Oasis.

Yesterday, I went to New Core Outlet to shop for a couple different things. They were having their Big Friday sale, and people were scrambling to find the best deals. The place was brimming with ajummas with teenage sons/daughters in tow, elbowing, shoving their way through the swarm of agassis and younger but equally notorious ajummas. To those who haven't been to Korea, it's hard to understand how scary they can be. With their short-curly hair, 'perpetually-angry' painted eyebrows, shiny faces and protruding bellies, it's understandable why some women hate to be associated with the word 'ajumma', more over, to be called one. But more than their outward appearance, they're the epitome of strength, frugality, and selflessness. They could sniff the best bargains from miles away, and with a few hundred of them at New Core, the place turned into a battlefield.

I was drenched in sweat, out of my wits, and terribly exhausted from all the pushing, shoving, and elbowing that I made a wrong turn and lost my way home. In the midst of innumerable apartment complexes, bustling shopping centers, unfamiliar congested roads, and pedestrians hustling their way from one place to another, I discovered an oasis that promises temporary relief and serenity from the frantic, frenzied, and 'headache-inducing' city.

It's a very spacious park, and I'm not sure if it's even famous or anything. The entrance is right in front of a busy street, but even if it's just a few meters away from the vehicle-clogged street, the air seemed fresher, cleaner, tinged with a bit of smell from pine trees and freshly-mowed grass.

I walked around and it was so relaxing to see the bright green trees and grass.


There were cute benches like this. I think it's a good, quiet place to read a book while drinking coffee.

Like with almost every park in Korea, there's a place to exercise.

This is what struck me the most. It's a huge, huge statue of a woman wearing hanbok. I have no idea who she is, but judging from the scale of the monument, I'm guessing she's probably deemed important and is revered by Koreans.

This is the view of the monument from afar. You could also see the buildings that surround the park.

There's also a Buddhist sanctuary at the far end. The place is so small and I'm not sure if we could actually call it temple (and do they have to have monks to be called a temple? ;-). Inside, there's a shrine where people could light some incense/candles, kneel, bow, and pray. Out of respect, I stayed outside and only took a picture of the gate.

Seeing this gave me yet another reason to love our city more!

Music Finds.

Chris is havin a blast watching Discovery Channel right now. They're doin a feature about Song-do (in Incheon) where he's from. When he's amused, bewildered or anxious, he makes those weird faces, and I couldn't help but to laugh behind his back. Ok, enough of that, this post isn't about him, his hometown or Discovery Channel...

***

I'm so into music, and I'm always on the look out for new songs that I could add to my ever growing mp3 files (currently at 1,213 songs and counting). That's why I'm starting a weekly music countdown thing-y here. Like I said, it's gonna be a weekly thing (ok, I'm beginning to sound redundant), and I'll be posting new songs and hopefully, it's on youtube so I could include the links.

Like some of you may know, I'm exclusively drawn to 3 specific genres (alternative, RNB, and Beach House music). So if it doesn't fall into any of the three categories, I don't listen to it (no matter how 'catchy' and popular the song is), hence I'm not gonna post it here.


Well, I've got a couple of really cool songs which I'm currently listening on repeat mode, and this will officially kick off my weekly countdown. Now do yourself a favor... sit back, click those links, and enjoy the music.

1. MGMT - *Time to Pretend God I love this song so much! I'm so feeling the beat, and I can't stop tapping my fingers everytime I hear it.

2. The Fly's - *Got you where I want you A song that's gonna be around for generations. It never gets old.

3. Snow Patrol - *How to be Dead This band never disappoints me. I haven't heard a song from Snow Patrol that I didn't like.

4. Vega 4 - *Life is Beautiful When I have difficulty sleeping, I listen to this song. It freezes all my anxieties and put me to sleep.

5. Tal Bachman - *If You Sleep You have to be really patient with this song. It doesn't start off really good, but wait till you get to the chorus. I'm telling you, it's definitely worth the wait.

