Today I saw the most hilarious thing! Well, Korea is always a surprising place. And I love it because Koreans are SO proud of everything that has anything to do with their culture! Except maybe the family relationships cauz parents are often control freaks in denial. But they always do so for the good of their offspring.
Anyway.
They just finished building those HUGE Hyperion towers in front of my school and like 5mins walk from my place (remember Nico how impressed you were by the enormous buildings when you got off the subway station?) There's multi-colored lights coming from the ground at night... it feels like walking on little rainbow drops. Seriously.
They're luxurious flats that cost over three million bucks a piece (yes, I live in the neighborhood that has the 98th tallest building in the world and... it's apartments!) and/so of course they're opening all sorts of commercial stores like Starbucks, Purely Decadent (not bad... soy ice cream), etc.
And today there was a big opening for a Gimbap place. Gimbap is Korean sushi; vegetables, ham and eggs rolled up in rice and seaweed. But you should have seen how they celebrated for the occasion!
There were ballons outside, lights and two chicks dressed pretty sexy, dancing and singing for the WHOLE DAY! It's like minus two outside. They were there when we left work at 8pm. And they're dancing their ass off!! I mean dirty dancing, but kinda trashy too because... well it was on the street. I was shocked.
First of all because we never see this in America (and by America I mean North America! Sorry USA but it's quite ethnocentric to refer to yourself as "America"!!!) And just because it's kinda degrading for women. I'll post a video soon. Although it's bad quality, you'll see what I mean.
There were also a bunch of flowers at the entrance of the store with giant ribbons on each bouquet.
I learned that this is typically Korean too. When you friend opens a new store, you send a gigantic bouquet with your name on a pink ribbon. It's a kind of showing off, like "look how how many friends i've got! Come into my shop because if I know that many people, then I must sell good stuff!"
Korea is all about appearances. Shallow, yes, but that's life.
I also discovered last week-end that Korean drycleaners/dressmakers are like little Chinese sweatshops: the place is tiny and there touns of people working in there, right next to each other. That was in Edae but Kyungah told me it's like that everywhere. Shocking.
Saturday night we shot some pool with Jin, Ben and Rachelle but we hard the hardest time finding a regular pool table; Korean pool tables don't have pockets! Well, it's probably this game where you only have red and whites balls, but anyway, we found ONE in a room filled with maybe 10 tables. And those places don't seel mekju (beer) so we could only have sodas.
Oh and now I have proof that some Korean children take a bus home at the language academy at MIDNIGHT on friday night! Took a picture of one of the bus, Highest21 is the name of the school. Can you believe this?! I complain if I have to leave school at 10pm!
Tonight we had sushi for Christine's Birthday and now i'm totally full. Sucks cauz I'm getting up early tomorrow again and teaching until 10pm. Arrrrg.
Oh and this private i'm teaching at school (Jake, from Sunny's class)... well, we met again today and he's really adorable but I think he has a learning disability.
It sucks because his mom told the school that after our first session he came home totally confident that he could read! She said he wouldn't let go of his English book and she said he's gaining self-confidence because I encourage him a lot. Good.
But today I got the feeling he's immediately forgetting everything as soon as we're done with it. Nevertheless, it's priceless to see his face when he gets the right answer!
He's so funny this little chubby kid, stretching out between two yawns while his big belly came out of his shirt and he was drueling like a baby. He's just a kid. I don't know. I hope I'll be able to help him a little. Sunny said everyone is making fun of him in class. That's awful.
But hey! I carry the sun in a golden cup, the moon in a silver bag...
Which reminds me: I recently came across pictures of my "journey" in France last year and I was totally AMAZED to see the breathtaking sceneries of my trip with Patrick in the French Alps for New Year's!!!
Is it just me, or that's how paradise must look like?!
