Tiger

2012 Reflections

I can’t believe it’s already 2012. I’m a year older and I think a year wiser (I hope!)
I stopped doing New Year’s Resolutions a while back so I won’t bother deciding things I can’t (or won’t) keep.
2011 flew by, literally. It seems the older we get, the faster time passes by. I’m halfway to 50 already Yikes!
I think I had a good 2011, didn’t repeat old mistakes, made new ones, but all in all nothing too bad~

Here’s to 2012! (a list)

  • Be a good person
  • Make lots of money (lots is relative I know πŸ˜‰ )
  • Drink less alcohol
  • Get in shape (I’ve lost considerable weight since coming to Korea, now it’s time to make some muscles!)
  • Have a good time
  • Find my path in life (i.e. a career path or what the heck I’m gonna do from now on)
  • Love, Trust, Believe

That’s all I can think of currently. I’m beginning 2012 a bit different than I did 2011. Apparently 2012 is the year of the Dragon (to be specific ‘Gold Dragon’) I wonder what the Dragon has in store for me this year?

I need to get my job situation sorted out…

Happy 2012 World!

Cheers to my friends Joe and David for coming to visit me~I know it wasn’t easy…for all of us hahaha.

Best Birthday Weekend EVER!

It’s already December and ya know what that means?

*drumroll please*

my BIRTHDAY!

*end drumroll*

Granted there are other people who also have December birthdays but this is my blog and so i’ll be a little self-centered here~

Anyways, I really think I have a knack for meeting and making good people and friends. Compared to my situation last year in ‘utmost boonieville’ the way I made friends isn’t all that much different. For example, I befriended good people at work (ie school) and at the gym. I guess it may be due to the fact that there’s a National University here that there are more people near my age range who I can get familiar with. Maybe it’s just a numbers game (?) Be that as it may I gathered a few of my friends I made this year and began my night~

I’m not the best event planner I just try to keep things simple but even then there can be some snags…I told my friends to meet me up for dinner at 6:30. Everyone showed up around 7…I guess that’s ‘Korean’ time for you or is it Asian time? I was a bit peeved that these guys would show up late but what can I do when their excuse was ‘to get my cake?’ I forgave them and we had dinner. After dinner we took the cake and went to a nearby coffee shop of my choosing. Lo and behold there was a special room just for ME. (I am kidding, apparently it’s a room used for special events ie birthdays)

My friends sang a wonderful tune of “Happy Birthday” first in English and the parts that they didn’t know they continued in Korean! lol πŸ˜€ Oh and the friends I invited to dinner were Tiger, Sean, and uh Jaguar (he’s basically our chauffeur). Now since everyone present was a ‘health guy’ (health in this case means fitness center) we only shared 1 bottle of beer amongst ourselves. The REAL party (ie drinking) would begin much later hah ha h..I think this was the first time I had ever experienced a birthday party with a cake and friends singing for me since like…ever? I won’t go into the details but yeah…most definitely the first time in Korea!

I had a friend from Seoul come visit me too. We’ll call him Dandy and I met him through Tiger, they are neighborhood buds since from ever~ Dandy started the drinking festivities by making me a ‘birthday shot.’ The only time I had ever experienced a ‘birthday’ shot was on my 21st bday way back in Austin, Texas. It was pretty awful tasting but it sure got me drunk quick. I was in no way prepared for what was coming up. The alcohol choices in our drinking place weren’t too varied and so Dandy had to improvise, Korean-style. I won’t go into detail but there was an awful lot of mixing of various things and not all of it was alcohol…

My head was banging the rest of the night, I hadn’t drank so much alcohol I think all year! Ah well, it was my special One day of the year so I’ll be alright. My birthday fell on a Friday this year and in the Korean mispronunciation it sounds like ‘Fly’ day. Time wasn’t the only thing flying that day thats FOR SURE.

Here are some pics. Jaguar wasn’t looking very presentable but what’s new? I was a bright red tomato all night and I didn’t give a fock hehe. Saturday was spent with a special person. Sunday I am busy recovering for the workweek ahead~

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

O genki desu ka~

Hello dear readers (I know you’re out there!..somewhere~)

It’s already the end of November and suffice it to say that I haven’t done much. Either that or I’ve done things that can’t be shared with the interworld aka you guys πŸ˜‰

I’m doing pretty well. Thanksgiving passed without much incident (well, they don’t really celebrate it here in Korea so…)I just got me some chicken ‘burger’ from McDonalds and had a few drinks with a friend (my friend didn’t drink b/c he’s a sensible driver!) Oh I’d like to mention 11.11.11 aka Pepero Day aka ‘once in a millenium day!’