Only in Korea.

This is one awful photo, and I'm sorry if you have to tilt your head a little to the right. I was just passing through some random street when I saw this middle-aged couple playing with 'that' thing. There are a bunch of plastic toys, stickers and candies inside the machine, but I don't see any reason why those two should be the slightest interested in them (the machine doesn't even have Xylitol!) Well, I always see Korea as a country of unpredictability. You can never anticipate what bizarre things you're gonna see next!

Bad Day, Gone Good.

After the Oido trip, I came back home the next day with a fever. I ached all over, got sore throat, and my head felt like it was smashed against the wall. It was no biggie, just a simple flu, but Chris was really worried so I took some flu medicines which made me feel really sleepy. I was so sleepy that I didn't feel the need to eat, so I headed straight to bed. When I woke up from the long 'nap' (if you could still call it a nap given that I slept all afternoon), I felt a little better. My headache was gone, but my stomach was rumbling so loud that it's embarrassing (which reminded me never to take Tylenol on an empty stomach again). When Chris asked me what I wanted to eat, I couldn't think of any other food but Gamjatang, so we went to our favorite Gamjatang restaurant which is about 8 minutes away from where we live. They served it in a really huge pot, and there was so much meat in there! Ok, I didn't just put that pepper in my mouth for the purpose of entertaining. I do eat those, in fact, I eat those frequently. I don't particularly like the taste, but dipped in ssamjjang, it's not so bad, and it's loaded with so much vitamins. I bite the tip first to see if my tongue could tolerate the 'zing'. Some peppers like that are really spicy, so you have to be careful before you bite a huge chunk or you'll end up with a burnt tongue.

Like I said, I was really hungry so after finishing all the meat and most of the soup, we ordered 'bokkeumbap'. The waitress brought the rice with sliced up kimchi, dried seaweed, and sesame oil. Then she put all those in the pot with a bit of the remaining soup (the rest she separated in another bowl). I like it when it's scorched, it's really good!

We were so full after the meal, so we went for a walk till we arrived at a park somewhere. The place where I stood is actually a fountain, but it wasn't working at that time. See those cute little lights at the back?

For some strange reason, Chris wanted to have ice cream so we went to Baskin and Robbins. Chris hates ice cream so I'm really curious what has gotten into him and he wanted to go there. I had a cone of Cappuccino/Espresso thingy, and Chris had Pistachio.

After the ice cream, we had this 'spur-of-the-moment' decision to watch a movie. It was almost 11:00 pm, so we hurried to go to CGV.

We chose "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince". While Chris was lining up to get our tickets, I took a picture of the place. The movie started at 11:10, pretty late but there were still a lot of people!

I'm not a Potter fan so I didn't actually like it. It's mediocrity, far too disappointing. I didn't watch all the other Potter movies, but I have a very good hunch that the Half Blood Prince was the worst.

We came back home around 2 am, but we slept at 3. I felt much better, though I still had a slight fever.

A Weekend We'll Never Forget.

It has been a crazy and super-stressful week, both Chris and I agreed that we need to get away from the city to clear our heads of any anxieties whatsoever. Friday was such a relief, and that night over dinner, we made plans to visit Oido the next day. I woke up around 12 noon with a slight headache the day we were supposed to go. Chris said it's ok to just cancel the trip so I could take a rest at home, but the thought of spending the whole day watching TV while Chris is playing computer game instantly made me feel better. At 3 pm, we departed, and it took a little more than two hours to get to our destination.

Oido is an island in Siheung City, West of Korea. On a good weather, you could clearly see Incheon and Wolgot from here.

I wasn't aware that summer vacation has already started, till we visited Oido Marine Park. The place was a screaming beehive! It's not a good time to go on a trip during the peakest of the season, when there's a mass exodus of Koreans flocking to every famous tourist destination there is. Prices are doubled, roads are congested, and parking is next to impossible. But we just couldn't wait another weekend to see this place, besides, we're planning a much longer road trip somewhere next week.

