Octopus legs, jazz bars and a shiny new friend!

First off, let me say: last night was fucking AWESOME. What started out as a pretty normal day in Seoul soon turned into what I think's going to be the turning point of this whole experience. To cut the crap, Mervyn arrived. OMG, another English person at last! Yup, while I've been having fun familiarising myself with the country up until now, and while I'd say one of the best things about Korea is its small Western population, even I was starting to get a bit desperate for some English-speaking company . . . and THANK THE HEAVENS it's not just arrived, but that it's arrived in the form of someone I can definitely see as becoming a really good friend.

So, we didn't waste any time! Mervyn got here about 6, and, without a plan, we headed straight out for dinner. Our tactic was just to pick a random station ("Seoul Nat'l University of Education" - that must be kind of studenty, RIGHT?") and get off at a random exit (Mervyn: "...this one's got a smiley face next to it on the map! Let's go there!"), and, somehow, it worked! We ended up at a little noodle-bar like restaurant, flipping through a menu with not as much as a word of English in it. So I pointed to a picture on the menu which I thought looked like chicken (*WESTERN DEFAULT MINDSET* = ALL WHITE MEAT = CHICKEN) and asked what it was, which apparently in Korean is the same as actually ordering food, so one plate of chicken-like stuff it was! Turned out it wasn't chicken. It wasn't even fucking close. It was OCTOPUS. And not just octopus, but octopus legs (legs... tentacles... I'm not splitting hairs) - all full of suckers and everything! Blerrrrgh! Don't ask me how the hell I thought a chicken was an octopus. Blame the menu! But, I guess it got me to try something I never would have dared to otherwise! And it wasn't actually that bad! ...except, in typical Korean style, the sauce it was in was hot enough to make you infertile.

So, after declaring nuclear war on our tastebuds, we figured we needed a drink to cool down. "Hmm, that place looks alright...", Mervyn mused. Oh, how right he was. Turns out it was what I can only think to describe as a Korean gentleman's cocktail bar: outwardly classy, but with a hint of middle-aged grime in the air. Now, don't get me wrong - it wasn't seedy and there was nothing sexual about it, it was just - well, a place where middle aged regulars go, mostly alone, for a drink and a chat with the female barstaff. More upsetting than sexy... these poor lonely old men... Anyway, needless to say, we were probably the youngest people to ever to step foot through the door. So, the scene set, we spent the next three hours sitting at the bar, drinking and chatting to two of the bar staff: Hannah and Eun Hye. Obviously, when I say "chatting", I mean Westerner "chatting", i.e. sign languaging and speaking like your audience is made up of partially deaf three year olds XD. Me and Mervyn hardly understood a word that was being said to us, and they hardly understood a word being said to them, but somehow we managed not only to swap numbers with Eun Hye (who reassured us with an "I'm fun!"XD, and when asked what she gets up to during the day replied "I DRINK."), but to get an invite to her mum's restaurant for a barbeque ("You? EAT?" *sign language*) and all agree to meet up and go clubbing at Gangnam at some point... MASSIVE WIN! Oh, and somewhere in between all that, me and Hannah found time to wipe the floor with Mervyn and Eun Hye at virtual darts... >:D

... in other words, a good, no AMAZING night was had by all! Even if I did have to be up for work again at 7! *shudder* Anyway, I'm off now to meet Mervyn for roud 2 - his class finishes at 7.30, so we're gonna go grab some dinner again and head off to another bar at another random station... hopefully with another random story to tell tomorrow! XD

(Quote of the night: Hannah, speaking to Eun Hye when Eun Hye asked her which night she wanted to go out next week: "I DON'T CARE!" ...hahaha, was so funny to hear her shout out so angrily in English! XD).