asian Cinema, Japanese Modern Literature, and Intro to Korean Music! After that I went to a 부동산 (real estate place) with Kyle to give my opinion on new apartments (since I am an expert at these things, obviously) as he had decided to change apartments. The real estate agent was really friendly and nice and talked to me even though I couldn't really understand half of what he was saying, but he spoke slowly and I got the jist. One of the things I really hate is when a cashier just points at the total instead of saying it out loud for me, or when a person just assumes I won't know what they're saying. If you're going to use violent hand gestures, at least give me the Korean that goes along with it!

After that, I met Matthew at the subway and we went out for dinner and dessert together! I had a fish-egg bibimbap and he had cold noodles. We tried each other's food and I decided that I definitely wanted to come back there again. It was great. Matthew went home and I hopped on the bus to Suwon.

Unfortunately, I got lost. This was WAY worse than when I got lost in New York City, though, because at least in New York people can help you pretty fluently. I spent an hour on the phone crying and reading signs trying to figure out where the heck I was. Turns out the bus dropped me off at Kyonggi University instead of Kyunghee University (OHH the immense difference!) I ended up having to grab a cab with this funny old Ahjussi who made Konglish conversation with me. He informed me that he's a singer and proceeded to wail along with a ballad on the radio, and then asked me what I was doing in Korea. When I told him I was attending Yonsei, he told me I was very smart, and then asked me if I liked Korean men. He gestured to himself to try to clarify to me, since he was asking in Korean, but that simple gesture complicated the question a lot because I didn't want to say that I liked a guy HIM that way, but I do like Korean guys. I was able to blurt out some answer that avoided the whole thing and we were on our way to the Yeongtong Home Plus. I met Angie there (at this point it was midnight, yikes!) and I passed out as soon as we got home to her apartment.

In the morning, it was time to go back to Seoul! Traveling was boring. During the day I went to the post office finally to mail all of my information to the embassy. The lady at the counter made me feel like a total dummy even though I wasn't doing anything wrong, just because I'd never used the courier system in Korea before. I went up to her and said, in Korean, "I don't know how to send mail in South Korea and I don't speak Korean well, is there someone here who speaks English?" and she just stared at me. I said "uhh...sorry..." in a very desperate way, hoping to get SOME kind of reaction out of her, and she just looks at me with this *wow what an idiot* face and says, in perfect English, "well, where were you intending to send the letter?" Thanks, lady, for being so accommodating. Eventually we got it all worked out and my info is now en route to the government! For dinner, I went back to the restaurant I ate at with Matthew and had the cold noodles (yummm) and then went home and went to sleep.

On Saturday, I was going to meet with Bomi and Dayoung but things didn't work out :(. Instead, I went to help Kyle out with moving his stuff a little (buy an apartment Thursday, move on Saturday - everything is fast in Korea) to his new place in Hapjeong. It's about one subway stop away from his old apartment. It was pretty uneventful. The moving truck driver asked him if he was from Japan (?) and naturally assumed that I was American. When we were in Hapjeong I found a cute little toy cow on the sidewalk and rescued him. I'm a hero! After everything was all moved in, I went home and retired for the day.

On Sunday, I bought a bunch of clothes and a giant comfy blanket for $16! A girl who had been teaching here was moving back to the states and sold me everything for really cheap. Thank you, Craigslist! After that, I took a nap and then I went grocery shopping at the World Cup Stadium!!! They call the complex SpoLand (Sport Land contraction?) and within the complex is a sauna called SpaLand! So cute, haha. The grocery store inside is called Home Plus (pronounced Home-uh Puh-lus-uh in Korea) and is a British/Korean department store chain. The food courts in Korea are amazing! You give the cashier your meal choice and she rings you out and gives you a number and an area to get your food at. You grab a table there and wait for your number to blink and a bell to ring and then go get your food. Water is self serve (self-serve water is kind of a thing in restaurants here) and you just eat your food and give the tray back to the window you got it from. The meal at Home Plus was HUGE (no, like you don't even understand how much food this was - I wish I'd taken a photo) and only cost about $12 USD. When I got home I unloaded groceries and made a spicy tuna mayonnaise with onion sandwich, too, and it was delicious. And then bed time!

Well, that's all that's been going on with my life lately. I'm going to make a post of funny t-shirts I've seen while in Korea so far in a few minutes.

Miss you guys!

Love,

Janet

The Longer Story

Hey there, I'm back again!