Those people who are standing on the left are what I call the "barkers". Their job is to attract passersby to enter the restaurants. They do all kinds of crazy stuff; they clap their hands, carry gongs, call you from afar, and one even grabbed my arm when I stopped momentarily to tie my shoelace (yeah..poor me). It was a test of patience as you get to be shoved, pushed, and shouted at by these people who seemed to be enveloped in the quirkiest of thoughts on how to bring in more dough for their respective restaurants.

The other side was much better, still crowded but the view is great. We passed by a random view point there where we stopped to take a picture. As you could see, it's pretty cloudy, but you could still see Incheon at the back. This place looks so much better at night when faint little lights and neon signs are seen from afar.

So what brings people to visit Oido other than seeing the breathtakingly beautiful scenery? Well, it's a place where the whole family could really enjoy. A lot of people have picnics here and do fishing like in the picture below.

It's also a good place for couples cause it's really romantic.

There are many fortune-tellers on the street, and many people visit their booths to have their fortune read. But this particular fortune-teller is different from the rest, cause at night he turns into a painter and sketches portraits too! Either he's hard up for cash, or he's just really talented!

There is a viewing deck where you could feed the birds, preferably with Oishi (no Pringles or Cheetos please!). I saw a lot of people both young and old feeding them. Who could blame them anyway, it's really fun! For those who haven't tried it, I say you MUST. You just throw the snack and a bird catches it midair. You could also feed them using your hand, but they sometimes bite so it's easier to just throw it up in the air. If it falls into the water, don't fret cause there are plenty of hungry ducks below that'll gladly eat them.

This is a very cute lighthouse at the "Sunset Place".

We also visited a small fishing community, but it's already closed when we got there. And that explains why their empty boats are stationed at the dock, with no fisherman in sight.

Both of us love to watch the sun set. Not only is it incredibly romantic, but it's also very 'enchanting' to see the skies change color. Our personal favorite is pink/purplish sky, but we don't usually get to see that. An hour before sunset, we bought a nice cold beer, chose a good spot, and watched as the horizon changed from gray, to orange, then finally warm red .

Shortly after sunset, the skies grew dark, and there wasn't much to see anymore. We're famished from only eating a sandwich for lunch and no breakfast, so we decided to find a good place to eat. Choosing wasn't so easy as there are so many restaurants to choose from, serving almost every delicious seafood dish I know (all boasting MBC, KBS, and SBS featured their restaurants). When Chris asked me what I wanted to eat, I said something new, something exotic and different like sashimi. We went to this great place, settled on a table, gave our orders, and waited. It didn't take long before the first plate was served. It has a little bit of everything from shrimps, scallops, sea squirt, shells, quail eggs, baby potatoes, and beans. I suppose the cherry tomatoes and prunes are for dessert, but those were the first ones we ate!
Then came the rest of our orders. This is one humongous serving of insanely delicious sashimi!

And this is my Oppa's favorite, wriggling squid sashimi. it feels kinda funny in the mouth, so you have to chew it really well before you swallow.

Like those food aren't enough, we even had Maeuntang! This is by far the most delicious Maeuntang I've ever tasted.

In Korea, a great, sumptuous meal would never be complete without soju. When we ordered it, the lady asked if we want a strong or mild soju. Ok, this was a first for me. I didn't know Chamisil Soju has 2 different kinds. Now, there's a hope for all those 'soju-haters' like me. Chris chose the mild one of course, and if I remember correctly, it's 19.5% alcohol volume. I must have tasted the stronger ones before, cause this time it went down pretty easy, and it wasn't that hard to swallow.

There was so much food that it's impossible to finish it all. I haven't eaten that much seafood in one night in my entire life! Food was really great, and I say it was the best part of the trip!