That is all..there I mentioned it, hah hah

I got back into going to the gym again, it’s become a part of my weekly, and weekDAY schedule. My goal as mentioned previous is just to ‘lose fat’ and so yeah, hopefully becoming stronger, healthier, more lean will be a nice side effect πŸ™‚ On a related note: I feel like I go to sleep much better and sleep more soundly after I work out. This good feeling is kind of addicting! hehe

I’ve been growing out my mustache this month of Movember, now that November is coming to an end, I will go back to being clean-shaved. I’ll share the pics right before I shave (which isn’t gonna be today) so yall will just have to wait!

My birthday is coming up soon, I’m mentioning this now because I may or may not write about what I do on my birthday (aka maybe more top-secret, ninja stuff will go down~) I’m sure my birthday will also pass without incident, although I may/possibly/get drunk? πŸ˜€

That’s all for now~thanks for reading!

My father

Well this weekend was super-packed and eventful. Friday-Sunday just flew by! To recap on Friday, I had planned on just chilling at home when my friend Jaguar invited me to go to his home in Ilsan (I guess this would be a ‘suburb’ outside of Seoul). I deliberated a bit and then decided to go. What a good choice I made! Ilsan is a quite lively place! Friday night I was feeling a bit ‘down’ and I wanted to get drunk (or just enjoy some drinks). Now Jaguar, being the health-freak (I’m using ‘health’ in the Korean definition in this case ‘fitness’) does NOT drink. But, being the pal he is he said he would provide me company and drink ONE beer while I got plastered (haha jk~) We went to a bar that Jaguar knew called ‘Siesta.’ Interesting name for an interesting bar. The interior struck me as being pretty high-class and the prices for drinks only confirmed it. On a side note; we also got a really cute/hot/attractive barkeep to keep us company! I was never so nervous as I was that night in a bar that’s for sure~~Anyways we had our drinks (Jaguar kept a good 1:4 ratio with me, he only had like half a beer…) and I had a great time. (Maybe it was due to there being an attractive girl at the bar but I wasn’t getting drunk that night AND I didn’t give a damn! :D)

We ended up back at Jag’s place around 5am and stealthily sneaked into his home because as Jaguar puts it “My father does not like to have his sleep interrupted..” I nodded along and quickly got into my ‘shinobi-mode’ and went to sleep. The next morning I was introduced to Jag’s mom. She is quite the tall lady (or I’m just short 😦 ) We had a GREAT late lunch with various side dishes I won’t even begin to try to name but trust me they were good OH and we had really good Honeydew melon and grapes (The melon was seriously seriously tasted like honey, OMG I wanna eat it againnn *wipes drool*)

Jag had to get a haircut and so we went back to ‘downtown’ Ilsan, a place called “La Festa” (Notice the Spanish usage here? Yeah, very good I know πŸ™‚ It was so PACKED full of people and lots and lots of let’s just say..eye candy heh heh. (but gdamn these girls are TALL!! what the heck do they EAT??) I accompanied Jag while he got his hair done at ‘Juno Hair’ (a popular and EXPENSIVE hair franchise in Korea) afterwards I had to bounce because I had to attend my friend Justin’s bday party extravabananza in Apgujeong. On the subway to Apgujeong (it’s on the same line as Ilsan!) I took some ‘secret stuff’ to help me better deal with the amount of alcohol I knew I would have to drink and thought happy thoughts about the possible ‘eye candy’ in Apgujeong. You see, Apgujeong apparently is where all the ‘rich’ folks and couples go to ‘play’ aka hang out. Also the best plastic surgeons in Korea reside here and so uh well, I’m sure their clients come here too πŸ˜‰ *wink wink. At last I made it to Apgujeong but maybe because either a) It was still too early in the night or b) It was too late in the day that I didn’t see as much eye candy as I had hoped. Ah well, better luck next time~

I attended Justin’s birthday get together and I got drunk. The end.

