Take Me Out to the Ball Game!

One thing I've really missed this summer is hitting up a few Cardinals baseball games, grabbing a delicious ballpark hotdog, and watching my main man Molina behind the plate.  Lucky for me, apart from soccer, baseball is Korea's second-most popular sport.  There are nine national teams in the Korean Baseball League and games are extremely cheap to attend.  I've gone to two games this summer and both have been extremely fun!

I went to my first game in June with my friend Cara.  It was 4 o'clock, we were already in Seoul and decided to take the subway over to Jamsil Sports Complex to see if there was a game since all games are played in the evenings.  We were able to get tickets for the 5:30 game, and we were asked which seats we wanted: the $10, $12, or $15.  We decided to splurge and go for the $15 seats between third base and home plate, about 12 rows from the field.  Not bad for the "pricy" tickets.  The stadium is divided into two sections: home team section and visiting section; so when you buy tickets, you choose which side you want to sit on.  We decided just to sit with the home team which was the LG Twins.  The visitors were the SK Wyverns.  All teams are owned by a major Korean corporation.  

View of the field

My second game was just a couple weeks ago, and I got to spend it with the people I love most: my family!  During our time in Seoul, it was a MUST to see a game since we all love a little baseball action.  Of course we "splurged" for the same tickets too.  This time we saw LG play the Lotte Giants, which we were told are the equivalent of the NY Yankees in regards to Korean fan bases.  The Korean guy sitting next to my dad was wearing a special All-Star jersey, which eventually lead to a conversation.  We found out that this guy had obtained his Master's degree from Washington University in St. Louis in 1996!  Talk about a small world!  Unfortunately this game was rained out in the 5th inning, but we still managed to witness a homerun and my brother and I left as jersey-holding members of the Giants fan base.

Family at the game...obviously I didn't get the memo about keeping our eyes open.

 My new jersey supporting Che Dae Seong, pitcher

The ballpark food isn't exactly what you would be able to find at Busch Stadium, but there is still quite the selection: Burger King, KFC, Pizza Hut, Smoothie King, etc.  Concession prices weren't overly inflated either which is always a plus.  Many people decide to skip the ballpark food altogether and order delivery to the stadium.  Fried chicken delivery is always the most popular choice for Koreans, and you can bring your own food into the stadium no problem.  My brother happened to be a huge fan of the $3 Budweiser tallboys.  Yep, you heard that right...$3.

Another great view from our seats.

If you go to a Korean baseball game, don't get upset when you don't heard the familiar "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" chant.  Instead, Koreans have their own chants which are led by cheerleaders.  Many of the chants are in tune to popular English songs; my personal favorite chant being the one to the tune of Disney's "It's a Small World".  

Hope you thought this post was a Grand Slam...sorry that wasn't as funny as I had hoped.  Until next time... 

          

Barbara in Korea: Adventures with my Mom

Ever since my mom booked her ticket to Korea in February, I've been counting down the days until she arrives.  Well, after a grueling 24-hour journey, she made it to Korea July 2nd.  I ditched school a little early so that I was able to meet her at the airport.  I had a big sign and smile waiting for her when she walked through the arrival gate; and, I got the hug I'd been waiting 11 months for!  

Since she's arrived, I think she's already experienced quite a lot; some things we've done together, and some things she's done alone because I'm still at work during the week.  On our first weekend together, I made sure to take my mom to the "hotspots" of Jecheon.  First on our list was Urimiji Lake, which is a reservoir on the outskirts of the city.  While there, we walked around the park which surrounds the lake and took a ride on a swan-shaped paddle boat.  There are a few food vendors in this area, so I was excited to have my mom try some authentic Korean street food including a chicken/coke cup and a spiral potato stick (which is a whole potato cut into a spiral shape, fried, and dipped in a seasoning of your choice).  We also took a walk through the rice fields.  Rice is a staple at every Korean meal, so there is a lot of land devoted to growing the stuff!  

My mom also got to see Cheongpung Lake, which is a large nearby lake.  My one landlord was kind enough to drive her there, give her a tour, and take her to dinner since I had to work.  

At Urimiji Lake

With the Jecheon characters

Street Food

Rice Fields

Afterwards, we stopped at the dog cafe to get our animal fix since we both miss our pets a lot.  As I've mentioned before, animal cafes are very popular in Korea, and we both really enjoyed playing with the several dogs that were there.  

