생일축하합니다!

...that's Korean for "happy birthday!" and what a happy birthday it was!

Waking up, I dove into the pile of presents and cards from home sittng next to my bed, which had been eagerly waiting to be opened for the past two weeks! Clothes from Mum and Dad, which was nice! :D After trying on my new gear, I had teaching as normal (9.30-12.30), but then, luckily, my afternoon classes were cancelled! Pretty cheeky birthday present! So to Rodeo-gil it was to treat myself to even more new clothes with the birthday money I don't have! I'll definitely be returning THERE come wage day!

So, well and truly presented and relaxed, up, I scootched over to Itaewon to meet Merv, Chris, Hye Jung and Jeong Mi for galbi (for the third time in so many days! XD) and then we all flitted up to N Seoul Tower by cable cart to lap up some nighttime scenery! Unfortunately, the lift to the very top of the tower was closed (we were half an hor too late! ;_;) but Hye Jung and Jeong Mi came well prepared and, from the mystery box that they had been carrying, whipped out a MASSIVE CAKE! Okay, no views from the top of the tower, but when we've got amazing cake and even better company I'm a happy boy!

Chris, Hye Jung and Jeong Mi enjoy the galbi!

Not quite atop N Seoul Tower - but halfway there!

Oh, and did I mention the MASSIVE CAKE...?

75% of Korea's supply of ice-cream went into making this cake.

Wow, definitely a birthday to remember! That cake must have cost a fortune! (Though, knowing Korean prices, it was probably about as much as a bakewell tart is back home XD) It was so cute the way Hye Jung emerged from the cab with this mystery box wrapped in her hands and a birthday hat too! (Look closely in the pictures, you might see it!) - ahhhh, I'm going to miss my Korean friends!

It was also really cool around the edges of the tower - it's a popular place for couples to date, and the fences are all flowering padlocks of every shape, colour and size, which couples on a date have brought themselves, written a heartfelt message on and then locked to the fence to symbolise their lasting love. Ahhhh, how sweet! There are actually now so many padlocks on the fences that the staff have even put up these metallic tree-like things to make more room to hold them on!

Padlocks, padlocks, everywhere! You can see how much they've filled up the fences!

Oh, it also turns out that this was actually my 20th birthday, rather than my 19th! ...since in Korea, although birthdays are still celebrated, you aren't considered as ageing a year on your birthday, but, instead, everyone gets a year older on January 1st of every new year. So, in that sense, I was aready 20 coming into the country! One of my students told me that she preferred it to the Western way, since it meant that everyone in her school year was the same age, but it seems a little strange to me! Is uniformity really that important? I guess it adds another dimension to New Year's celebrations though!

Anyway, in other news, I got talking to Jeong Mi last night and she mentioned going to an SM Town Concert at Olympic Park. In Korea, SM Town is literally as big as they come: it's like an amalgamation of all of the biggest acts on the SM label: Super Junior, DBSK, SNSD, BoA... needless to say, I'M THERE! Hahaha, will be such a different side of Korea worth seeing: the side of the rabid teenage fangirl. Apparently we're going to have to POUNCE on the ticket website when it opens, though, rabid teenage fangirls don't hang around when it comes to ticket-buying! Oh, and it also turns out that we share the same favourite member of Super Junior: Hankyung! Great minds and all that...! :P

Anyway, I'll leave you with this pretty nifty picture of me in front of N Seoul Tower! (The tower was waaaaaaaay too big to get a close-up of in one picture, but I used MS Paint to stick two together - not bad, huh? :P).