Hahaha got you! πŸ˜› I ended up staying up all night to catch the first subway back to my town which I thought was at 5am but instead on Sundays its at 5:40, but then once I got ON the sub didn’t take off until 5:45. WTF!!! I was supremely tired when I got into bed around 7:30am…I slept until I heard my phone ring around noon and it was my dad telling me that he was on his way. I proceeded to get up, drink some water, and fell right back to sleep until 1:30 when my phone rang again…

Finally after almost 2 years I met my dad again. He hadn’t changed much except his hair was unnaturally black, I commented on this and yes he told me he had started dying it black. (I remember him having a some white hairs back in Texas) My dad was accompanied by his old friend and high school classmate Jung Ui Taek μ •μ˜νƒ. Mr. Jung told me he and my dad were basically like ‘brothers’ and so that made Mr. Jung basically my ‘uncle’ aka μ‚Όμ΄Œ (sahm chon) heh.

We talked the usual yakity yak and then proceeded to Soyang Dam which is pretty damn big (hehe don’t mind me~)
Here’s a picture for your viewing pleasure

Damn big dam!

After that we had a late lunch/early dinner of my town’s specialty λ‹­κΈΈλΉ„ aka chicken galbi (ribs) and λ§‰κ΅­μˆ˜ (noodles). After getting some food (I was effing starving!) we headed to a scenic coffee shop called Santorini on the nearby Gubong-san (san means mountain). Santorini has in my opinion, the best view of my city. You can clearly see the building and such landscape from here. Oh here’s another picture…

You can see the city in the background, it looks even better even later!

 

 

 

 

I apologize for my poor state of fashion-ness. I didn’t get much sleep, hadn’t showered and was in a rush today.

Meeting a new ‘Uncle’ was a pleasant experience as well. He’s an interesting dude and he told me interesting things about my dad in his younger years. While I always respected my dad, that respect was tied to the fear I had of him. Now, the fear is gone and only the respect remains. Oh and apparently my father was quite ‘popular with the ladies’ back in the day, heh I respect that (highly!).

I didn’t get to spend much time with dad today but it was short and sweet and not at all unpleasant (well getting up was unpleasant though hah). I hope my dad makes a full recovery and enjoys the rest of his stay in Korea. He tells me that he would like to live in Korea someday and while the old ‘me’ would have shuddered at the thought; I’m now quite nonchalant about the matter. It would be nice for him to get back to his roots and meet up his old friends and etc. I guess I’ve grown up a bit (not physically though πŸ˜‰ )

That’s all folks~hope you enjoyed reading my blog as much I enjoyed writing it!!

peace

October – Fall classic

So it’s October now. I’m not normally a baseball fan but my hometown Texas Rangers are in the World Series! WOOT! The NBA is in a lockout unfortunately and the Dallas Cowboys are doing pretty poorly so Yay go Rangers!!

That’s all I’ll touch on with sports.

This post will be more rambling from me as I only have about 10 minutes to write it.

  • It’s almost 0 degrees C these days, I’m damn cold!
  • I’m still nervous around girls.
  • I am eagerly awaiting my paycheck..
  • I need to go shopping for clothes…
  • Tuesdays are my worst day at work, 1st graders are so hard to deal with!
  • (related) if I don’t have a crappy Monday, then Tuesday will come back to bite me.
  • Started hitting the gym again, put in a good 45 mins, my body is not liking me this morning…
  • I am still too sensitive about things.
  • Started reading again although it is an e-book.
  • My Korean language ability goes up and down depending on my mood.
  • I don’t like ‘fake’ people but I think I’m becoming ‘faker’ everyday.
  • I need to set some goals…
  • I am awkward and weird and maybe a bit pushy.
  • My mood fluctuates throughout the day.
  • I don’t want/need your pity.
  • Alcohol is good in small doses. Although going on a binge is sometimes called for~
  • I wonder what I’ll be doing in 1 months time?

Cruel Angel’s Thesis

Hey guys.

So I would like to share some of the things I’ve learned in my life and probably realized I knew these things while being here in Korea.

  1. Classical Music is good in small doses, too much can be sensory overload.
  2. They say that washing your face with cold water is better for your skin. Now I don’t know the science but here’s my thinking on this reasoning. Warm water opens up your pores, cold will do the opposite. Therefore you wash with cold water to make sure your pores stay shut while rinsing off the gunk on your face.
  3. I need to go to Europe one day…
  4. I’m a negative person period
  5. I wished I still had a violin.
  6. I am weak at drinking alcohol.
  7. My religious views: ??

