work = soju, karaoke, and dancing

Last night was the reason that i should probably always have my camera on me, but like always it's just sitting here on the table. Two days ago I had heard a few of the Korean teachers talking about a work dinner thing. At first I was like....I don't really want to go and started arranging other plans for my Friday night. Well, yesterday at work. Rebecca, one of the Korean teachers said that I should go because Director would be paying for it. My broke ass was like "ooh, a free meal, okay, i'll go". I'm definitely glad that I did.

We started out going to a restaurant across the street. It was the first time that I had been to a restaurant where you take off your shoes going in and then sit on the floor. In Korean...I wish I had a picture to explain..at your table there is a big hole in the middle that they put a bucket of hot coals in. Then you order your meat and they come and put a grate over the coals and you cook your own meat. Last night we had marinated pork..but you wrap it up in lettuce. At a Korean meal there is no empty space on the table. There are so many side dishes (last night there was pumpkin...delicious!) Well after a little while the Soju started pouring. I've learned to love it. Then we had some rice wine, really good as well. We just kept ordering more and more meat. I think that my little table had 5 orders of meat...for about 3 of us, haha. The restaurant became really crowded and we were being shushed and tables were moving away from us. There were probably 20 of us there. It was all of the lead Korean teachers and then all of us foreign except for one. Director was running around passing out shots...we had so much. Then Jennifer said that we were going to karaoke. Oh, God....so we went to Karaoke where as soon as we got there they put a ton of Cass beer cans on the table....we ended up having to get more. But Asian karaoke isn't like at home. Here you have your own little room that you go into....So they were singing Korean songs and we were all dancing and having a great time.

AFTER that...Director said that we were going to a night club. At this point....everyone was drunk. Where is the nightclub? Director paid for all of our taxis and we get there and it was not like anything that I had ever seen...again, I wish that I had pictures! You walk into this room that is about half the size of a football field..maybe larger and there are rows and rows of seating. There are a MILLION employees so you end up bowing a lot (respect thing) and then they lead you to the table. Again..the table is filled with beer but this time we got fruit as well! The stage had pop acts playing. Korean music is stuck behind American, still heavy into the pop boy/girl bands. I had no idea what they were saying but it was so much fun. All of us were just out there dancing. We had our own dance circle..We were all feeling the love, haha.

Then it's time to go....and wait...it's only 11pm. I barely remember taking the taxi home. Karla and I went on a tour of our apartment building and then we went to the expatriate bar...a few more beers, and a ton of white people later...we came home.

That was my Friday in Korea.

Sidenote: all of those damn alphabet fish...worthless, haha. All of my kids are now using workbooks!

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Kim