Shanghai

(Actually published March 7th, 2008)

Hey everyone. It's been a while, but I do have something to tell you all about. A month ago I was in Shanghai for Chinese New Years. I went with my friends from Japan Laurence and Lindsay. We arrived in China on February 6th (New Year's Eve) and returned to Korea on the 10th.

The flight was uneventful, and we had some directions to get the hostel. We took the bus, and I got my first introduction to China. On the bus, no one spoke English except for the woman who was selling tickets. There was an old man singing in a Chinese language, and it was actually quite interesting. His pitch kept on changing, which makes sense given that the Chinese languages are tonal, but it was very different to hear it.

Driving into Shanghai, I was surprised to see that the city itself is actually quite green. There's a lot of green space and it was impressive.

Once we got closer to downtown Shanghai, there were fireworks going off. It was still night, so I didn't get a good look at Shanghai at that point. We eventually got to the train station, and took the subway to our hostel.

Shanghai has an awesome subway system. It's fast, cheap and not crowded (by Asian city standards). We got a little lost looking for the hostel, but found it eventually.

We met some people at the hostel, and wanted to look for a bar. Unfortunately, everything near our hostel was closed and there were no taxi cabs in sight. We walked around for a while looking for a place to eat and drink. Meanwhile, fireworks were going off everywhere, non-stop. We stopped by a street vendor, and bought some fireworks from them.

We walked around for a long time, and then we met up with two Dutch guys and an American that were staying at our hostel. They were learning Mandarin in Beijing and could communicate with some people, which was a huge help. We went from bar to bar in Shanghai. Fireworks were still going off constantly in the background.

We ended up going to a bar called Babyface, and arrived at midnight. When we arrived, the bouncers started to get people away from the entrance of the dance club. They were setting off fireworks in probably the largest display of fireworks I've ever seen. It went off for 5 minutes. There were, of course, other fireworks going off nearby.

Inside was fun. We kept on buying full vodka bottles, and I met a Japanese guy and started using my Japanese skills on him. He was a nice guy, and I gave him my Japanese cell phone number. When we left the bar at 4 am, there were still fireworks. That night we got up several times to the sound of fireworks. That is to say, there were a lot of fireworks.

The next day we hit up downtown Shanghai. It was fun. The first thing to note about Shanghai is that it's so futuristic it will make Japan look like a third world country. We also went in a tunnel that went under the river in Shanghai. It was really trippy. Worth doing, even though it was a complete rip off.

We went to bed early that second day because we had big plans for the third day. We went to a river village. Basically, it's a traditional Chinese village. It's described as China's Venice. It was really beautiful. It has boats with people paddling it themselves and some Chinese buildings. It was quite the tourist trap, but the best shop was far from the tourist shops. It was a tiny house with a woman painting inside. She had beautiful pictures posted on the wall. I took a look around and decided to buy something. I now have authentic Chinese art, and it's awesome.

We went back home and drank in our hostel that night. Played some drinking games and learned probably the greatest new rules for Kings. You will all have to wait until you play with me before you learned the awesomeness of the new rules (Viking is my favorite).

So the next day, our last full day in Shanghai, we hit up places around Shanghai. We saw a part called Old Town, which was fantastic. It was packed, and once again, a tourist trap, but it had Chinese lanterns overhead and beautiful architecture. We walked around, and I bought my very own Mao clock! That's right everyone, my very own made in China clock. Now, this may come as a surprise to a lot of you, but it's actually a piece of shit. I would never have equated made in China with cheap crap! It doesn't even keep time accurately.

While leaving Old Town, we got lost. We wound up in a poor part of Shanghai and it was interesting to walk around there. Houses looked really bad on the outside, but one thing I noticed was that there was air conditioning units in some of the windows... definetely a stranger sight of China.

We then went to Qibao. The place was awesome! It was another ancient part of Shanghai. There were small shops, it was packed, and we ate weird Chinese food. Everything was packed. Not so much of a touristy spot, although there were still shops here and there. Definitely worth seeing if you're in Shanghai.

Our last night, we went drinking again. I made a new friend from Hong Kong, and got his e-mail address, so I might drop him a line when I go to visit. The next morning, I got up early and saw a Chinese Buddhist temple. It's been interesting to see how different they are in Japan, Korea and China. I think the Chinese temples were the most beautiful.

We left China later that day. Shanghai was awesome. A nice city, with nice people, cheap food, and gorgeous women. Definitely worth a visit at least once, and definitely a good place to live (if you can live under a dictatorship that suppresses speech).