There you have it~

(i wonder what i am doing now)

More about me – Secret Obsessions.

So I decided to skip going to the gym again. I’m feeling a little under the weather these days, the climate suddenly dropped about 10 degrees C within a day/night and I guess this is causing my nose to cry (err sniffle).

I may have mentioned previously but living in Korea has changed me. I’ve lost considerable weight since I’ve been here, enough for students to be shocked or amazed when I show them how I looked during my graduation photos. To be specific I’ve lost around 5-6 kg. I can attest that I feel lighter and I fit better into my clothes. It seems Korean clothes were designed just for me! Especially regarding jeans and the like, the fashion in Korea is top-notch in my humble opinion. Maybe it’s due to the different diet I’m eating these days or going to the gym (once in a blue moon~) but I feel a lot healthier now then I ever did in Texas.

Anyways I had to do a lot of shopping in Korea due to the clothes I brought with me are ‘too big’ to wear in public. (I basically use all my american clothes to work out in haha or use as cleaning cloths). I’ve learned a thing or two about fashion I hope and am learning more about myself in the process. Then again, I didn’t have the disposable income I currently enjoy.

Now I guess it’s time I let you in on one of my ‘secret obsessions.’ I’m sure all of yall got some but just won’t admit it…but today I will unveil for the very first time something you prolly didn’t know bout me*!

*drumroll please!*

I’m obsessed with shoes.

*end drumroll*

Whew, now that’s a weight off my chest! ha…ha..ha. (what were yall expecting something a lot more juicier?)

I never used to think about shoes back home. For the most part, I never really ‘bought’ shoes, they were usually bought for me whenever I had outgrown my old ones and I couldn’t really choose them either..maybe that’s why this ‘s.o.’ of mine is a rather new occurrence so I guess it would be perfectly logical to assume that nobody not even I would be an obsession. (I guess I’m trying to say that this is also a ‘recent’ obsession, hmm r.s.o? πŸ™‚
This all goes back to living in Korea, my style knowledge meter has gone up a few points and I now consider my footwear more. Footwear technology has progressed a lot since I was a kid and I never ever knew about it 😦 Shoes these days are not only highly functional, comfortable but look damn good too! Now trying to be a ‘smart’ shopper (hehe Samsung’s ads for smartphones/devices have a slogan of ‘How to live smart’) I guess living smart means buying Samsung? I degress…Anyhow, when I purchase something I want it to have good utility, durability, and appearance all while costing reasonable. I made a purchase of ‘running shoes’ called Lunarglide 3 from Nike. (I was always given Reeboks that looked god-awful and cheap and so I tend to stick to Nike in my adult life) These boys cost me a pretty penny, 135,000 won to be exact. I don’t know what the current exchange rates are but this is still my 2nd most expensive possession on me (the first being my smartphone! thanks samsung!)

Here’s a picture of these AWESOME shoes.

These badboys feel so GOOD!

I think these shoes fit my criteria listed above well I had to make myself a ‘reason’ to justify the cost a little bit..Anyways these shoes are SUPER light and make me feel so lightweight like a feather or something. I basically wear these anytime I’m not at work and not at home (because wearing shoes in my home is a no-no, but slippers may suffice ;))

Why the heck am I talking about shoes today? Well, first because it’s one of my r.s.o’s that I wanted to share and second because I was actually looking up shoes on the interweb and decided to blog about it.

Oh another nifty thing is that apparently this specific color (which I have) is sold out in Korea. Other colors (one maybe?) have since come out but my colors the best. (The new color I saw says unisex but I think it’s girly – just mixing the colors sky blue and pink don’t make something unisex, it’s more like uni-mpliedsex.) I considered myself lucky when I was able to snag these early one morning. I’d also like to add a note that my friend Tiger recommended I buy these. Apparently he wanted to get the Nike Lunarglide 2’s but they were sold out and he got the Lunar Eclipse instead (which also looks real good!) I being the gentle, docile, and jealous fellow I am decided to heed his advice and bought my Lunarglide 3’s maybe a week or so after they launched. I felt a little pride once I found out that my specific color was hard to find in Korea, hehe. Oh and speaking of my good friend and pal Tiger…he got a girlfriend and afterwards he dropped off the face of the earth I mean Korea. It’s a common story and it could happen to anyone without a significant other. One jealousy was extinguished and another was ignited in my heart…

Regardless, being in Korea has given me disposable income for the first time and I am loving the freedom and power that brings. However, (as a wise uncle once said) “with great power comes even greater responsibility” and now that I’ve bought these shoes, I’m going to have a eat some more 라면 (rah myun aka instant noodle, ramen). Since started working out on-off again, I’ve cut my 라면 eatage considerably. I eat it 1-2 a month now, it used to be 1-2 times a week!