Everything about Oido exceeded my expectation. The breathtaking view, sunset so beautiful it hurts, and it's so damn romantic you can't help but cuddle and feel all mushy and sappy. I forgot to mention foreigners and 'locals' are in equal proportion, so I didn't stick like a sore thumb. We had so much fun, and I'm absolutely positive we're gonna visit this place again soon!

The Cine Park Experience.

There are 4 big theaters here in Suwon, and CGV Cine Park is one of them. It's the nearest to our place, so that's where we usually go when we wanna watch a movie. Our phone subscription allows us to watch a movie once a month for free (how cool is that?!), so it has also become our monthly 'thing' to visit there. I like Cine Park a lot cause it's not too crowded. It's also a good place to hangout, especially at night when all those cute lights and neon signs are turned on. Inside, there are many shops, cafes, and restaurants to choose from.

The last time we went there was last month. We wanted to watch "Terminator Salvation" but it wasn't shown anymore, and they replaced it with "Transformers" instead. Chris strongly refused to watch it so I had to drag him to go inside. I didn't wanna watch it too, but there was no other choice cause it was the only English movie shown at that time, and there's no way I could bear to watch a 2-hour Korean movie without subtitle. Well, I did once, and it was a 15th century historical movie. I almost popped a vein trying to decipher what those guys were talking about. I could understand a bit of Korean, but not like the ancient way they used. What makes it more difficult to understand is their intonation, it's very different from what I hear from people around me. It's like they're singing but they're not. I don't know, it's kinda hard to describe it. I try to read their facial expression to get a clue of what's happening, but with their 'poker-face', it's impossible to. They made "my queen, the emperor just died" seem like "dude, where are my keys?", cause everyone had the same facial expression all throughout the movie.

After the movie, we looked for a place to eat. I wanted to skip the usual restaurants we visit and try something new, so we went to the foodcourt. We haven't eaten at a foodcourt before, so I was so excited to try it. As soon as I saw the display, my eyes popped cause it looked so real! The plates are huge, and the food looked so mouthwatering.





Here's how it works, so you choose the menu you want, and it has a corresponding code. You give that code to the cashier and pay, and you'll be given a slip. You wait at the table till your number is shown in the screen, then you go claim your food. The food didn't look exactly like the one I chose. The plate is smaller and the quantity is lesser. The taste is uhm.. rather disappointing, cause I expected more. But then again, it's one of the cheapest place to eat, so quality isn't exactly the reason why people go there.

Seven days to go before July ends, and we're gonna visit Cine Park again soon. We haven't decided which movie we're gonna watch, but one thing's for sure, we wont be visiting the foodcourt again.

Artsy-Partsy.

When I'm out of the house doing the most random things, I always see a lot of unusual stuff that show a different side of Korea, and it kills me that I wasn't able to take pictures of those cause I didn't have the camera with me. But now I learned my lesson, so whenever I go out of the house, I make it a point to always bring it. Korea is "unpredictable" in the sense that you don't know what you're gonna see next.

Today's no different, I brought the camera even though I'm just going to buy a new hairbrush. And while I was on my way to the mall, I saw some pretty interesting sculptures or what others like to call "artwork". I'm not really into sculptures or any 3-dimensional art objects for that matter, so I don't really know if I'm looking at something that is a work of art or just a piece of crap. Well, they're all over the place and I thought I should take some pictures to show it to you guys.


The first one right here gives me the whole "Film-festival" vibe. I haven't been to one, but for some reason, I think it'll be a good representation for the movie industry.



This reminds me of a Science project I did when I was in highschool. The theme then was "Sci-fi" and "Futuristic".



I really don't get this. What a waste of precious resources. Do they know how many pots and pans you could make with all those metal?



A huge broken lock in a parking lot. Something tells me we should never park the car there.



This one is interesting. I see it as a symbol of family, security, and unity which is perfect for the insurance company building where it's located.



One of those sculptures I don't really get. It reminds me of Donuts, in a weird kinda way.



Ok, this is my favorite. In a land where women over 50 kgs are considered fat, this is a breath of fresh air.

Thoughts on blogging.

