Whatever happened to Helen!
hello all,
I haven't forgotten you all I promise. Just that I haven't found myself with more than a few minutes to spare on the Internet recently. That is not to say that I have been exceptionally busy or anything - just that it is soooo hot when I get back to my house that I tend to get out of my sweaty clothes and into clean PJs asap and that is me in the house from there on in really. But I have been a-visiting again. I have been to Suncheon twice - the first weekend was a fantastic beer filled frolic (I would tell you more but all of the stories are very much of a 'you had to be there' nature and I wouldn't want to waste my time sitting here sniggering over the PC while reliving memories that wouldn't even bring a smile to your collective face), and the second time I was just breaking a six hour journey to Pusan by getting drunk with some friends on the way.
My summer vacation has been and gone now: all three days of it. And I had to fight for the third one of those. That is a little unfair as I did have the two weekend days as well. So a group of us got together and decided to go to Pusan for the long weekend. Didn't realise that another group had had the same idea - a group of around 40 million other people. PUSAN WAS CROWDED. I can't put it any plainer than that. I was aware of rumours of the beach being standing room only during the summer but I had never seen anything like this. Let's start with the accommodation.
The prices were up from the usual 30,000 won a night to a vastly overflated 150,000 won for the night and there was scant little of that available. If I had known then I would have packed according to what others were doing - that is sleeping on the beach mainly. There must have been more people there than in the motels. Because the first lot of our group got there on Thursday night we were able to get two rooms for the duration - though the woman wanted to give one of them away for the Saturday night! We managed to hang onto them both though.
The first night that we arrived was spent walking around all kinds of places trying to find us an ajumma with rooms for us and avoiding Bangladeshi men offering us money for sex and trying to take photos of us - more on that later. Once we had somewhere it was time to eat and onto one of the true delights of Pusan - large American chain restaurants! Well, you are supposed to eat different food when on holiday so we forwent the usual Bi Bim Bab (rice with assorted veggies and one of my fav dishes here) to indulge in totally chopstickless food in the likes of TGI Fridays, Outback Steakhouse and Bennigans with a sneaky Maccas when pissed. The food was amazing and I would heartily recommend Bennigans for the best service on Haeundae Beach (which was where we were staying).
Other than food there was a lot of fighting our way into the water only to be hit with a large amount of large inflatable driven recklessly by small unaccompanied kids and again avoiding the Bangladeshi paparazzi on the shore. I began to get really quick at spotting men sidling over like crabs while their mate stood in the background fumbling with his camera. What they want these photos for I have no idea - ('And this is another one of some girls I never spoke to and who told me to sod off shortly after this shot was taken when she noticed the camera!') Also a lot of beer drunk on the beach into the wee small hours and much sneaking into posh hotels on the beachfront to use their toilets. We all bought cool hippy clothes (for about ten times the price we would have paid in Thailand but cheap when you take into account the fact that we didn't have to fly anywhere!) and I got totally carried away and got a toe ring and henna tattoo as well. Ah well, you only get one summer vacation - or you do in Korea anyway!
I have to teach now so will continue this another time!
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I haven't forgotten you all I promise. Just that I haven't found myself with more than a few minutes to spare on the Internet recently. That is not to say that I have been exceptionally busy or anything - just that it is soooo hot when I get back to my house that I tend to get out of my sweaty clothes and into clean PJs asap and that is me in the house from there on in really. But I have been a-visiting again. I have been to Suncheon twice - the first weekend was a fantastic beer filled frolic (I would tell you more but all of the stories are very much of a 'you had to be there' nature and I wouldn't want to waste my time sitting here sniggering over the PC while reliving memories that wouldn't even bring a smile to your collective face), and the second time I was just breaking a six hour journey to Pusan by getting drunk with some friends on the way.
My summer vacation has been and gone now: all three days of it. And I had to fight for the third one of those. That is a little unfair as I did have the two weekend days as well. So a group of us got together and decided to go to Pusan for the long weekend. Didn't realise that another group had had the same idea - a group of around 40 million other people. PUSAN WAS CROWDED. I can't put it any plainer than that. I was aware of rumours of the beach being standing room only during the summer but I had never seen anything like this. Let's start with the accommodation.
The prices were up from the usual 30,000 won a night to a vastly overflated 150,000 won for the night and there was scant little of that available. If I had known then I would have packed according to what others were doing - that is sleeping on the beach mainly. There must have been more people there than in the motels. Because the first lot of our group got there on Thursday night we were able to get two rooms for the duration - though the woman wanted to give one of them away for the Saturday night! We managed to hang onto them both though.
The first night that we arrived was spent walking around all kinds of places trying to find us an ajumma with rooms for us and avoiding Bangladeshi men offering us money for sex and trying to take photos of us - more on that later. Once we had somewhere it was time to eat and onto one of the true delights of Pusan - large American chain restaurants! Well, you are supposed to eat different food when on holiday so we forwent the usual Bi Bim Bab (rice with assorted veggies and one of my fav dishes here) to indulge in totally chopstickless food in the likes of TGI Fridays, Outback Steakhouse and Bennigans with a sneaky Maccas when pissed. The food was amazing and I would heartily recommend Bennigans for the best service on Haeundae Beach (which was where we were staying).
Other than food there was a lot of fighting our way into the water only to be hit with a large amount of large inflatable driven recklessly by small unaccompanied kids and again avoiding the Bangladeshi paparazzi on the shore. I began to get really quick at spotting men sidling over like crabs while their mate stood in the background fumbling with his camera. What they want these photos for I have no idea - ('And this is another one of some girls I never spoke to and who told me to sod off shortly after this shot was taken when she noticed the camera!') Also a lot of beer drunk on the beach into the wee small hours and much sneaking into posh hotels on the beachfront to use their toilets. We all bought cool hippy clothes (for about ten times the price we would have paid in Thailand but cheap when you take into account the fact that we didn't have to fly anywhere!) and I got totally carried away and got a toe ring and henna tattoo as well. Ah well, you only get one summer vacation - or you do in Korea anyway!
I have to teach now so will continue this another time!
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posted by Helen @ 5:14 PM
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