Allison and I have been trying to coordinate a Skype chat for the last week, and finally managed to do so today. Among many things, we talked about school, Korea, plans for the future, moving, mutual friends, the Flicker in Seoul group, Heath Ledger’s death, wigs, dakalbi, The Grammys, and our mutual love for Friday Night Lights. We both agree that Riggins and Lyla should be together, and I divulged that upon first seeing Landry on that show, I referred to him as Matt Damon’s ugly brother. Oh, stop it. He has definitely grown on me since! For those in the States, stream full episodes of TV shows (including FNL) at Fancast.

We also talked about our love of Juno’s soundtrack. Here are some songs from the album.

Barry Louis Polisar - All I Want Is You

The Moldy Peaches - Anyone Else But You

The Ansy Pants - Tree Hugger

…how easy it is to waste time in a week.  Let’s see what I’ve been up to:

• had to wait 15 minutes for amazing Japanese ramen near Hongdae with Ras, Reardon, Barbara, Kevin, and Amy.
• made Ras buy an Atoma notebook at Paper Republic.  They’re one of my favorite notebooks because of their disc binding system.
• had dinner and drinks with Kevin and his lady in Sinchon.
• went to the Superbowl with Kevin and Ras.  Good times.  Good drinks.  Good company.
• had people over Wednesday for a Sollal potluck.
• Joel and Bart came over for pizza, beer, and Arrested Development on Sunday.
• watched the 2nd season of Friday Night Lights, and asked Ras why we can’t just see all the exciting plays in real football.   He tells me it’s called SportsCenter.  Boo.
• watched the last season of The 4400.  Thank god it’s finally over… I was getting tired of it.
• been eyeing the game in my living room and think it’s too bad you can’t play Pictionary with only two people.
• did LOTS of recycling today and took out seven bottles of wine from Wednesday alone.  No, Mr. apartment security guard/recycling organizer, I’m NOT an alcoholic.  My friends are.

Here are pictures from that night:

Mat gave us the recipe for the stuffing and it was fantastic!  We also had another turkey, which is good for anytime of year.  Yeeaaah!  It might look burnt, but was perfect on the inside.  Even the white meat was juicy.  Too bad turkey is a seasonal thing at Costco.  After the first Thanksgiving meal, we bought another one and had it in the freezer for two months.

Last Sunday was spent in Songtan, at the Korean/American Friendship Festival… or was it Cultural Festival? I can’t remember. We were supposed to meet Greg, his wife, and her sister around noon. We drove down a little earlier to visit a tailor shop and get some things made. Ras put in an order for two pairs of pants, three dress shirts, and a shirt alteration for around 200,000 won. I also got a pair of dress pants made for 50,000 won, paying an extra 10,000 for better fabric. The price is comparable to buying something off the rack, but it’s tailored to fit you. Our order should be ready by the end of next week.

[View the entire pictures from the day HERE.]

After finding Greg, we immediately went to look for something to eat. Our first meal of the day would be Thai food. There wasn’t a big selection at the food tent we went to, but it was pretty good. They didn’t Koreanize the taste at all.

Our day can be summed up by this: eat, drink, walk, eat, drink, walk, eat, drink, drink, drink.

There were food and merchandise tents as far as the eye could see.

We took a break here because if you ordered the 2000 won pajeon, the dongdongju was free. How could you pass that up?

We also ate spicy hot wings, covered with Texas Pete hot sauce (the best sauce, as proclaimed by Mat and Ras). While the lady was making the wings, she accidentally broke the bottle of hot sauce. We were devastated, since it was the only reason we stopped under her food tent. Luckily, she had her son run out and get a new bottle. While eating our wings, we used about 1/4 of her new bottle.

It would not be a proper Korean festival, without half a pig roasting.

This looks so good! Especially the crispy butt to the left. A typical serving for two of this roasted pork runs 20,000 to 30,000 won. It’s delicious, but not cheap.

This is where we spent most of our time. It involved draft beer and people watching.

It’s been a pretty easy week so far, with it being midterm week.  I don’t have regular classes, and my only obligation is teaching for 2 1/2 hours a day from Monday through Thursday.  Needless to say, I’m loving it.  This morning, Ras and I went to Yongsan to do some shopping.  He needed to buy a monitor cable, a 60 amp inline fuse, and other car audio “stuff” that’s way over my head.  As for myself, I picked up a 300GB hard drive for 115,000 won ($125 USD).  I can’t believe hard drives have gone done so much in price, from even six months ago.  A 500GB drive can be bought for 160,000 won, and that’s without bartering.  I’ve partitioned 110 GB to backup my 100GB Macbook Pro and the other 190GB will be for archiving my pictures, after I burn them on DVD, of course.

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The following pictures are from Dave’s birthday dinner in Ansan last Saturday.  I think I’ve fixed the Flickr/faded colors problem.  As you can see, Dave chose to go back to the “Taj Mahel.”  This time, we had 11 roti between the 4 of us!  We also walked around the street and they guys bought some cheap jerseys for when they play basketball.

There was also a lot of night shopping.

Nathan’s party on Friday turned out to be fun and surprising.  Honestly, with him being a single guy, I wasn’t expecting much food at the party.  I mean, my Korean name is “Mi Hung-ri,” after all.  I made sure to eat before getting there, and we brought our own alcohol.  We met up with Bart near E-Mart and pre-funked a little before heading to Nathan’s in Sanbon.  There were eight people there, including Dave and Peter, two of our co-workers.  The first thing I noticed, was the table full of FOOD!  And good food at that.  I immediately went for the salmon and cheeses, then helped myself to a fruity cocktail.

There were plenty of drinks for everyone’s tastes - juice, wine, beer, soju, bek seju, gin, vodka, kahlua, Jagermeister, etc.

If a good host provides enough food, drinks, and makes sure guests are having a good time, then Nathan’s definitely a good host.  Good times were had by all.  By the time I left, there were around 25 people there.  Nathan even gave out prizes for the best ajumma and ajoshi costume.

Unfortunately I didn’t win the best ajumma costume, but I’m sure I would have some in second!  Ras, Bart, and Dave tied for best ajoshi.  They had to share the ajoshi prize: Ras got a cassette of “trot” music, Bart got soju, and Dave won a pack of cigarettes.  There was a fourth prize, and the guys had to “rock, scissor, paper” for it.  Dave won and became the lucky winner of Korean Chinese porn!  Look at how happy he is!

See the rest of the photos from that night in my Flickr account.