The First Weekend - Changwonderlust (Part 2 - Sunday)

Sunday wasn't such a big deal. Just taking it easy after zero sleep and endless walking through Seoul. It took me so long to write this, because Sunday easily became Monday and I started working again.
Sunday evening, however, was fairly interesting. An American friend I have made (he works at a nearby campus) agreed that we should hoof it around Changwon and learn the city, not just the bus routes.

We make it our goal to find the large central shopping hub of Changwon - City 7.
City 7 is a mall of sorts but it's entirely made out of slightly overlapping circles and the ones that don't overlap, you walk across a short boardwalk to. It's kind of confusing to explain, but it's a pretty cool layout. Basically, imagine how most mall food courts are set up (in a giant circle) and imagine all the stores and every floor being laid out like that.

I was a little dismayed at how pricey everything was there. Lots of high end Korean clothing retailers selling suits at 40%...but they were originally 350,000 Won so...not a great bargain. I either need to find a cheaper outlet, or come to terms with the fact that I'll never get to own a korean summer wardrobe =[. I seriously wanted one too. Whatever Koreans make their clothes out of is awesome. Super light material that allows them to wear three piece suits without breaking a swear. It's like linen, but it doesn't wrinkle as easily. Clark Kent doesn't even own a suit that light and durable.

I was also a little saddened that sushi in the mall is relatively the same price as American sushi. Guess for cheap sushi I'll need to keep shopping at LotteMart. Patrick and I found a place for dinner in the mall that looked pretty good. I honestly have no idea what we ordered. We picked what was recommended "Best." The easiest way to describe it is like spicy chicken frid rice but served on a giant hotplate. We ordered some 소주 to help wash down the heat, but the food was actually really good. Only cost us about 5,000 Won apiece.

Speaking of "apiece" the only thing about Korea that legitimately bothers me is this "Korean style" of payment I keep running into. Especially when it's two post-college kids running around and one of has to pay for both of us. We haven't even gotten our first paychecks yet! Especially if you want a big night out on the town with your friends, one of you has to pay for everyone to go out to the club or dinner or whatever! That makes having friends in Korea a very expensive prospect. I mean, theoretically I think it's a cute idea, but in practice it makes things financially painful if you're Mr. Life-Of-The-Party.

So after dinner, I decide to show Patrick the bars where the Westerners hang out. Only problem is, I don't know exactly where the bars are. But I'm confident we'll find them, because I remember the general area. We take off and head down the road, passing the Changwon Sports Complex, which is an awesome area where they put all the sports stadiums in one massive area and also have a kids playground. I can't imagine why no one skateboards in Korea. Especially with stairs like this:

Or maybe these stairs are the reason there are no more skaters in Korea...

We make our way to the bars but I cannot remember where the bar was. I just remember going into a gray tunnel with a wooden door at the end. But I do remember a giant night club we find our way to called New Castle (like the beer) with a giant light up marquee that's impossible to miss. We decide to head inside and learn it is out-fucking-ragously expensive. 40,000 Won for 2 people which apparently bought us like 3 beers and a giant basket of fruit (which was delicious, but I would have preferred more alcohol). And hostesses kept bringing us snacks and pestering us for tips which was really annoying after we just dropped 40 bucks on three beers. Stop bringing me popcorn and bring me a flask. Then you get a tip. It was kind of lame though. We soon realized that Sunday doesn't seem to be the night people go out. There were maybe 9 other people there beside us.

Despite that, I have to hand it to the club...the place ran a show like we were in Vegas. We first noticed the DJ was shirtless, then two dudes in man-thongs come on stage and we look at each other like "fuck...this is the wrong kind of night club" especially since we look around and notice like 95% of the hosts were dudes. But then an extremely attractive Korean girl comes on stage in the same non-existent attire and we relaxed a little. After that act ended, a giant light-up DJ station rose out of the ground and a new DJ came out and played a set. Then, the whole stage flipped up to reveal new wall to wall lighting and a six man K-pop band rose out of the ground. It was just ridiculous. With all the hosts around, I was scared to take pictures, but I was definitely expecting white tigers and acrobats to come out next. Koreans really go all out on their aesthetics. I would have appreciated more with a bit more alcohol...but it definitely made us interested to come back on a prime night. So we took a cab home after a bit and promised to come back this weekend on a prime night.