Before I met Chris, I knew very little of this country. Even if I was surrounded by Koreans for years, I still couldn't get a 'feel' of their country and culture. Whenever I ask them to describe Korea, I usually get a generic response like "Korea is very beautiful", "it's very clean", and "it has four seasons" like they learned that from school or something. Maybe it's because of the language that's why it's so hard for them to describe Korea the way I wanted them to, or maybe it's something else.. Hanging out with them taught me a couple of things about their culture like how they value age, their love for drinking (that's why you could always find them in bars around Manila), and their obsession with education. But no matter how many Koreans I meet, there were still so many things I couldn't understand, and so many questions were still unanswered.


After I met Chris, I became more and more eager to learn about his country. Sure there are so many stuff you could read on the Internet, but I find blogs more informative. I wanted to know how it's like to be here, 'see' things that they see, and 'feel' things that they feel even if I was thousands of miles away from this country. I consider myself lucky for having to read Anabanana's blog before, because her posts answered a lot of things I couldn't understand. She inspired me in so many ways, so when I came here, I wanted to do the same thing. I wanna be able to share my experiences not just through words but also pictures, cause there might be someone like me out there, who wants to know how it's like to be here, 'see' things as I see them, and 'feel' what I feel. I'd sometimes receive kudos comments that inspire me to write and share more. But there's one that flattered me the most, and it says "parang nakapasyal na rin ako sa Korea", cause that's exactly my purpose for blogging.


I like to keep it real, no pretense or whatsoever. When I'm sad, bitter, happy, or angry I say that straight-up. I make fun of myself, laugh at my insecurities, and I even write personal stuff that I shouldn't be saying. I never intended to boast cause life here isn't as sweet as some people would think. This is exactly the way I wanna present my life here in Korea. It's what I like calling "bitter-sweet", both pleasant and painful, sad and happy, boring but sometimes fun!

My Korean Coffee Experience.

Lately, I noticed that I'm having this 'incessant' craving for coffee buns and caramel macchiato. So for 4 straight mornings (excluding my other occassional visits), I've been going to this coffee shop called "Rotiboy". Here in our place, we have about a hundred different coffee shops, and Rotiboy happens to be the smallest. It's so small that it could only accomodate around 10 people, even less. Their coffee is actually not that impressive, cause I've tasted better, but compared to other coffee shops in our area, they're the best! Their coffee bun is a totally different thing. Those buns are 'out of this world'! It's so damn good it's gonna be hard to describe it without using profanities ;-). As soon as you enter the door, the first thing you're gonna notice is the smell of these 'heavenly' buns (I could even smell it from across the street^^), and it'll be impossible for you to resist ordering. I guarantee that on the first bite, you'll be hooked, and you'll be craving for more (drool)... and more... till you blow up your diet for the sake of these buns. I'm beginning to sound like a deranged coffee-bun addict, and I think I should stay away from these buns for while before it turns into a full-blown, 'hard-to-get-rid-of ' addiction.






Coffee is like a drug to me, and I need to have 2 cups of coffee a day to function properly. But I can't afford to go to Rotiboy twice a day, so I just drink Maxim's in the afternoon. Sometimes, I'd have some pastry on the side like the one shown below. I got this cheese cake from Homeplus for 1,700 won. It's the only cake I eat cause for some reason, I'm extremely choosy when it comes to that. I find the ones served at coffee shops disappointing (except for those buns of course), and I think it's a total waste of money so I almost never order from them. I could get something 10x better than the ones they serve at half the price anyway!

Nail Thrift~ing.

