Fun Friday!

The first class was cancelled because students were voting for their class presidents. Instead, we had to swap and do it for 5th period later in the day. So, in the morning, I looked up restaurants to go to for dinner. The rest of the work day was rather uneventful.

After work, I headed to Jongno area where I had picked a restaurant and had idea of a coffee shop I would go to to study Korean after dinner. It was a bit early for dinner when I first arrived to the area so I located the restaurant, Koba and then went to Cheonggyecheon. I sat by the stream for a little bit soaking up the last few rays of sunshine and worked more on itineraries for my visitors.

I returned to Koba and was greeted with a smallish mostly empty restaurant. There was a older Korean man on the left side of the bar and an older Caucasian man on the right side. The young waiter was also doubling as bartender and he was very friendly, asking where I was from. I finally got my food (I ordered a vegetarian sandwich) and was enjoying it-it rivaled my favorite sandwich from Casablanca (though I like how Casablanca puts more veggies on the sandwich). The chef came out (his name is Simon and he's from Morocco) and saw me eating the sandwich-holding it with both hands and diving right in-and he applauded me and said it was good to see me eating a sandwich the "real" way. After I finished eating, G, the waiter asked me if I liked beer. I said I didn't mind it and he told me he was going to give me a free glass. I got my beer and joined the others at the bar. They ended up cranking up the music a bit more and we talked and sang and danced in our seats. G got a little crazy and was even flicking the lights on and off. After a little bit, some other people came into the restaurant and G said, "we have to act normal now!" and they turned the music down a little bit. I talked with the American man-he works for an NGO and was doing a business trip in Korea. It was really great to talk with him. As time went on a few more people trickled in and out. We were joined at the bar by a Japanese girl who somehow knew G. Then, we were joined by a Brazilian. He teaches music at Kyunghee University-has lived in Korea for 10 years. There was a drum in the restaurant so he ended up doing a few small "performances" for us and also was teaching us how to play the drum. Simon made some fried potato balls for us as service and they were delicious. It was a lot of fun meeting new people. I was there from 6 until 12:30! I never made it to a cafe to study Korean because I was enjoying the time at Koba so much. It was such a great find to stumble upon and I was thankful that G had asked if I wanted a beer and was friendly.