I guess this secret obsession is a lot better than say, secretly being an alcoholic or gambler. My problem is I do everything and so I had to dip into my savings a little bit these past few months. (to clear any possible confusion, no I am NOT an alcoholic or gambler, except on holidays πŸ˜›

Thanks for reading guys (and gals~)

g’nite

 

 

Foodie food special!

Hello dear readers and fans (I know yall are out there!..somewhere πŸ™‚ )

As per my last post (which I didn’t realize didn’t get published until right now but whatever~) I spent my Chuseok holiday with my relatives in Korea! To be specific, I visited relatives living in the Gyeonggi province (or Gyeonggi-do as they say in Korea). I had a good 4-5 day weekend and all I did was eat, sleep, and repeat (with some family gambling mixed in here and there – don’t worry guys I lost money hehe)

Anyways this was my first time to really ‘celebrate’ Chuseok in Korea. Now what does that entail? Well basically Chuseok and Lunar New Years are known as λͺ…μ ˆ (myung jul) in Korea, don’t ask me what the translation is cuz I don’t know. These two times of the year are the only times when the entire (and in my case extended) family get together to eat and talk and enjoy each others’ company. There are also specific foods prepared for these special occasions. First is μ†‘νŽΈ (song pyun) a delectable rice cake dessert-type item that is made with sesame seeds. (Yum!) Also my favorite type of meat BEEF is prepared as well. Marinated beef ribs or κ°ˆλΉ„μ°œ (galbi jjim), spicy beef stew 윑개μž₯ (yook geh jang) and of course a ‘national representative food of Korea’ (if you will) 뢈고기 (BULGOGI!) I had all of the above except for the beef ribs because to prepare it takes a lot of work or 손 (sohn – aka hands). We also make and eat a variety of μ „ (juhn aka Korean pancakes) some vegetable μ „ and my very favorite kind called λ™κ·Έλž‘λ•‘ (dong guh lang ddeng) which is like dumplings except they’re round and have BEEF!! (I really like beef :P)

Oh and we can’t have holidays without alcohol and so I enjoyed some of that as well including 막걸리 (mak guhl lee aka the Korean version of sake except its better because I say so) and λ§₯μ£Ό (mek joo aka beer). Oh I forgot another thing everyone does when we get together and that’s watch tv.

I also would like to mention that I helped make μ „ and collected some ingredients, namely pine leaves to make μ†‘νŽΈ (pine leaves are steamed with the rice cakes to give that oh so pleasant aroma and feel ^^)

I feel super recharged and well rested and also super duper fat after doing nothing but eating, sleeping, and repeating for 3 days straight. Haha it seems like September will fly by in no time what with a students’ field trip coming up as well as midterms. I think I will just glide into October!

Here are some pics of the various food dishes oh that reminds me about μž‘μ±„ (jahp cheh) a really good noodle dish with various veggies and BEEF!

enjoy and let your mouth water~ πŸ˜‰

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

I am drinking zuh agua~

Hello dear readers (I know you’re out there…somewhere :P)

It’s Friday night over here in the SK. There’s nothing on the tv worth watching. I had a not so great time last night and so I’m just using today to rest and chillax (that’s chill + relax!)

I’m recently sort of/kind of/possibly addicted to a PC game as well. It’s called FIFA Online 2 and it’s about SOCCER! I really enjoy watching soccer and other things related to soccer like playing a GAME about it!! Anywho, I’m currently No. 1 amongst my ‘health club’ friends, remember THeM? Of course I play it the most often and so that’s probably why I’m in better ‘form’ than the others. Actually that brings to mind the word ‘condition.’ This is an interesting word with many different meanings but I’d like to touch on the meaning of the word in THiS context. Here in Korea they use the word ‘condition’ in all its Kongrish glory as meaning related to your current ‘mood’ or ‘feeling.’ Now bringing this meaning ‘stateside,’ I don’t think people stateside talk about their ‘condition’ in this respect. We would say “I feel like $#%!” and etc~

I had dinner with Sean, yeah just us two. Oh so Tiger got into an accident (read: fight) and is now staying in a hospital. I’d like to talk more about what I think about health insurance and hospitals in Korea but oh that’s another post..I went to visit Tiger YESTERDAY and then the oh-so-much-alcohol-why-do-i-d-o-this-every-time-event happened.

