Bonus Ramblings

This evening, I decided to go to a café for a little tea and reading time. I really like reading in public places, for whatever reason. So I walked over to a cute little place called Hue Story that is just down the main road from my place. If you were to judge the regular activities of Koreans based solely on what shops are most numerous, you would be convinced that all people did was drink coffee, eat out and talk on cell phones. This city is quite crawling with cafés. Hue Story is a cute little place with an exposed brick wall, Christmas lights and some kitschy decor including a high ledge that holds a skateboard and a random selection of university textbooks including Orthodontics, Power Electronics and Clinical Pedodontics.

I ordered a black tea but what I got tasted like a halfway between black and green (and was, as tea tends to be here, horrifically overpriced) and sat down to read Sandman vol 8. When I first arrived, a big group of girls sat at the tables beside me, giggling and chatting. When they left, they were replaced by a very quiet couple that, for a while, I thought didn’t speak at all.
Across the street from the café is the building of one of Korea’s big TV stations and I went walking in its pleasant little courtyard before I came to Hue Story. Attached to the building is a movie theatre that I might check out soon. It’s almost the weekend, which is exciting. I’m hope to take a little trip to the jimjilbang for a little TLC on Saturday. Jimjilbang are awesome, family-friendly, affordable spa places with hot tubs and saunas and hot floors to lie on. Totally my sort of places.

While we were wandering last Sunday, we passed a belly dancing studio which I also want to check out since I really liked taking belly dance lessons way back in Guelph.
Tonight feels like a night of random reflections and I shouldn’t waste this inexplicably mellow and talkative mood, so the rest of this entry is a bunch of observations / thoughts / mongoose.
Previously I mentioned the crazily wide roads around here. I said 6 to 8 lanes but I actually counted and the one I have to cross to go to work is in fact 12 lanes wide. For real. And yet there are still always cars parked on the sidewalk and at least twice I’ve been narrowly missed by motorcyclists careening along the sidewalk. I’m beginning to suspect that sidewalks here are conceptualized rather differently than I’m used to.

On a completely unrelated note, I the toilets at work are squatters. When I told my mom she was surprised because last year we only encountered squat toilets in China, but it seems like they are common in Korea, just not as much in Seoul. I’m not a very good squatter, for my shame, so it’s taking some getting used to. I do take the point that they are, in their way, more sanitary than seated toilets since everyone’s bare bum isn’t touching the same seat (though it’s a hell of a job not peeing on your pants when you are new to squatting) but since I’m not even close to being a germaphobe, I do prefer unsanitary over uncomfortable. Also, the bathrooms are horrifically cold, as is the water that comes out of the tap. So peeing at work = not that fun.
Another remembered tidbit: I’m definitely going to miss Canada’s non-smoking laws. By the time I came of age, smoking was already a no-no in bars and clubs (yeah, I’m so young, I know) and this fact becomes more valuable when you go to places where smoking is still a-okay in such places. Yuck.

Lastly on the miscellaneous thoughts train: much can be said about Korea’s incredible homogeneity. But the part of it that I am thinking about right now is that, when something is in style, a breathtakingly, incomparably large portion of the population is into it. An obvious example: shiny black coats. Seriously, young and old, male and female, a ridiculously high percentage of the population wears essentially the same winter coat. It’s actually pretty incredible. Even the most generally accepted trends in Canada can’t hope to be so ubiquitous.
To wrap up this meandering entry, I give you another lovely link. This group is huge in Korea as well as Southeast Asia /Oceania (I once saw a video of some Malaysia teen girls, including hijabis, doing a synchronized dance to one of their songs in the middle of a city square) and this song has the sexy sound of good old fashioned R&B. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvXMOSB5aqk

Love,
AAA

P.S. as an unrelated bonus, here is another link to an Iron & Wine song that I lovely like crazy and is highly appropriate for such a mellow mood.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVwIBFEjQXY