the past week

still haven't edited/uploaded the recent pics. no time to write much either because i had to finish a paper last week and we went exploring a lot to make up for all the afternoons spent at home (yes, room 304 is starting to feel like home) because a certain person keeps taking long afternoon-to-evening naps, depriving me of a shopping/dinner/gimik buddy. so... some highlights from the past seven days:

monday the 17th -- explored the small streets branching out of chamsari-gil (what we call pedro gil) and found a cozy restaurant where i had my favorite albap (fish roe with rice & veggies in a sizzling pot) and S had some donkatsu thingy. dark like a pub but smells like kimchi. cheaper than our usual/favorite dinner places (kookdang on chamsari-gil, oici wine cafe, etc.). will write more about manang kookdang and the award-winning coffee of oici wine some other time.

wednesday the 19th -- went to immigration office after school to apply for alien ID. didn't eat lunch, subsisted on supermarket camembert, crackers, and a sushi rice triangle from ministop. after immigration, had overpriced watery jamaican blue mountain coffee at some cafe in hyundai department store where i also had a quasi-bruschetta with olives, roasted veggies and blushed tomatoes (!!!). i really miss having a kitchen. but i'm never going back to that place. sagwa talaga ng kape dito sa seoul, kahit sa starbucks.

thursday the 20th -- had lunch at a pakistani restaurant in itaewon near the mosque with my muslim friends (azri, cecep and asma) and kalinga the sri lankan cinematographer. i took videos of everyone singing songs from their countries (malaysia, indonesia, sri lanka) while we waited for the amazingly good food to arrive. it was sooo good! basmati rice! lamb curry! (yes, yes, i ate meat but it was halal so not so bad for me...) raita! biryani! really smooth lassi! not a whiff of kimchi anywhere! yay! after lunch we went to this international food store where i found cornik, alamang, bagoong, patis, indonesian noodles and frozen hopia baboy from eng bee tin. pinatulan ko yung cornik. hahaha.

friday the 21st -- good weather, quite sunny. went up to roof in between writing my paper. it took me 11 hours to finish. i started 2pm and finished at 1:30am.

saturday the 22nd -- watch dvd movie ("art of fighting") at seoul selection, a cool english-language bookstore/expat hangout in front of gyeongbokgung palace, which i have yet to visit. we then explored lovely insa-dong, a tourist trap, a street lined with art galleries, little shops that sell crafts, sweets, etc. lots of stalls on the sidewalks selling hats, jewelry, scarves, snacks, stationery, incense, etc. i bought a jar of citron tea (like marmalade, very lemony with zest, which you mix with hot or cold water), little sweets (six tiny squares of nut and seed brittle including pine nut, sesame, black sesame and i dunno what else), two halter tops from nepal and a scarf from india. that night, S and i watched an episode of desperate housewives on his laptop. it was a nice change to actually watch something in english.

sunday the 23rd -- went to myongdong cathedral with S and met another exiled pinoy, R, who teaches programming at DLSU and is here to study the gaming industry of korea. he's also part of ACPI. R specializes in artificial intelligence applied to gaming, and he plays the violin and the piano. it was fun experiencing the cultural phenomenon called Spring Sale at myongdong (a retail fashion district spitting distance from the cathedral) where most items had 30% to 70% discount. had to endure geektalk bonding between the two gamer boys i was with for a couple of hours because we had to stay indoors to avoid the freezing rain. that same night, we had this crazy idea of having a picnic dinner on the roof of our building. in 5 degree C weather!!! somehow, we enjoyed indonesian insta-noodles, pickled quail eggs from the convenience store, aligue rice, citron tea and indonesian fish kropek. i couldn't find edible plant-derived food at the convenience store save for packets of nasty looking kimchi.

monday the 24th -- after school ended, we went shopping at dongdaemun market. this is actually an area near the dongdaemun sports stadium full of buildings retailing clothes. we could say that we went there to practice our korean counting and haggling skills but i doubt if any of you would believe me. i never knew shopping for a guy could be so much fun, a bit of a power trip. we found a nice spring jacket, some shirts. we kept getting big discounts because the tinderas all thought S was really cute & looked like some japanese actor daw. asa pa. anyway, the resemblance to the japanese actor really paid off because when we saw a stall selling indian stuff, i found juties i really liked. these can retail for up to php 3,000 in manila. the original price for a pair was 45,000 won but we haggled like heck. in the end, we got the juties plus a bracelet and a pocket mirror for much much less than the original price of the juties alone. our total discount was 23,000 won (around 1,200 pesos). may gusto siguro yung tindera kay siege.