Tiger’s home is in Seoul and so he went back there. I took the ol’ (actually it’s fairly recently built) subway ‘up’ to Seoul (even though technically it’s down but when referring to going to Seoul, it’s ALWAYS going ‘up’ somewheres…I think maybe this dates to basically going to Seoul would bring you ‘up’ in social status??). His hospital was really close to the subway stop (well not really close, but I’ve been getting to walking around so much, it would’ve been a little silly to drive the same distance, oh wait…) Anyways long story short, Tiger said other friends were coming to visit him including GIRLS(!) and that one of them was an ‘internet shopping mall model.’ I only paid attention to ‘shopping’ ‘model’ and thoughts came up to my head but I digress…My original plan was to visit some relatives who I hadn’t seen in a while but…that didn’t happen. I waited for said ‘model’ friend and she was indeed kinda cute/pretty. [yeah she’s not quite and not quite pretty, maybe a little bit of both…] The reason I am ‘resting’ today is because I ended up drinking with several of Tiger’s friends, (turns out they’re his HS classmates and one middle schooler). I drank too much….ughh

Back to dinner with Sean, what we ate is inconsequential but WHERE now that’s the key. We ate at the “Back Door of Gangwon University.” It was cheap and good and so it fit the bill. After dinner I proceeded to flex my Fifa skills and kick Sean’s ass (online) hehe.

Anyways that’s all I did and now I’m watching episodes of The Big Bang Theory and possibly even Arrested Development!

Zi agua es gud..

Friends and companionship

Hello dear readers and fans (I know you’re out there~) it’s been awhile.

As per my last post I am/was in a ‘slump’ a funk of sorts. Everyday was becoming boring, routine, and almost unbearable even. I didn’t want to bore you (kind) readers with the details of my life because “the details of my life are inconsequential” (guess where that quote is from and you win a prize!) Anywho, I’m on the upswing again, that’s life right? Ups and downs a rollercoaster of emotions if you will..

Today I’d like to talk about friends and the companionship that accompanies said friendship. I may have touched on this topic briefly in a previous post so forgive me in advance. I am alone in Korea, well more like ‘on my own’ but more or less the same meaning. It’s not easy being ‘on your own’ especially in a ‘foreign’ country, even if it is my ethnic motherland. I feel homesick at times, mostly missing the things I took for granted while living at home – homemade food, laundry, clean home (thanks to my lovely Grandma), and of course my friends (yall know who you are πŸ˜‰ ) I came to Korea for personal reasons and so now there’s no looking back. They say variety is the spice of life but what then is monotony? In my humble opinion, I would say monotony is Hell. Now I’m no means the ‘adventurous’ type but I guess coming to Korea is in itself a little ‘adventure’ πŸ˜›

I have a knack for making friends, this dates back to my days at UT while living in the dorms. However, maybe it is due to me making friends so quickly that they ‘go’ just as quickly. I find it difficult to make lasting friendships but I want/need more than just ‘acquaintances’ around me. Therein lies my problem/solution(?) I can sort of ‘weed out’ my acquaintances and the ones remaining basically remain my friends! And of course it is a natural progression that even though we are ‘acquainted’ this can upgrade to friend status. I’m going to leave it at that or I’ll just keep rambling..