Other than Chris, I don't usually get compliments that my nails are cute or something, so I wanna say T-H-A-N-K-S to those who said so! I bite my nails a lot (a nasty habit I'm trying so hard to kick), so it looks kinda gross. What I do is color them to make them stand out (and to hide the fact that it looks too damn gross without one^^). Since going to the Nail Salon costs a lot of money, I just buy the nail polish and do it myself. It's easy cause they really have good nail polish here, especially Skin Food (my favorite... though they don't have the yellow I wanted). They also have really cute nail stickers which are so easy to use (their floral pattern is my favorite ^^). It helps if you have a steady hand, in my case, I drink a lot of coffee so I make a lot of errors and have to re-apply it over and over till I get the result I wanted. I'm right-handed so applying the nail polish on the right is one tedious task. Sometimes I'd ask Chris to do it for me. Of course he complains, but when I tell him I'm just gonna go to the salon and pay, he immediately stops whining and applies that nail polish. It's funny how a simple trip to the salon could motivate him into doing the "girl-iest" job! ;-p

The day we went to Daebudo.

I've heard about Daebudo (Daebu Island) a long time ago from Chris. He always mentioned he wanted to bring me there, but for some reason, we would always end up going to a different place. He went to Daebudo with his parents a couple of years ago, and that trip inspired him to bring me there. Daebudo is located in Ansan-si, Gyeonggido province. This huge island which connects to Oido in Siheung City, sits in the Yellow Sea or how the Koreans call it, "the West Sea". Like I said in my previous post "Beach Talk", the Western shore is muddy and shallow like that of Daebudo, so this place isn't exactly for swimming and more for sightseeing purposes only.

So Sunday was the day we both decided to visit Daebudo. Chris woke up early to find some info about the weather and the place . He doesn't know how to get there without a car (we don't have it right now, and we wont be using it for a while.. long story^^), so he has to know how using the subway and bus. He woke me up around 11 am, demanding breakfast. I don't know but Sunday has always been my "lazy day", so I just bought coffee buns instead of preparing the usual breakfast. Right after we ate, we departed. The coffee and buns made me even more sleepy than I already was (we were up till 5 am the night before the trip), so I had to have more coffee at the station to perk me up.

We got off somewhere in Ansan, and while we were waiting for the bus that'll take us to Daebudo, I took a picture of the place. What I love about Ansan is that it has it's own 'urban' and 'rural' side. This is how their 'urban' side looks like. It doesn't look any different from the streets back in the city.

And this is how their 'rural' side looks like. Looks so different from the picture above right?

Ok, I know Daebudo looks icky and muddy cause you have to get dirty and all (this isn't a place for the squeamish), but you'll be surprised to know how romantic and fun it is to walk in the mud and explore different weird creatures. It's a totally different experience for me, and I had a lot of fun.

A lot of couples and families visit this place. There are so many crabs in the mud so some people brought their own shovel and buckets to catch them.

Those who didn't wanna get dirty chose to stay in shady spots like this. Some put up their own tents, and had barbecue (and if there's barbecue, there would always be soju right?).

Chris had so much fun digging and looking for creatures in the mud. I didn't touch any of them cause I'm afraid they'd bite. Here's Chris scaring me with some unidentified insect.



When the sun was about to set, I grabbed Chris to clean up and we chose a cozy spot to watch...

It's one of the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen. The sun made a cute reflection in the mud...

Of course, a trip would never be complete without tasting their famous food. Daebudo is known for it's delicious Kalguksu (칼 쿸 수). It's the main reason why Chris wanted to bring me there. We went to a Kalguksu restaurant that was featured in SBS. While waiting for our order, "banchan" (side-dishes) were served. The grain thing-y is called "bori" (barley), and you mix it with those veggies and gochujang to make "boribap".


And this one is called "bajirak kalguksu". It comes in a really huge bowl, enough to feed 4 hungry people. It was so delicious and so different from what I've tasted before!

Right after we ate, we decided to go home. It was already dark then. Both of us were really tired and we slept on the bus going to the subway station. Chris was being his usual 'goofy-self' when we were at the train, so as not to make me fall asleep again. Ansan is known for it's numerous factories, so there were more foreigners than Koreans on the train. We were oblivious to the stares we got from them as we took this picture...

* and as you can see in the picture, I bite my nails a lot!!!