I'm getting internet from the front stoop of the apartment. Awesome, haha.

Alright so a few extra details about the past few days.

A lot of young men in Korea wear polos with big bold letters on the underside of the collar (which means they always wear it popped advertising the lettering). I saw a boy on the subway today with an Angry Birds polo on. Literally had an angry bird on the pec. I was dying.

I was on my way out to Suwon today and there was a boy next to me who was starting to fall asleep. I felt pressure on my shoulder and turned and all of a sudden he was sleeping on me. I had no idea what to do. The old lady across from me was cracking up; apparently I was making a pretty hilarious face. He slept on me for half. an. hour. Thankfully he didn't drool. When we finally came to a stop, he jolted up and just looked at me, then got up and left. I was so weirded out.

Today I had a great interaction with a drunk guy. He was sitting on a stoop at a street corner just reeling back and forth, and I asked him if he was okay and he just went mrrrrrphlphhhhrrrrrrr and swayed a little more. We had a total connection.

Tonight I went out for 고기만두국 with Angie and Jerrime (it's like a dumpling soup) and it was one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. The dumplings were like 95% meat (which is GREAT) and the soup was just the right salty and eggy. I was in heaven. Whenever I bit into a little dumpling the soup would fill up my mouth and steam would puff out everywhere - a little taste of paradise with every chew!!!!! (I would go on for days but I won't bore you, haha)

Afterward we went to home plus, and then went out and got Rich Milk Ice Cream Bars (which are basically condensed milk on a stick, YUM!) and sat outside of the corner store and hung out. It was really peaceful.

Anyways, that's it for now! Miss y'all!

Love,

Janet

잘지내?

Woops, haven't posted in a while.
Long story short, went out around Hongdae on Saturday, and then went to a place right outside of Seoul called Suwon on Sunday.
I only have internet because I'm in a bank right now.
Yikes.
See y'all later!
Sorry this is so short!
Love,
Janet

Pictures!

Right inside the entrance of 경복궁:

Area 15: GORGEOUS!!!

Spicy chicken rice - stir-fried right in front of you!

Green tea pat bingsu! (Maybe I should stop posting pictures of this - I think you may all already know what it looks like since I've posted it so much, hahah!)

At Esther's request, a photo of my dress, hahah:

문화

Yesterday was a very, very full and tiring day.

I woke up at 7:45 so that I could meet Stephanie, Maddi, and Sun at 경복궁 (Gyeongbokgung) to tour a palace and take a look at the folk museum. I'll post a few pictures because it's hard to just talk about in a blog post, but it was REALLY awesome and pretty. The palace complex consisted of lots of buildings with cool architecture and really pretty paintings, gardens, ponds, a tower, and lots of nice scenery. There was a gift shop where I grabbed some postcards, and a lot of great photo opportunities. The entire day my camera was reading low battery so I was panicking thinking I wouldn't be able to get all of the pictures I wanted. Another reason I was panicking was because I LOST MY NOTEBOOK WITH ALL OF MY INFORMATION IN IT. I didn't have it for three hours. I found it right outside of the subway station and breathed the biggest sigh of relief of my life. I've never lost anything that important before. It had passwords to my twitter AND my facebook, AND my blog, AND - well, you get the idea, and all of the contact numbers I need in Korea. Oh my gosh. So stressful. So happy I found it.

After 경복궁, we went to 인사동, which is a big shopping area with cheap things for tourists. I got a typical Korean-tourist t-shirt and looked at a lot of pottery, tea, and jewelry. We ate 김밥 (kimbab) at a place near the big shopping area and while we were eating it started raining like CRAZY. We saw Susan in a shop randomly and waited out the rain with her and talked a little.

After all of this I left Maddi, Sun, and Stephanie to go meet Dayoung, Bomi, and Alex near Yonsei. I got lost and eventually made my way all the way to 을지로1가 station (which is about 3 subway stops away from where I was supposed to be and an extra 30 minute walk I didn't have to take) and so needless to say I felt sweaty and gross and had to stop at home before I could go out again.

The three of us had fun hanging out, and eventually I went home. I was mad hungry so I stopped to grab some street food (my first time!!! and one of the few times I'll ever go- it's so greasy, haha). While I was waiting for my corn dog to fry, A GIANT CICADA CAME OUT OF NOWHERE AND ATTACKED ME! It flew straight into my chest and bounced off (it hurt!! he hit me really hard!!) and then flew around the food stall a little bit. My hero, a Korean ahjussi from the food stall next door, came over and just literally grabbed it out of the air by its wings and threw it off into the trees. I was almost crying. Bugs are so scary. I went home after that, finished my food, and passed out.