The beginning of this semester I had to start anew. I decided I had enough of my previous town and so I wanted to go ‘someplace’ bigger, well I certainly got what I wanted. I am currently in the capital of my province and so it’s a lot more ‘developed’ than said boonies I was in last year. (To be honest though, human greed has no bounds because now I want even more!) Anyways I would like to touch on my friends that I met at the ‘health club’ (aka fitness center/gym). These are real good guys (although one of them KH2 is way too much to handle sometimes, we are of opposite ilk I suppose). I also met a new friend recently (the current roommate of KH2). The moment I saw him the name ‘Sean’ came to mind and so I called him that. (I also had trouble remembering his name but his initials are SC, hmm…sounds so FAMILIAR hmm) Sean liked the name so much he took it for his own. As a result I unknowingly ‘named’ someone and it made me happy! After that I also named KH1 and KH2, Tiger and Jaguar respectively. KH1 is aiming to become a personal trainer and so he wanted a ‘cool’ and unique sounding name that would portray his image. He’s a big guy and reminds me of Wolverine from the X Men so I wanted to suggest Harry but he turned that down…then I thought, hey our Chinese zodiac is the ‘Tiger’ so why not try it? He was immediately impressed and proceeded to give me a ‘tiger hug’ so tight I heard some joints pop (I think they were mine…) As for Jaguar…well he picked that one himself, I kinda wanted to suggest Jackal (because he sort of resembles some sort of wolf creature but…) I guess Jaguar fits because it’s sort of ‘dark and majestic’ kinda how he wants to appear/be. He’s also a rich kid and so maybe one day he will own his namesake in the form of automobile transportation heh heh.

Back to the present, I really like Sean. I think he’s a humble kid and maybe it’s because of my ‘older brother’ nature (and him being younger than me) I like him around me, almost reminds me of my brother back home…I also met Sean at the gym because Jaguar sort of coerced/forced(?) him to come (yeah Jaguar definitely fits that dude well..he’s definitely…I won’t go there in my blog because I try to keep my posts rated G).

It’s Tuesday here deep in the heart of monsoon season and I was feeling shitty (I wonder if that’s rated G, ah whatever~). Work ain’t bad, all I do is show movies until vacation so I’m not ‘teaching’ anything but I’m just so bored and tired. (Sitting/standing around all day can be surprisingly tiring, or maybe I’m just outta shape 😦 ) I took a walk to the nearby National University (because food’s cheap around there and I felt like eating with friends and not..alone) I originally just planned on meeting up with Tiger but Jaguar has a car (not a Jaguar mind you but a Hyundai) and he knew a ‘really good noodle place!’ so we decided to go there, the 4 of us. I thought eating ‘really good noodles’ would cheer me up (cuz I LOVE noodles) but nah I was still in the dumps. To make things worse Jaguar kept making small talk with me and when I’m in the dumps I don’t like to be bothered (it’s a bad habit of mine I know..working on changing it). Anyways after dinner Jaguar went to do his ‘jaguar thing’ aka meeting girls and so the three of us went to eat some ice cream.

We went to Baskin-Robbins because that’s where cool kids go to eat ice cream here in Korea (no Braums here unfortunately, hmm maybe I should START one hahaha~) Tiger knew something was up with me (I tend to show my mood pretty easily, it’s written all over my face apparently) and so he offered to treat ice cream. I just agreed half-heartedly but my inner fatty (or is it outer?) was jumping for joy inside. I chose my ‘favorite’ ice cream called ‘Shooting Star’ (it’s a combination of vanilla ice cream with blue ice cream, cherry filling and POP ROCKS!) I like the Pop rocks, heck I would just eat those if I could but being embedded in an ice cream ain’t too bad either (hmm another thing I could try out in the states if/when I go back) Anyways eating ice cream was a great way to break the ice between the three of us. I’m close to Tiger but Sean’s a relative newcomer but he’s chill so we get all get along~(Jaguar is NOT chill though, I’ll say that straight up..) After eating ice cream and talking it was really therapeutic for me and I learned some more things.

  1. I need to start reading books again, real books and not comic books…
  2. Positive thinking is the way to go and
  3. I need to stop bashing myself so much! I’m a mellow yellow dude and I don’t give a fock about anything.

This is a double-edged sword because sometimes just not giving a fock makes me not want to do..a fock (anything) Hence, I’m a perpetual hamster in a wheel, except this wheel is a wheel of despair. Circling and circling into the abyss…I know it won’t happen overnight but with the help of these friends I hope to overcome and conquer…myself. I’m going to start reading again, positive thinking needs a foundation I’m sure and both my friends have read quite a few books on the topic apparently. I’m gonna roll with it because I’m down with it and I also get jiggy wit it (wait that last one…oh nevermind)

Korea is a cool place, I’ve met some cool people and well, I’m not going to give up. “Can’t stop won’t stop don’t stop” I think those are the lyrics to a K pop song but I can’t remember exactly because they all sort of blend together.

Can’t wait till vacation, I’m going to spend it catching up with various peoples around Korea. I’ll be sure to update yall accordingly~

Good night now,,