Kara-not-oke

I’ve never seen so much communal teeth brushing (and I’m a big fan of communal brushing) as I do in the university toilets. All times of day, more often than not at least someone is giving their chops a scrub. The other day, and I kid you not, it was so crowded that someone was brushing at a urinal. I’m not quite sure where the obsession with constantly keeping their teeth clean has come from, but I can hazard a guess it’s from the same source as a load of other TAT that I have heard over the past few weeks. For instance: if I don’t have an umbrella, the acidity in the rain will make my hair fall out; if I drink water with a meal it will dilute my stomach acid, making digestion less efficient and making me fat; if I sleep at night with a fan on and the doors closed I WILL DIE.  Koreans may work and study ridiculously hard, but there appears to be a national inability to question utter BS.

Went to a 노래방/noraebang (essentially karaoke) with some Taiwanese course mates. Wow. I had not realised that karaoke etiquette is not a universal concept prior to this event. I sang the first song (September by Earth Wind & Fire, routine) whilst they proceeded to queue literally about 25 songs. The next song I had queued (Livin’ la vida loca, homage to the German Market) had not reached its turn in the queue within AN HOUR. My incredulity at this extreme discourtesy led me to leaving, meeting a friend (who received a rant on social politeness) and then playing some bus roulette.

Ah Bus roulette, quickly becoming a personal favourite of mine. Seoul rules are (just made that up) get on the first bus you see, pick a person at random (usually someone with an odd sense of fashion) and then get off when they do. Ended up in this dodgy neighbourhood where there seemed to be a lot of police cars, so promptly got on another bus and ended up in Gangnam (yes, the Gangnam of Gangnam style). I can confirm that the ‘Gangnam style’ is genuinely song title worthy as there are indeed many ‘hey, sexy lady’ [sic] .

climbing a mountain with good company

Went to climb up Bukhansan, a mountain in Seoul, with a friend because in the Autumn it is apparently beautiful (although I think I was a bit too late..). Got given instructions of where to go from host Dad in korean which is probably why we got lost. I've come to realise that Koreans are the epitome of 'all the gear but no idea', and so it slowly began to dawn on me that the tactic of following the couple of front of us with properly keen hiking gear was failing after walking for about 45 minutes along a flat road. After changing routes, we found a massive gang of people walking one route, so we decided to join in with them. It turned out that we had managed to gatecrash a companies' team bonding day out, and also managed to gatecrash their picnic at the top of the mountain too (it was delicious), AND even made some cheeky appearances in their group photos. Classic. They had the most interesting approach of downing alcohol to get back down the mountain once at the top as to 'loosen up the muscles'. Well - when in Rome. Oh, and impressed some of the babes with some one handed climbing whilst videoing with my other hand. You're welcome, ladies.
 They had booked an 'after hike' table(s) at a restaurant, but after no invitation materialising (even after dropping numerous strong hints of having no plans) we thought it was probably a step too far to join in with this one too. Although definitely enjoyed seeing the confused look on one of the guys faces after walking passed the restaurant who, after hiking with them the whole day, must have assumed that I we were fellow employees.

Went to a constructed traditional folk village in the middle of Seoul. They had this free traditional medical examination service, so I decided to show some hot nurses my health and my language skills. Having to take of my shoes though, it got pointed out numerous times that I had some little holes in my socks. And also that my nose was red due to the cold. They said I was cute, not quite the impression I aimed to make, but I'll take it. They also said I looked like Robin Williams. Not thrilled, but I probably would have been a lot happier with the comparison if it hadn't been made in the context of Mrs Doubtfire.