Bookstore, Electronics Store & the Odd Melon

I went to a giant subteranean bookstore today to buy my Derivatives textbook. I thought that I wouldn't be able to find it, but it is really quite difficult to miss (see pictures).

I then went to Yongsan station, to the giant electronics market. It is several stories high and is located in at least 2 buildings. It is organized in cells, so all the camera-oriented shops tend to look the same. It was a fun experience anyway!

Last but not least, I picked up a strange looking fruit today. I was surprised to find that the interior of the melon is white, considering the colourful exterior. Here are some pics!

Check this out!

http://www.vbs.tv/video.php?id=1438428757

Just watch it!!! It's a really scary documentary on North Korea!

Dinner at my place

After class Agata, Lisa, Remi, Jonathan and I got together for dinner at my place. Here are some pictures (it goes unmentioned that fun was had by all!)

Sick!

From the 12th to the 14th, I was quite sick with some sort of flu bug. Therefore, I didn't do very much and the experience wasn't quite... pleasant. That's all on that topic.

Montain and tourist street

Today I went up a mountain with Pete and some Chinese students (well, mountain may be an overstatement). I will include a picture taken from campus when I think about it (done!). It was basically one of those nature-fresh-air type expeditions! And, at the top of the mountain, there is this very nicely painted gazebo-thing. Lot's of fun!

You can see the school (it's a little foggy though!)


This is the gazebo on the mountain

After that, Peter and I went to Seoul, since he had to be at the American embassy early the next morning. So, walked around very touristy area. We saw some very cool shops and had a great time!


Man rolling out some kind of nut/oat square. Very good!

Girl taken from the audience to try to make rice paste.



The tourist street

Seoul - First Time

Well, I went to Seoul for the first time today. It was very enjoyable! Ahhh, on the topic of Seoul, it is pronounced "soul", to purge all ambiguity. It's even spelled "Soul" under certain writing systems, so there we have it.

Anyway, Agata and I went to Itaewon, which is the international district in Seoul (so there's Western stuff and stuff from all over). First we had to navigate the subway (which is the train of Incheon that ends up underground at one point...). To get there we had to transfer 3 times or so, but it wasn't too challenging.

Bathroom vending machine.

Yea...

The subway literally exits in the middle of Itaewon, so finding it was not a problem at all. After wandering around, we decided on eating at this little Japanese place. It was quite nice, but not overly-quick in serving us... I did take a picture of a man engaging in primitive MTS (if you don't know what that is, I'm not going to explain it).

Primitive MTS

After that, we did some shopping (and haggling) and eventually headed back home as we had dinner arrangements made with Lisa, Elise and Remi. We decided to go to the same chicken-in-red-sauce place we went on our first day. The dish was once more enjoyed by all!

To top off dinner, we went to Basking Robins and had some yummy ice cream. I had pineapple ice cream, in case you were wondering. And, to finish the evening, we went to Blackcat and met up with Morgane, one of Remi's French friends. Again, much fun was had by all.

Orientation, Judo and BBQ

At School

On Tuesday we had the orientation for all the international students, so we got to meet Johnathan. Johnathan is the last Concordia student, also in IR and he is living in Seoul (for some reason... I think he likes taking the train every morning!). Anyway, orientation was short and slightly redundant, since Mr. Kim briefed us pretty well by email. Found out that we are basically all the exchange students at INHA besides the billions of Chinese and a few Middle-Eastern and French grad students who mostly keep to themselves. However, in class I met Suzi, a Singaporean Economics student (as a sidenote, Singaporeans do not look either Chinese or Korean. I can't really explain it, it's just like that. Also, it seems that Koreans have great difficulty telling in Korean and Chinese people apart! Actually, almost every professor has mentioned it...). Getting back to topic, Suzi's in most of my classes, which is pretty cool.

Judo

Anyway, after class, I went to Judo with Remi. I mostly watched since I didn't know any of the moves (all the people there have been doing it for years), but it was still quite fun. For those who don't know, Judo is the art of NOT punching or kicking people. Instead, you throw, flip, lock, trip, strangle or do practically anything else to them (except punch or kick them). Pleasant, I know. The session started with the warm-up/stretching, then there was the practice (which involved doing one arbitrary move on your partner 20 times and then having him do the same to you - and repeat, with different techniques) and finally there were the combats. Obviously, they were much more fun. Seeing people thrown each other around is always fun!

BBQ & Blackcat

After Judo, we had a type of Korean BBQ, which involved roasting thick slices of unsalted pork (kinda like bacon) on a grill set into the middle of the table. Other things were available for roasting as well, such as an assortment of mushrooms, garlic and stuff I have no names for. Once roasted, the stuff is placed into a leaf of lettuce (using chopsticks, of course) and then eaten. Yummy. As we were sitting down, Agata called and expressed interest in joining us as she had finished tutoring early, so she came on over. Cost of meal: around 6$ a person (3.50$ for just the meat!). So not too bad!

Once our meal was devoured, we joined Peter and the gang and Blackcat for another very nice evening.

First Day of School + Schedule

On Monday I had classes. They were... well classes. Yay! I'm the only non-Asian person in my Monday class, and (apart from my friends) am the only non-Asian person in all my classes. At least attendance is a no-brainer for the prof.

Anyway, here is my schedule. It was not finalized until significantly later than the first day of school, but chronological accuracy is not my first priority in this blog.

Not much....

HomEver with Lisa

I didn't really do very much today. In the morning I just took it easy and ended up making arrangement to go to HomEver with Lisa (who I hadn't met yet). So, I met her at the Flying Dragon Statue (the Uni's marcot... thing) and then we headed over to HomEver to do some shopping, mostly for school supplies. It's nice that we don't have to bother with physical descriptions (How will I recognize you??? - I'm not Asian - Well, that makes this easier!!!), so we didn't have any trouble recognizing each other. So we went to HomEver and had a nice conversation about stuff. Lisa's a Concordia student who lives in Hudson (small world, eh?) who is studying International Relations and staying at the dorm. So, we bought our stuff and headed back to the dorm (since it would have been difficult for her to carry all her stuff, and I had very little ).

Tea with Pete and Elise

Once Lisa had returned to her dorm, I started heading home when I bumped into Pete and Elise. Peter has already been introduced , but this was the first time I met Elise. Elise had arrived days ago and they were just returning from HomEver as well (I guess we missed them in there by minutes). So, Pete suggested we have tea at his place, which we did. Elise is in Korea to teach English, even though she is very much a french Quebecer at heart (yup, also from Montreal!). However, she has been living in Taiwan with her Taiwanese husband for a few years, and came to Korea for a change. Why not, right?

Desires, Blackcat and Woodstock

After tea, I headed back to the apartment and knocked on Agata's door to see if she was back. Yes, she was (by an hour or so). So, she told me all about her stay and we had a semi-serious conversation about desires, and how the Budhists believe that we shouldn't desire anything. You shouldn't even desire world peace or anything righteous-seeming like that (I didn't really get it, but that's all right!). After that, we had crepes (again) and then went to Blackcat with Pete, Elise and Eaun (Remi was busy working). Since the monks had woken her at a very early hour, Agata retired early. Peter and Eaun then decided to show us another bar, this one called Woodstock. Pretty cool place, had a screen showing out-dated music videos and concerts. Anyway, we played a fun card game (the name of which I have forgotten) but much fun was had. Here is a picture: