Birthday Weekend

After Halloween, my birthday is like around the corner. This year my birthday landed on Sunday. My Korean college friend had made plans for my fabulous birthday weekend. I was so excited for that weekend! We were supposed to go to spend a weekend in a pension in Taean, claming, and etc. My friend had already booked a place for all of us to stay for the weekend, so all we needed to do was to show up in Cheonan. As the weekend was approaching, the weather was not coping with us at all. It was raining that weekend and it was suppose to get even worst...Great! What a great start to my birthday weekend! TT Before heading out to the train station to Cheonan, I had dinner with a friend that was introduce to me by my main school. She was a college student in Changwon about the same age as I am. My colleagues told me that she would like to meet foreigners in Milyang. From what I heard from them, she lived in New York City for 3 years interning at a Korean company. We finally were meeting up for dinner on Friday. I was pretty excited!!!

But this week, I caught a cold this week somehow, so I had the sniffly running nose, cough and a throat that was aching. I thought it would be a great time to have some delicious Sam-se-tang. It was also drizzling and cold outside so it was perfect to have some chicken rice soup. We ended up talking, non-stop about ourselves and what we did in America. It was great until it was time to leave. I purchase a ticket to leave Milyang on Friday night so I can arrive at Cheonan at 10:45pm. My train was leaving at 7:10pm. So, we ended up leaving at 7pm, I thought I had enough time to get to the train station,,,boy was I wrong...I blame it all on the stupid rain...I quickly power walked to my apartment to grab my carry-on luggage and bolted out the door. I took a cab and there was traffic...for some reason since it's raining, people all of a sudden have different driving styles...being super slow...ughhh...As soon as I got to the train station, I ran as fast as I could with all the bags in my hands. I missed my train by 1 minute...I couldn't believe it...ughh... I saw it leaving and I was like F*%&@! I went to the counter and told them I just miss my train the representative helped get my reimbursement back but I had to pain a penalty fee of 4000 won. It is definitely better than the full amount. 

 

The representative was super nice and she helped me book another ticket for next train heading out to Cheonan but I had to wait an hour...and it was also double the price because it was KTX...TT....You learn from your mistakes!.. When I arrive in Cheonan station, my friend was at the station looking for me. I was apparently suppose to go to Cheonan-Asan station. That is why we couldn't find eachother....OMG moment...I felt so stupid...ughh..I had to take the metro to Cheonan-Asan. I followed all the signs for Cheonan-Asan but no one was waiting there, about 10 minutes passed. I started doubting myself and tripled check the signs and it had arrows assuring me that I was heading to Cheonan-Asan Station. I called my Korean friend and told her about my situation to just double check. I ended up giving my phone to a complete stranger after saying excuse me in Korean so my friend can check if I was at the correct place. Of course, I had to pick the most gorgeous looking man to help me hahaha and he was right in front of me so it was meant to be. I was standing on the wrong side...now it started to make sense that no one was standing over here...O.O...great now I look stupid...fml...>.< He was so helpful and the group of guys were so cute. As I was leaving the metro, they were waving goodbye. I respectfully said good-bye and gave them a head bow. I was laughing at myself because I made myself look like a fool in front of them standing on the wrong side...hahaha..you just got to love it..

I was finally at the correct station. I  meet up with my college friend and a friend from another town. I felt so sorry and bad because they had to wait another 20 minutes because of my careless mistakes. My Korean friend just got her driver's license not to long ago, so she was a newbie at drivng. She picked me up at the station and she has one of those cute small light aqua blue compact cars. I felt like I was in one of those light blue fake barbie doll cars hahaha. Anyways, we decided to go see a movie called Dracula in Port-a-Pent in Cheonan at CGV. It was my first movie theater in Korea and it was amazing. They had a wide selection of affordable food choices, a section of fashion displays, and much more. You even had the option to choose your seats of where you wanted to sit. After getting are cheese bacon fries and beer we headed to the room.

 

Outside of the movie theaters, there are many places to buy snacks from...which I love..something that I need to bring back to the States with me...and it is not overprices...

Fancy movie theater rooms...very elegant..

Morning breakfast from my Korean friend's mom...she is super sweet...rice cake and mandu...homemade of deliciousness... :)

Italian food for my birthday lunch....

Super cute chef....had to take the picture of him in front of the oven brick...

Table setting and the server was super nice and generous.. (:

This pasta dish was a red sauce pasta..very flavorful..it was delicious but it didn't blow me away...it very good Korean Italian food.

White sauce seafood pasta...very delicious and flavorful...

This pizza blowned me away..it was super delicious and cheesy...There is honey on the side were you drizzle on top of the pizza and it is phenomenally delicious...I want to go back just for this heavenly piece of master piece.

Of course, Bing-su to Cheesecake Patbingsu...droolss...

Oven fried chicken was pretty delicious....but for the pasta with grilled chicken probably not going to order that again...It tasted like boiled pasta with white sauce from a can poured on top..><

Late night drink... 

October Collage

 My wishes...

 Jinju Station...

Clubbing in Hongdae

10/25~10/26 This weekend, my friend had invited me to go clubbing with her in Hongdae. I also had invited a couple of my friends to come along. I believe the more the merrier. I have to say I was a bit skeptical on how clubbing worked in South Korea. I wanted to know if it was similar or different from the States, so I went to check it out. I love going to Seoul but that requires me waking real early for the train. It is a bit dreadful waking up that early on a Saturday but  I don't mind it because I would be so excited for the day. The cheapest train ticket for Seoul would be Munghwa which is roughly aroun24,800 won ($25), the slowest train and it takes 5 hours. I usually buy the ticket for around 5:49am so I would get there around 10:49am. I get the earliest ticket because I want to get out of my town, explore Seoul more since it has so much to offer, and to catch up with my friends that live in Seoul. My little town doesn't have much to do. This Saturday morning, I had my alarm for 4:30am but the snooze button.... I snoozed my alarm until 5:10am. I stayed up late to catch up with the latest season of Grey's Anatomy. I just couldn't stop watching it because it left you off your seat at every episode like any other good drama would do. Anyhow, I quickly got ready and slab some makeup to make me look half awake...I'm a walking zombie if I don't get enough sleep...by the time I was finish getting ready it was already 5:37am. I quickly grab all my belongings and ran out the door. I thought I had enough time so I just powered walk to the Main Street. The Main Street has dozens of taxis swarming around this time of night but for some odd reason, the streets were dead, not a single taxi. I was like f@&$! So I was walking around literally looking out for a taxi to drive by and I was like I don't have enough time it was 5:40am. I quickly went into the GS25 and use the universal hand signal for a phone call and I blurted out taxiiii. I tried real hard to make it sound like how Koreans say it. Thank goodness she understood. She called the taxi and it came in 2 mins..so it's about 5:43am. I am panicking a lot inside because if I don't make this train I would get to Seoul around 1pm or so...

I quickly threw my carry on bag and said "gichayeog", (train station). I had to say it twice since he didn't understand, my pronunciation is off sometimes but I am pretty sure that I had said it correctly, because when the cashier called the taxi, I heard her say "miguk". I felt like this taxi driver was f$&@ing with me. I mad sure to watch were the meter is because taxi drivers sometimes scam you. If they press thoses buttons, there is extra surcharges up to 2000 won. Well, I was right his itchy fingers was there. I'm pretty sure I was staring real hard and he saw that I'm not stupid and slowly withdraw his itchy hands away..ugh.. I didn't have the time, way to early for that sh$&@, and there was a mere possiblity that I was missing my train. I told the taxi driver "Bali, Bali!" (Hurry, Hurry!) he didn't understand and started to break....I was like Aniyo, upeyy! (No, up!). I felt like that was the slowest taxi ride I have ever been on.Korean taxi drivers are very wreckless, speedy, ignorant and they think they own the streets. They drive super fast to get you from point A to point B really fast so usually you are holding on for dear life when your in a taxi car in Korea. The funny part is that they get offended if you put on your seatbelt and start talking in Korean or smacking the selt beat out of your hands. This happened many times wih me because I always put a seat belt on. I don't care if your a good drivers or whatever. Seat belt is a must. Things can happen!! Let me stop with this taxi rant and get back to finishing the story. I finally arrived at 5:48am. I ran as fast as could with a carry on in my hands and an oversized bag, up a flight of stairs and down a flight of stairs to catch the train. I was getting stares running but I didn't really care it's Korea. I had a train to catch. I get stares were ever I go as I mentioned I'm a standing tower in Korea. This morning was a rough start! 

Zzzzzzz....5 hours later.....I finally arrived in Seoul. My friends and I were meeting up at the Hello Kitty cafe in Hongdae. I had the most difficult time finding the cafe I was literally circling around Hongdae with a carry on luggage. I was following direction from a blogger online and she said that it is near a Watson and Ho bar. There are about 3 Ho bars in Hongdae. I was such a tourist. This was my third time in Hongdae. I love Hongdae nightlife it is pretty awesome. My friends were coming a little later because their bus arrival was alittle later than mine. By the time they got to Seoul, we ended up going together...me with directions not so good I guess...haha

 

Before heading out to go clubbing, we decided to get dinner before chugging down massive amounts alcohol..haha jk I'm not a heavy drinker, but I like to drink moderately. We went to eat at Mr. Cheese Rib, apparently it is a new popular food in Seoul. I am always up to trying new things especially when it comes to food.

When we walked into Mr. Cheese Rib's restaurant it was really busy, In my head, I was assuming it must be really good since it was packed. We had a choice of choosing how spicy we wanted our ribs, of course we choose the lowest level we can possible pick (mild). We had are Korean friend order since she knew more Korean than anyone else at the table. While waiting for our food, I was looking around and man did the food look amazingly good. While we were chatting up a storm, are food finally came to the table. We had a ghetto gas stove with a hot cast iron plate full of marinated ribs and massive amounts of cheese. Hooray for me because I love cheese. 

In Korea, cheese is super expensive and hard to come by especially were I live, unfortunately. The only time I eat cheese is when it comes with our food that we order. (pizza, cheese dakgalbi, etc) So, this year I will be cheese deprived.. TT haha really tho. We got these special gloves to use to eat our ribs with to prevent our hands from getting dirty. The first bite into my ribs, my mouth was on fire, literally!!! I couldn't help but prance my legs around as that was suppose to soothe my pain in my mouth...hahaha but that hella was spicy as #$&%*! and the sad part is that we had to champ it out and finish it. My grandma and mom always nags when throwing out food, so they make sure that we eat all our food before letting us play when we were little. It always stuck with me, therefore I don't let food go to waste. I was eating ribs after ribs because if I stopped it was much more painful but there was a point were I couldn't handle the heat anymore. I was sweating eating theses ribs; one of my friends said I looked like I was giving birth..haha.. Most of my friends had a couple and called it quits. I told my friends after eating these spicy ribs, we don't need to put lip gloss on because we would have plumped lips ready for the club..hahaha... We were probably the most obnoxious table and loudest table in the restaurant but we had the I don't care attitude like most foreigners...haha 

Yep! I also tried Nitrogen ice cream before I left Seoul treating my home sickness. Before leaving I usually like to get something sweet as I head back to my town.hahaha

That's all I have for ya'll now but I should be posting another one about my birthday weekend in Cheonan!! 

Xoxo-Chuieeadventures