4.10.2006

Oh, Canada?

So we missed our connection, and got to spend an extra night out of the country, this time in Toronto. We hopped on the subway, which, if you've been keeping up, was like child's play when the stations and announcements are in English!

We stayed in the college part of town, but on Sunday night was pretty low key. Although upon a strangers suggestion, we ate at this small restaurant, where randomly some comedians got together every Sunday night to practice new material on each other (since fellow comedians are the toughest to please, especially Canadian comedians). It was profoundly hilarious, by far the funniest night of our entire trip! I think my loud laughter in the background probably boosted their confidence a little too. But these guys actually are full-time comedians, that is their job. Yea I know. Who would have thought, Canadian comedians. We chatted with some of them afterwards, and determined them to be very amicable and approachable people. We have since considered defecting for that reason among others.

Finally though, we have made it home safe and sound to our nation's capital!

I think I'm turning Japanese!

Well it was sad leaving you Chang-Ro, but we will meet again soon, I am sure of this. Thanks for all your time and help, we never would have been able to do it without you! We truly discovered the best kept secret in Asia.
Alas, the trip must go on, we are still going, going, going. But wearing out too. We arrived in Tokyo in the late afternoon and treated ourselves to a nice hotel for our final night in Asia, after all our huts and guestrooms. The Hotel New Otani was definitely fancy, its built right in the middle of a garden and carp pond in Akasaka. We planned on cramming all Tokyo into one night and one morning, and were successful!


The first night brought us to Shinjuku, the part of town that lights up at night. Tokyo is the most crowded city I have ever experienced. It was Saturday night, so of course the subways were crowded, but we read that the Shinjuku station alone sees upwards of 2 million passengers passing through daily! And boy is the Tokyo subway confusing, there are at least 12 different lines, and each station has mazes of exits and passages, but we made it relatively unscathed with our trusty map.


After stopping into a side restaurant and getting some delicious Japanses dumplings we wandered around a bit, then back to the subway for Roppongi, which was toted as the hip nightlife scene. We also learned of Roppongi Hills, an architectural project 15 years in the making that fuses housing, work, and play into one community. We also checked out the Park Hyatt, very fancy, someday a return visit will be in order...

The next morning we headed to the fish market, which had already wrapped up but nonetheless we saw some monster crabs. Then, we headed up to see the cherry blossoms at Ueno, Tokyo's biggest park. It was very beautiful, and surprise, surprise, crowded! We got a lot of exercise strolling through the park and it was very relaxing.



Next we headed to Ginza, the high class shopping district compared to NYC's Park Avenue. There were a lot of shoppers out, but we stuck to window shopping. We got Fendi, Prada, Gucci, and every other classy brand you could name drop, but apparently Dior's display is too ritzy to be video-taped from outside. HAH.

That was Tokyo in a day. More time would have been nice, but we are itching to be able to communicate with strangers when necessary and eat American food!

4.07.2006

Cultural Cornucopia in Korea


Day 3 in Seoul, we met a fellow traveller staying at Kim's guest house, Steph from Brunswick, Germany, who we convinced to accompany us in our Changro-guided tour. We took the subway, on which we have become experts, to Sinchon to meet Pete and his medical school classmate, Song-soo, who, at 6 feet is one of the bigger Koreans around. He claims to always get picked first in basketball! He actually completed his military service on an American base and spent some months in Colorado so his English was very good, so we were all able to communicate without Pete having to translate. We had lunch at a Korean Chinese restaurant and got the real version of General Tso's. Delicious!

After that we went to the shopping district in the middle of Seoul. They have clothes stores as far as the eye can see in both directions, not to mention, stories upon stories of clothing boothes all right next to each other. Needless to say the girls were in heaven while I tried to spend most of my time sitting outside and checking out the river (or more like a stream) that goes through the whole city.