Meeting up with the Japan crew

It has been almost two months that I've been in Korea, which means that I've been in Korea as long as I've been in Japan. I will write a post soon about the differences between Japan and Korea for all of you who were curious.

Last night, I got to see the people who came with me to Korea from Japan. We met in Seoul and went for a fun night of drinking and dancing. It started off with meeting up with one friend in a part of town called Gangnam. We went to a bookstore, met a nice Vancouver woman and talked about traveling in Japan. She told us about a casino where they only let in foreigners, and they feed you and give you free alcohol. It sounds like a perfect way to spend a day.

Afterwards we went to meet up with our other friends. From there we went to a nice bar that was really chill. It was probably the best pub/bar I've been in. We then went to another area that's near the universities in Seoul.

First we hit up a bar that was a dance club at the same time. Very loud music, packed , but it had a nice mix of Koreans and foreigners. Most places have far too many Koreans or too many foreigners.

After a few drinks, one guy and I decided to introduce ourselves to some people. So we found 3 foreign girls. We started talking to them, and the conversation went a little like this:

Me: Hey, where are you from?
Girls: She's from Latvia and we're from Germany.
Me (in German): Pleasure to meet you, what brings you to Korea?
Girls (English): Our parents work here. We go to school here.
Me: High school or university?
Girls: High school.
Me: How old are you girls?
Girls: 17.

At this point, my friend looked at me with confusion, I laughed and walked away. Lesson for today: Rather than ask a girl her age when she's told you that she goes to high school, say goodbye.

After that bar, we went to a bar called M2. This is where the university students go. It's basically like 'Chez Dagobert' in Quebec city, but with Koreans instead of French girls, smaller, and with more people. So we went to the front, because that's what you do at a club. There was a sea of Koreans. It was kind of mesmerizing, but you can't have alcohol if you're at the front. They're quite anal about it. I guess I was just spoiled by sketchy Kingston bars where you could leave your bottle or cup anywhere.

After that, we left to go sleep. I got to sleep on the floor, which was awesome, except I didn't have a pillow.

I need more nights like that in Seoul. It was actually lots of fun.

House on Hooker Hill

It's been a while since I've written a post, so I'll talk about Korea and last night.


I've met new people, and more people, so that's a good thing. I've seen all of my friends who came here from Japan and gone drinking in Seoul a few times.

Suwon, the city I currently reside in, is a city of 1 million people. There are bars near Suwon station, which is only one stop away from my house. There's a fort built on a hill called Hwaseong which is a 15 minute walk from my house, and is a world heritage spot. The most popular bars are near Suwon station, and in another part of town which has a lot of foreigners.

Seoul's fun. I've been to a few areas, but two areas to drink. These areas are Iteawon and Gangnam. The first is an international place with a lot of GIs, English Teachers, Indians, Africans and any Koreans that want to learn English. It also has a nice place warmly called 'Hooker Hill'.

Gangnam is fun, it's also fairly international, but caters more to Koreans. There are bars, restaurants, and it's a good time. I've only been once, but I do plan on going again soon.

And now for a story. My friend Laurence and I wanted to do a night out on the town, meet some people, have a good time. We went from bar to bar in Itaewon, and didn't find any Koreas to talk to. Unfortunately, we went mostly into empty bars. We then went to the Canadian bar, drank a few, and asked some people to tell us of a few places in Itaewon to go to. They gave us the name of a few places, so we went to see them. One of the places was a bar on the top of hooker hill.

As Laurence and I were walking up hooker hill, there were tiny buildings, no bigger than maybe 3 rooms. There were women looking into the street by opening their doors just a bit. When an unsuspecting person, in this case myself and my friend Laurence, would walk by, they would grab the guy and try and drag them into the hut. While being dragged in, a nice American girl was yelling out "herpes, gonnorhea, STD central" just in case we didn't know.

I didn't go inside one of the huts, but I got to see it while the stubborn Korean prostitute tried to drag me in. There's a main room, and there were four women (including the ones trying to drag us in). They were dressed up... well like prostitutes. The place had two rooms that I saw, and I didn't see them that well, but there was a big velvet couch in one of them.

We went to the top, got sketched out, and decided to go back down the hill. We got accosted by the same group of women, and fought them off. She then said something in Korean which I'm sure wasn't flattering.

And that's a story of my adventure in Seoul.