This past weekend my mom, my co-teacher, a co-worker, my friend and I all headed to the east coast of Korea to see the infamous Haesindong Park, aka the Penis Park.  It attracts many visitors every year, especially foreigners...I'm sure you can guess why!  Yes, the park is filled with nothing but penis statues: fat penises, skinny penises, short penises, long penises, pensises with faces, and even a penis teeter-totter.  You get the picture.  The penis park doesn't just exist for dicks and giggles; there's a story behind it.  

The Tale:

Supposedly a long time ago, there was a young virgin girl who drowned in the ocean in which the park overlooks.  After the drowning, fishermen noticed that fish seemed to be disappearing from the water.  The fishermen concluded that the loss of fish must be because the girl was haunting the ocean and was angry after dying a virgin.  In order to appease the girl's spirit, the fishermen built penises, and more penises and more.  

Obviously these fishermen were smart, because, duh, what else does a virgin girl want?  Nowadays, the park is just a interesting place to visit in a very conservative country.  Did I mention there were families with young kids there?  No?  Well there were, and it was weird.

Penis teeter-totter

Since we were already near the coast, we decided to hit up a local beach.  The beach scene in Korea is quite different from the U.S.; instead of swimsuits, everyone is swimming in regular clothes, and instead of beach towels, there are tents set up on the beach.  Koreans even cook ramen and barbeque on the beach!  It's just a different experience here.  

Food is a big part of Korean culture, so I've had fun taking my mom to some different restaurants to try out Korean food.  The first place I took her was a traditional restaurant in which you eat on short tables and sit on the floor.  Traditional restaurants often serve each person a bowl of rice and then everyone shares multiple side dishes, usually soups and vegetable-based dishes which have been fermented.  We also ate Korean BBQ one night.  BBQ is my favorite here.  BBQ consists of cooking meat (pork, beef or duck) at your table and it is also served with many side dishes.  Surprisingly, my mom has seemed to enjoy Korean food; this was something that I definitely had to adjust to when I first arrived.  My mom has faced one major setback though: chopsticks!  She has been a trooper and tried using them at every meal, but the waiter always ends up bringing her a fork.  Some things just take time.  

Using chopsticks!

My mom has also visited my school on a few occasions and met many of my students and co-workers. Everyone has enjoyed asking her questions like "How old are you?", and we've also heard several times, "Same face!".  It's been a really great experience for my students to meet another "foreigner" and for my mom to finally meet the kids I've been teaching to the past year.  

Next week, we will be off to Jeju Island and Seoul for more adventures since I will be starting summer vacation.

Rafting in Yeongwol

Over the weekend, a few friends and I went rafting in Yeongwol, a nearby town about 25 minutes away.  It's currently typhoon season, but luckily the rain stayed away Saturday and it couldn't have been a better day to go.  I was kind of expecting white-water, Colorado style rapids, but Korea didn't quite live up to those expectations.  But it was a great time nonetheless!

We were the only "foreigner" raft on the whole river, so of course many people stared at us and some even shouted some friendly "hellos" our way.  We quickly learned that it is Korean custom to splash the rafts that you pass or that pass you while you make your way down the river.  Koreans made the splashing bit look really easy, but I proved to be a terrible splasher...it was definitely harder than it looked!!  You had to smack you paddle across the water to splash the raft alongside of you...or if you're me, you try to do it, fail, and then cover your head so you don't get water in your eyes.  I definitely let my raft team down in the splashing competitions.  Oh well, I made up for it by being a great paddler.  

About halfway down the river, we were able to anchor the raft and swim for a bit.  Many Koreans can't swim because they don't get a chance to take swimming lessons and their aren't any outdoor, recreational pools anywhere.  Because of this, I'm a little surprised that rafting and other swim-related activities are so popular.  Because Koreans can't really swim, everyone had to wear lifejackets and helmets the whole time on the raft...bummer.  But it was still a great time!

A friend on the trip had a GoPro and was able to get some great shots of us on our trip.  Here is a link to a video he made with the footage...check it out!    

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNY3cqt7WUE&list=UUVO3AX99iovlmun5WfkHrgw

The rafting crew!

Snappin' a few during our swim break...

Busan: The "Miami of Korea"

A couple weeks ago I traveled to Busan, Korea's second largest city which is located on the country's southern tip.  I would describe Busan as the "Miami" of Korea because of its infamous beaches, coastline, warm weather, and skyscrapers.  Until then, I hadn't seen the south of Korea at all, so it was a nice change of scenery.  Korea's southern regions are supposed to be very beautiful, and Busan did not disappoint.