There we met up with Pete's posse of ladies, Chi-Hoon, Chi-He, and Yoon-Jung. They're all in training to be stewardesses (not an outdated term in Korea) for Korean Air. They were very shy at first, covering there mouths and giggling a lot, but after speaking the international language of Soju (a rice wine that's taken in shot glasses), they began to open up, and had a strong English vocabulary. We had some dinner and drinks at Song-Soo's favorite spot in Jongno. We played traditional Korean drinking games, which mostly involve counting and memory, and helped break the ice a lot more. We will spread these games across the US upon our return.


After dinner we headed back to Sinchon to the bar strip near the university to finish the night off, as you can see!

Lauren, Steph and I made it home safe, and we had a great time meeting all our new friends and promised everyone that they had a place to stay in Chicago anytime!

4.05.2006

Korea.....E Dynasty Baby!



Hello! We made it to Korea! We flew the red-eye to Korea on Monday and arrived VERY tired. We found Kim's Guest House...it's a great place to stay for $37/night and we're meeting lots of other travellers. Swedish, Australian, Japanese. We paid for a room and it includes breakfast, free internet, free laundry, and and a shared bathroom.

We net up with Pete at the hospital where he has medical school....yes, he actually is in school! I saw him first and asked Jason if he thought it was him. Jason said "no, he looks too tall", but I knew it was him! Pete walked through the doors in a blazer and nice jeans. Koreans dress nice! Everyone looks very neat and proper. It's very clean here compared to Thailand. We keep comparing to to America..except it's populated with Koreans!

We went to Pete's place and then walked to a buddist temple near by. Then we went to eat at a traditional Korean place....rice and beef in a stone bowl. It was delicious. Then we started drinking!!! We drank traditional rice wine with sausage and this food that reminded us of fruit loops. Then we went to a place called Zen 2 and drank 3 shots of tequilla, each! Then we met up with a friend of Pete's named Jong-Yu and went to sing Karaoke. We were horrible but it was so much fun.



We had to sleep off the alcohol the next morning. We did our laundry and Kim's Guest House and found a market for breakfast. It's really difficult to find your way around here....we don't recognize any of the language or signage.

Jason and I visited the Palace in the city. The flowers are starting to blossom.



Then we met up with Pete and his friend, Rhyo-Jo. We went to a couple traditional Korean neighborhoods and went window shopping. Then we went to a mall with the most expensive brands....gucci, marc jacobs, manolo blanik, yves st. laurent, etc. It was awesome! Rhyo-Jo asked us what a good name would be for her if she studied in the U.S.A. I told her that Emma and Chloe were popular right now...she can choose from anything! She was really cute, but Pete is trying to choose which girl to date....I guess we will meet another girl tomorrow. You know Pete!!!!



Then we went to eat at a Korean fast food place and had lots of yummy food. I wonder if there are more Korean places in America that we just don't notice.

Then we went to a discount mall and bought me a pair of "skinny" jeans and a shirt for the clubs. We went back to Pete's studio apartment and split a bottle of rice wine and then went to a great fried chicken place for some beer and chicken. What a great night! We're really enjoying Korea so far. These are some pictures of Pete's apartment. He pays $850 per month....real estate is expensive is Seoul.

4.02.2006

Last Days in Koh Chang



The past couple days have been great. We rented another motorbike and explored the south end of Koh Chang. We stopped at a little bar hut on the beach and enjoyed a long conversation about world politics with an Aussie/Indian named Amar. We were glad to have stopped at the bar because we found out the owner had started the place to get money to send back to her baby in rural thailand.



We did a little more shopping and I think now we're done with that!

Last night, the owner of Koh Chang Hut organized a big seafood night for all of the guests. We ate shrimp and fish, it was delicious. Jason said that he was very proud of himself because he wasn't too crazy about seafood (you wouldn't have guessed if you saw him peeling and popping this shrimp!). Jason is also sad to leave his favorite beer of Thailand, Beer Chang. My personal preference is Singha.




Now we're headed back to Bangkok by bus to catch a midnight plane to Seoul. I'm kind of worried because we haven't heard back from our friend Pete Lee yet. Not too surprising coming from Pete, but I have faith he'll redeem himself! We'll have to buy a guidbook when we get there and hit the city alone until we can get in contact with him.

La Gorn for Now! We'll see you all soon...