On the subway, I got a call from the hostel. The guy on the other end of the phone had a very odd way of speaking in English. Definitely not the typical Korean accent I hear when my students speak English, for example. It's really hard to describe his voice, but it was tonally high and slightly nasally. His tone would often shift somewhat wildly like a pubescent teenager dealing with a cracking voice. He was also constantly addressing me as "man" as in "That's cool, man". More on this guy in a little bit.
As we exited the subway and approached our hostel, we were simultaneously becoming more entrenched in what I would describe as a decadent party area: every establishment was a bar, blaring loud music from all directions, flyers everywhere, and everyone dressed to the nines. It actually bared an exact resemblance to the party area in my city.
Like everywhere else, the music was blaring in our hostel as we walked in. It was just barely after setting our bags down that the woman working the front desk asked if we wanted a beer. Daniel and I gave each other a look as I said, "Well, first I think we'd like to check in...we have reservations..." She said, "OK, let me call the owner." Not a minute later did this stylishly dressed Korean come stumbling up to us, "Hey, man! My name is Tiger!" Ah, we had spoken on the phone with THIS guy. He had clearly been drinking since his voice was now also slightly slurred. "Yea, man! You guys are the last ones checking in tonight!"
As he was checking us in, a man approaching middle age creepily came up next to us. He eventually introduced himself. He was a marketing consultant from Nicaragua working for Tiger. I would've never guessed!
To our simultaneous dismay and delight, Tiger informed us that the actual hostel was a ways away and we could get there by taxi within 10 minutes. So we left together to get a taxi. As he lead us out back into the decadent party streets, he was clearly a bit stumbly. We passed some foreigners that exclaimed, "Hey Tiger! What's up?!" Tiger responded by saying, "Not now, man! I have to take care of my guests!"
We got to the street and he said, "Let's cross right here!" I looked both ways and there was oncoming traffic coming from one direction moving at an alarming pace. Tiger brazenly, but cooly, walked across the street while we hurried our sober selves with luggage in tow.
Our "hostel" was actually just one apartment in what looked to be very expensive resort apartments (the buildings were next to the sea). The apartment was actually really really big: it had three bathrooms, several bedrooms, and a huge common area. It was probably one of the most comfortable hostel stays I have ever had.
The Spanish man working at our hostel was incredibly nice and helpful. He pointed out tons of points of interest on a map, and was completely honest concerning which ones were worth a visit and which weren't.
Busan is the second largest city in South Korea. It sits on the Southeast coast and from what I would guess, most of South Korea's exports and imports flow through its ports. Of course, seafood populates the restaurants and markets like the people populate the city. It is also worth noting that the people of Busan are known for their rougher behavior and way of speaking (at least compared to the rest of the Koreans).
Once Daniel woke up, we decided on a loose itinerary based on the information we were given by our Spanish friend. Unfortunately, rain was planned for the entire day and no sooner did we leave our hostel/apartment than it started raining. We went through a park that overlooked a major part of the city and then to a modern history museum practically right next door. Then, giving in to the fact that it probably was not going to stop raining anytime soon, we elected to spend the rest of the afternoon in a public bath.
We spent an hour and a half in the bath/sauna area of SpaDay before we decided to explore the facilities a bit more. What we found a humongous area that was almost like a mini-mall. The hall from the public bath/sauna area led to a huge open space where people were just lounging around on heated floors, on sofas, then in another room on recliners watching TV and DVDs. There was even a restaurant and cafe. There were tons of "special rooms" promising different sensations..."the wave room", "the electron room". I kind of felt like I was in a cult because everyone was wearing the same garb and it seemed like we were our own community completely cut off from the outside world. I would love to go again when I make it back to Busan!
After meeting up with our friend, Helen, and eating dinner by a crowded ice ring, we headed back to our hostel to get ready for Halloween. As we were headed back, we were slammed with a deluge from the skies. I don't think I have ever expierenced rain that heavy before...and it only lasted two minutes. We got completely soaked!
Unfortunately, the firework display that was part of our wanting to come to Busan in the first place was canceled due to the rain; but we were still ready to celebrate Halloween! We got in our costumes and started drinking with the other temporary residents of our hostel. Despite a bit of drama (not really worth expending the energy to explain it), we left the hostel/apartment to go to the hostel/bar where we had first checked in. People were meeting up there to head to a club together. Unfortunately, were late arriving and everyone had already left. We had to get a hold of the one and only Tiger to get directions to the club. We eventually made it. The club was definitely a bit more posh than what I am used to. The decorations were great, and some of the DJing was pretty cool. One DJ started his set in a drag racing outfit and pretended to play videogames as a videogame was projected onto the wall behind him. After that he went into a remix of the Ghostbusters' theme song. However, the drink prices were a bit steep for our pockets, so we elected to leave and ended up at an Irish bar with a bunch of foreigners. We did some dancing and had some cocktails. Then we moved back to the area in which our hostel/bar was located. There was a huge gathering of foreigners dressed in costume in the middle of the streets (streets not so much for cars as for pedestrians)...probably roughly 300 foreigners. I actually recognized many people from my EPIK orientation whom we also hung out with in Namhae over Chuseok weekend. It was nice (drunkenly) catching up with them. We went to a couple other bars in the area before heading back home around 4:30 a.m.
Our friend, Helen, was convinced she was going to stay out later and tried taking pictures of the directions back to the hostel using the camera on her phone. I couldn't stop laughing because all of the pictures she was taking (she took 14) were awful. I said, "Helen, you are NEVER going to make it home with these God-awful pictures." So I was able to convince her to come back to the hostel with us.
The next morning was absolutely gorgeous. If only the previous day had been anything like that! We decided to take a walk along the cliffs of the ocean and enjoy the sun before heading back to Daejeon.
