New Years Eve! - Monday Dec. 31, 2007

I randomly decided to leave earlier than I initially expected to head to Seoul; I got there around 2:30PM. I realized after arriving that my friends (Jen and Diane) whom I was supposed to meet were busy for the next few hours with Diane's co-teacher. So, I called Christine A. to see what they were up to. From that phone call, I learned that they were meeting Laura T., Min, and Julia in about an hour. Ha! There are always ETAs in Seoul; you just have to work your way around the phone chain. I called Laura, and we decided to meet at Apgujeong station, which is only two stops away from the express bus terminal.

Here begins the adventure...
So, we were looking for this specific restaurant called Butterfinger. Now, to hop into a taxi in Seoul with only the name of a restaurant in mind...well...it just doesn't work. We know! We asked 7 taxi drivers. We then discovered that it was on Rodeo (Yup, Seoul has a Rodeo Drive). We got in another taxi and from Rodeo were able to use landmarks to find this random restaurant that serves pancakes ALL DAY! The name is actually Butterfinger Pancakes. We waited for about 30 minutes and finally got a seat. There was one open next to us that we were going to save for the girls we were meeting, but they hadn't answered their phones or called. So, just as I'm calling and Christine picks up...we give away the table next to us...only to learn that our friends are right outside paying the taxi driver. Ha! Nicely enough, the waiters and waitresses rearranged our tables so we could all sit together. It was incredibly busy and not very big, but it has AMAZING food! I got a Belgium waffle and seasoned potatoes. We were basically in heaven! Yes we ate breakfast at 4:30PM...and somehow I managed to forget to eat the rest of the day. It was nice to catch up with everyone; it ended up being Christine A., Min, Laura T., Julia, Jenna, Sarata, and me. I forgot how nice it was to just sit around and talk about random everything.

After leaving there, we walked around in that area. It seemed as if we would duck in a store to escape the cold, make fun of some of the stuff in there, and then leave to head to the next store. To be fair, there was some pretty ugly stuff that deserved to be made fun of; we were in one of the uppity districts. For example: fur earrings, a gold necklace with a giant gold 3-D hot air balloon, a pair of white high top shoes with red leather at the top, white gogo boots, a $300 tank top that says "Whipped Cream: Now with extender novel. Now you can put toppings at the bottom of your dessert., a furry pink jacket. There's a funny story about that last one. We went into a designer store (forget which one) and Sarata was messing with this coat and mentioned that someone must have shaved a dog or something along those lines; the cell phone in the pocket then went off. Yes, it was someone's jacket who was simply trying on clothes in the dressing room. And yes, her boyfriend was sitting right next to the jacket. And yes, he understood her. Haha!

We split up for a bit. While Christine, Laura, and Sarata got their nails done, Julia, Min, Jenna, and I went to sit down and drink some wine at a cute little wine shop. We talked about winter break travel plans, after Fulbright plans, and random ETA gossip. We met back up with the other girls at a bar called Monkey Beach. They had American alcohol!! We got a "bucket" of midori sour and a "bucket" of vodka ice tea. They each had 6 shots of alcohol in them, but there were 7 of us. We had two rounds of shots after that. The waiter kept coming and giving us neon glow-in-the-dark bracelets and glasses!! Since we only had 2 glasses, we all chipped in to get each of us a pair of glow-in-the-dark glasses. I don't know about the other girls, but I wasn't incredibly sober at this point...I don't think the other girls were too on top of things either. We left from there and went to get french fries that we saw on the way to the bar. I remember checking our email there and eating the french fries really quickly.

We then headed to the subway and Christine and I separated from the others to head to our concert. We managed to figure out how to get to a specific station, and we met up with Jason. When we got to Olympic Stadium, Jen ran our tickets out to us. Apparently we weren't going to all sit together, because Diane brought her host sibs and they took our seats. We ended up being able to sit together anyway, because some people didn't show up near our seats. The concert was K-Pop (YG Entertainment), and it lasted for over 6 hours. It started at midnight, and Christine, Jason, Ray, and I finally left around 6:00AM. Jen, Diane, and her host sibs stayed a little longer, because they were being picked up by Diane's host fam. The bands included 1TYM, 45RPM, Big Bang, SE7EN, Jian, Gummy, and a few more other than that.

Did I forget to mention that it was FREEZING outside!? Oh my gosh...it was COLD. We separated at the subway; Christine and I stuck together because we were kind of going the same direction. She and I talked for a bit until I had to get off and transfer trains. I took a 7:30AM bus and got home around 9:00AM. I met my host father; he told me that we were going to go to a jimjilbang. I looked back and forth between the clock and him a few times. He then told me to "take a rest." Haha! He said we could go later in the day.