Subways, Soju and Squid

So it's about time that I write about my first time in Seoul and first time on the subway.

So my first Saturday here I arranged with my friend Jon and his fiance Krista to take the subway over to eastern Seoul to meet them. The plan was that I would take the subway myself and then spend the night and they would come back with me to Incheon and help me out a bit with local things. Now it is important to mention that the subway ride is about 2 hours just to get there.

I was supposed to have internet hooked up around 4:00, but in true Korean fashion no one showed up until 530. I don't know what took so long but they were here for two hours. When they left I basically ran out the door and headed to the station.

One of my biggest fears was using the subway system alone. When I got there a Korean worker helped me to buy a ticket and I was on the platform within minutes. I originally thought that I was on the wrong platform but as more people started coming on to it I realized that they had to all be going the direction of Seoul, the other way was one last subway stop and then the end of the line.

I was lucky and caught the Rapid train which skips about 9 stops on the way to my transfer station, shaving off about 20 minutes. I got off, transferred, and got on the proper platform all within minutes. It was a HUGE victory. I was so proud of myself. The subway ride after seemed so long and I was so bored. I had my ipod but I was worried about missing the stop that I didn't really listen to it. But I made it and didn't get on the wrong subway once. I didn't cry once. And I didn't offend or piss off any Koreans in the process so it was a successful trip on all accounts (I credit the English subway map in the back of the Seoul book Jenna got me completely for this fact).

When I arrived at the Cheonho station I couldn't figure out how to get out. Apparently you have to swipe your card to leave the one area but I didn't know this. I just kept walking and the doors would slam on me. There was a guy protecting two that were obviously broken, he stepped aside to talk to someone and I ran through and kept on going. Jon had told me to go out exit 5....do you think that I could find exit 5? No. I found 1-4 and then 6-10, but no five. I walked around in circles for at least ten minutes. I continued to look at the signs and then go to where it said #5 was and nope... not there... I looked at the map again and decided to go out #4 and walk around outside to the fifth exit.

Upon exiting the station I was in awe, it was awesome. Bright lights, lots of shops, tons of people... what I had originally expected in coming to SK. Jon and Krista live in a really busy area at night and there is lots of street traffic, bars and street vendors...I loved it.

I was taken to their place and it was really nice, especially compared to mine. I was definitely jealous of all their storage and their clean looking bathroom. Plus their loft bed that you had to climb stair to get to, although it was only about 4 feet high so you have to hunch or crawl to the bed...but still, it makes their living room a living room and not a bedroom.

We had some beer and I had my first experience with soju. Soju is kinda of like Korean vodka but tastes alarmingly similar to rubbing alcohol. Soju really is pretty gross, but it's cheap so I could see it becoming a staple in my drinking expeditions. Jon says that often they judge the night on how bad their Soju headache is the next day. Krista also cooked me some food because all I had eaten all day was a piece of toast.

We headed out to their favorite bar called the Funky Dunky (awesome name right?), which is right around the corner from their place. It was packed. There was flaring by the bartenders, some really disgusting drinks made that included raw egg that some girls had to drink and we got a free beer for Krista's loud cheering (last week Krista won a whole bottle of vodka in a drinking competition). It seemed that everything that happened there was a big ordeal and production. I wish I had a place like that near me, but my area doesn't really have a happening nightlife.

I ate fire squid! Basically what happened was that they came to our table with raw squid and then Jon held the lighter and the guy had alcohol on his fingers and some in his mouth, he lit his fingers on fire and held them by the squid and then spit the alcohol out of his mouth and it put the squid on fire, he repeated this a few times. See the video below, it's much more impressive than the picture.

We got back to their place around 230 and by the time I fell asleep it was definitely 3:00. I was up at 7:00 and couldn't get back to sleep..I blame the Soju headache.

The next morning Jon made eggs and toasted bagels for breakfast. We all showered and then headed on our way back to Incheon.