The next morning I was supposed to be at the 신촌subway station at 11:30 to meet Alecia for my cell phone and to have lunch. ...I, of course, woke up at noon. After yelling a few choice expletives I threw on some clothing and went running out the door. I made it there 45 minutes late and she, being the lovely amazing person she is, was there waiting for me still. Alecia gets a lot of love and a huge hug from me.

We had lunch at 하늘본닭 (Korean-Born Chicken?) which is a chicken stir-fry sort of place (the spices in the air there always make me sneeze up a storm, but it's soooo delicious) and we had the kalbi stir fry. We left and went shopping at the nearby Hyundai department store, and then stopped at Cold Stone and had green tea pat bingsu (I see a trend forming!) for dessert. She treated me for lunch and dessert even though I begged her to at least let me pay for dessert. My stomach wasn't complaining, though! Tee hee.

Anyways, now I'm back at home and chilling out, and will probably grab some snacks later and just figure out what I'm gonna do about my passport and my ARC card and my visa and my banking card and chest x-ray/HepB scan. Phew. Busy world. I have an appointment with the embassy on Monday!!

Talk to y'all later!

<3,

Janet

Pictures!

Lantern made of a little toy chest pig!!

Mango Coconut with Dduk! Mmmmm...

Pat bingsu!! Green tea flavor...yum!

Heekyong and I at the most famous pat bingsu place in Seoul!

너무 먹어

Today I woke up extra early (noon) to go to Apgujeong to meet with Eric and Heekyong! Heekyong was a little bit late so I hung out with Eric, but then she showed up and went for some good old pat bingsu.

We went to what is apparently the most famous place in all of Seoul and apparently every foreigner goes their to get their bingsu. So naturally, we were around #100 in line. It only took about 45 minutes, though, because service is fast and it's only dessert. It was WELL worth the wait - delicious and sweet and creamy - and it was good to sit and chill out with some old Wes friends. After eating our pat bingsu we went to go walk the streets of Apgujeong!

Apgujeong is where all the beautiful people hang out. It's very expensive to shop and eat there, and if you hang out there enough, you run into tons of celebrities. We only saw one, though, and I don't even remember her name. We stopped and had a little food at this place called SchoolFood which is basically street food inside of a restaurant. It was super tasty but I'd just drunk a lot of chocolate milk waaaay too fast so I didn't get to eat much. After SchoolFood we went to the street where all the rich kids hang out, Rodeo. There we went to a place called MangoSix and had this mango smoothie thing with a coconut ice cream island and little rice cakes floating around in it. It was one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. Eric paid for everything we ate, which was SOOO nice of him!!

After hanging out with Eric and Heekyong allll day (which was great! I'll miss you guys!) I went to Sinchon to meet up with, of course, Bomi, Dayoung, and Alex. We chilled until around eleven, and they went all the way home with me to make sure I got home safely! They also showed me how to take the bus, which is 2/3 as cheap as taking the subway! I love my friends :))

After I got home I settled down a little, and then went out for my late late dinner. I had dwaeji bulgogi, which is basically marinated and cooked pork with different add-ins and veggies and such, and wrapped up in a lettuce leaf with sauce and such. It was really good and filling. I ate a LOT today. My tummy is happy.

Anyways, about to go to bed. I'm meeting up with Sun, Maddi, and Stephanie to go to a palace tomorrow!

Night night!!

<3,

Janet

심심

Well, lately, I've had legit nothing to do except watch Youtube videos, but I've used my time wisely to study Korean some more.

Today I went to the bank (I was down to my last 5,000 원 bill) and withdrew money, then ran to the store to buy a TOWEL!!! Yes, I have been borrowing for over a week. Bad Janet :(

I also bought a gorgeous dress for 10,000 원, which is a great price and it's a REALLY cute dress.

When I got home I putzed around but eventually ended up cooking Korean food; a thing called gongnamul something-or-other, but it's basically a mung bean sprout side dish. I am happy to report that it was a delicious success!

Anyways, yes, still a boring person. Tomorrow I'm meeting with Eric and Heekyong, though, and having dinner with Alex, Dayoung, Crystal, and Bomi.

Later!

Love,

Janet