A post, from Korea

So it has come to my attention that I haven't been posting enough messages from Korea. I've been here for about three weeks, and I've been to Seoul a few times, and I've gone out once in a while.

I got lucky enough to see some foreigners and they were a fun bunch. I'll see them later I'm sure, and they seem nice enough. So more foreigners is always good. I was also lucky enough to have nice co-workers. The boss is good some people got better deals in Korea, but there are far more people who got a lot worse. A LOT WORSE.

There haven't been any big adventures yet. Winter's coming, so it's less likely that there will be big adventures.

So, three weeks later, I can say that Korea's fun, but I miss Japan. A lot.

Korea

So I arrived in Korea almost two weeks ago, and I thought it was worth writing about my experiences so far.

Let me start by saying that Korea is very very different from Japan. The biggest difference is the drivers. In Japan, everyone follows every traffic law, in Korea, I cannot tell you how many times I've seen people go through red lights. The police don't stop them, it's a minor offense here in South Korea.

The people are very nice in Korea, but a different kind of nice than in Japan. The Japanese were far more polite and Koreans are more generous. Japanese are very quiet, and don't want to disturb you unless you are visibly in need of help while the Koreans are very verbose and will talk to you if they suspect they can help you.

The cost of living is much cheaper in Korea. I can go into a restaurant and have the biggest meal ever, and it will never cost more than 10 dollars. I can get a good size meal that will fill you up for $3.50. The subway system in Seoul is much cheaper, it's less than 3 dollars to get from Suwon (where I live) to Seoul which is any hour away. In Osaka, it use to cost 3 dollars for a subway trip that was 4 to 6 stops away. Taxi cabs are also very cheap in Korea, but I'll give you more concrete examples later.

Seoul's a fun city. I've had some good meals and seen some cool shops. I'll explore it all more and write about it.

Korea bound

I'm leaving for Korea on the 14th. I will not have the internet between now and my arrival in Seoul.

So here's one of my last posts from Japan, if not my last.

So I will write about a few things that I have found to love in Japan. The first is J-pop. J-pop rocks.

The Japanese people are lots of fun. The guys will drink with you, and it's awesome, because most Japanese are light weights.

A lot of Japanese women are naive, and extremely sweet. I won't talk about my successes or failure with Japanese women, but I must say that I was, and still am, quite surprised by how awesome they are. I didn't kick myself for not knowing Japanese until I started talking to Japanese women.

Japanese ancient culture is really beautiful. The temples are always a great sight, even if they're not well known.

The food's good here. Very different, but good.

The Cherry Blossom (Sakura) is beautiful. I saw my first one today that only had a few flowers on it, but I still couldn't help but appreciate the beauty of the few flowers it had on its branches.

I have been dreading leaving the country, and it's near. I'm going to take the next few days to explore.

I'll start writing to you guys from Korea. See you in a bit.

Halloween in Osaka

In Japan, Halloween is usually celebrated the Saturday before Halloween. They don't hand out candy to people, but I did get a piece of candy when I bought beer at a convenience store.

So Saturday was someone's Sayonora party. My friend Kate was heading back to Toronto on the following Monday. We started off drinking at the docks, and didn't realize that tonight was the big Halloween thing. We then started going to a park in American Town (ame-mura), and on our way, realized a lot of Japanese people were dressed up. It was awesome, because they go all out here. My favorite costumes included princess Garnett from FF9, two girls dressed up as white mage and black mage from FF, and a girl in a panda suit, because Panda suits kick ass.

It was absolutely hilarious, I met some Japanese guys (mentioned in the last post) and we were just having fun drinking in the park, enjoying life.

Last night, Halloween, I had a costume. If you don't know, it was Pikachu. Most people don't wear their costumes on Halloween night. On my way to meet friends, I had so many Japanese women wave, watch me walking around, and some would even say "Kawaii" (cute). The younger men would usually smile, or start yelling out "Pikachu!". The funniest reaction by far were the business men and the older women. They would look at me, and look away, but you could tell they were laughing inside. They then kept on walking as if nothing was wrong, that seeing someone dressed up as a popular icon from their culture on any given night was entirely normal. It would be rude to make a deal out of it.

Drinking was pretty uneventful, except that it was the Sayonora party for my housemate, Hugh, and another friend, Dan. Dan drank with us until 5 am, then we had to go home, catch the bus and get on his flight back to the UK. It's really sad seeing everyone leave, even though I've only known them for a short period of time.

You'll all be glad to know however that I got McDonald's breakfast at 5 am, which is probably the after drinking food in the world.