[thumb:2438:l]I went out last night for dinner with Peizhou, Jason, and Aaron. We went to a Chinese restaurant in Sinchon and it was pretty good. Peizhou said the food wasn’t totally authentic, so I guess we should take his word for it…since he’s Chinese and all. I thought about telling him that he didn’t know what he was talking about, but I figured I wouldn’t get really far with that. We had an interesting time after that. We wandered around Sinchon for a while and stopped in wherever looked interesting. Other than some weird places (and a sign catching on fire: see video below), we ended up at this place called ‘woodstock.” It’s kind of a really simple American style place and they have a huge library of CDs and LPs of 1970’s and 80’s music that you can tell them to play. We stayed there for a good few hours and argued over which songs we should request and how great it was to hear some of the stuff.
[thumb:2437:r]I woke up around noon today, hung around the dorm and then headed to Korean class at 4. I ate this really spicy egg soup called sundubu for dinner. It was great and I couldn’t argue with a whole meal for W2300 ($2.50). By the time 8pm rolled around I met up with some people in the basement to play poker. I started off great, raking in the chips for a while, then I died off. I got three hours of fun for only $5; totally worth it. Ben suggested we head to the batting cage afterwards, and no one but Diana and I wanted to go. We three actually had an interesting night after poker. We started off playing air hockey, then arcade basketball, then a couple of mario kart races (one of them I won!). Then it was over to the batting cage, which I think I surprised myself at. I hit a fair share of balls and I felt almost like a farm-raised potato farmer’s son, but just for like 2 or 3 minutes until I dropped the bat or a ball hit me in the back or something. After that, we decided we needed to go bowling. Great idea. I won with a 115. The bowling alley was on the 3rd floor of this shady building with a “night club” on the second floor. I wasn’t about to go check it out.
I’m planning to go souvenir shopping with Diana tomorrow in Insadong and probably spend a little bit of time goofing around around there. I just hope it’s not gross and rainy like it was today.
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Cool Bar’s sign caught on fire as we walked by.
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April 21st, 2007 - 4:19 pm
Sundubu jigae(순두부 찌개) is a bean curd pot stew.
Dubu(두부:Korean) means a bean curd, 豆腐(Chinese letters). We read it-豆腐- as ‘dubu’ in Korea and ‘tofu’ in Japan. Sundubu is one kind of dubu in Korea, can be explained like sort of bean curd which doesn’t have a form. Dubu takes a square form, you can see this form in the market or supermarket.
This Sundubu jigae’s main ingredient is the tofu doesn’t have a shape, we almost always put an egg into this very hot pot stew before we just eat. This food is one of home-made dishes, there are mild, hot, sea food, vegetable tastes, it is cooked depending on individual’s flavor.
I’m afraid this explain gets long, just what I’d like to mention is that sundubu is not an egg soup, thanks.
April 21st, 2007 - 5:40 pm
Personally think that Insadong doesn’t regard any more as an attractive visit point for the traditional atmosphere things in a tour, rather than some kind of cheap souvenir market or something, but some real charm of Insadong hides inside of deep lanes-not a main street- and galleries. Numerous cafes and restaurants for Korean teas and food in the narrow lanes are good for hang-out with friends. Probably the next weekend(from 04/27), there would be more fun to enjoy at Insadong. I hope you have a happy time with your friend.
Do you like a walking tour? Take a map from the information center and go by yourself some working tour, it would be fun. I only visited the main information center which is located in near Seoul city hall and Gwanghwamun, but there are really good info, maps, brochures for things do in Seoul. The web address as below have some working tour info I just mentioned.
http://english.visitseoul.net/visit2007en/index.jsp
Hong Dae(hongik university) area is cool to hang out, specially for clubs, bars. It is easy and closed to go from now your school, yonsei university. Hong dae(we call hong-dae as hongik uni, yon-dae as yonsei uni, ee-dae as ewha uni) can be said by many young people that one of must-go place for trendy Korean night culture. You would meet many indie bands’ performances and funny people in there. I would recommend to go before you leave here, get some info from your local friends at school before hanging out in Hong dae later.