My friend Cara and I took the 6:30am bus from Jecheon and arrived in Busan around 11am.  We took the subway (which is a much, much smaller version compared to Seoul's system) to the Haeundae area. We stayed in a really fancy high-rise-apartment-turned-hostel with an awesome view overlooking a pier.  After checking into our accommodation, we wasted no time and headed to the beach.  Unfortunately, it was still a bit chilly to swim, but it was nice to walk on the beach nonetheless.  My beach experience in Korea was definitely different than any beach experience I've ever had in the U.S.  Koreans are very conscious of the sun and don't tan if they can help it; so instead of seeing people scantily clad in an assortment of bikinis and swim trunks, people were much more covered up (I'm talking long-sleeve shirts and pants).  To be honest, I maybe saw one person in a swimsuit (and it was a foreigner)!  Maybe that's because of the fact that many Koreans can't actually swim either.  As we were walking along the beach, we stumbled upon a sand-castle competition.  These weren't your average sand-castles either.  They were giant piles of sand with elaborate carvings in them.  Most had some sort of animal/jungle theme going on.

At Haeundae Beach

Sandcastle at Haeundae Beach

Haeundae Beach

Beautiful view from the hotel

Because of it's coastal location, Busan is very famous for seafood and it's fish markets.  We decided to walk through a fish market, and were astounded by the variety of fish/sea creatures we saw...and to think that they are all edible!  We went in looking for a specific type of fish, and we most definitely found it.  I'm not sure the scientific name for it, but it's nickname is the "Penis" fish.  I'll let the picture do the explaining...I'm sure it's not hard to guess why it's called that.

Penis Fish...yes, it's edible..but no I didn't try it.

Fish market findings

After we found THE penis fish we had heard so much about, we headed towards Busan's Cultural Village.  The cultural village is sometimes called the "Santorini" [as in Santorini, Greece] of Korea.  While Santorini's building are all white, the cultural village's building are a rainbow of various colors.  There wasn't really anything to do at the cultural village besides snap a few pictures, but it was still a great sight to see.      

Culture Village

Also while in Busan we decided to go see a temple, because honestly, what is a Korean trip without seeing a temple?  Haedong Yonggungsa Temple was built in 1376, and it was different than the dozen others I've seen because it overlooked the water--most temples are in the mountains.  It was a royal pain in the ass to get there (a 25 minute ride on an overly-crowded city bus, standing room only), but again, I guess it was worth it because the weather was absolutely perfect and the place was very picturesque.  It seemed that everyone had the same idea as us that day, because the temple was quite crowded with other tourists.  We took a quick selfie by the giant, gold Buddha statue (when in Korea, do as the Korean's do..), threw a penny in a well for good luck, and walked around the temple grounds.

Oh hey, Buddha!

Unfortunately the only thing I found lacking about Busan was the nightlife.  While the streetside adult slushies and cocktails were amazing, Seoul still takes the cake in the nightlife category.  I guess it's a good thing Seoul is closer to me then!    

One last stop before we headed back to Jecheon was Shinsegae Department Store.  It also happens to be the largest department store in the world!  It was filled with high-end stores like Gucci, Armani, Prada, Burberry, and Hermes.  Needless to say, I didn't buy anything...haha.

Dating and Couple Culture

This week I thought I would address a topic that I haven't really talked about at all in my blog: Korean dating and couple culture.  To foreigners, Korean couple culture may seem strange and vastly different than western dating, but after ten months here, I've come to find it really cute and charming.

In my opinion, couple culture is a topic that is brought up a lot because Koreans love to pry into everyone's love life.  They are obsessed with asking, "Do you have a boyfriend/girlfriend?" and if you say "no", they want to know why.  But, if you say "yes" you do have a significant other, there's a very good chance you were set up through family members or mutual friends on a blind date.  Koreans absolutely love to play matchmaker!  In the U.S., many single people meet potential dates randomly at bars, at work, through friends..basically anywhere; in Korea it's very different.  Koreans don't typically strike up conversations with strangers and ask for their phone number.  I've heard that their usually too shy to do such a bold gesture, so they rely on people they trust (aka friends and family) to set them up on a blind date.  Korean singles also like to date a person around their own age, plus or minus a couple years.  I believe it is pretty rare to date someone significantly older or younger than yourself here.

Once you have established an actual relationship with someone, the exciting "couple" things begin.  Once the relationship is official, couples will begin to document their time together by counting days.  While western couples will say they've been together for "X" amount of months, Korean couples will tell you they've been a couple for "X" amount of days.  It's very common for someone to say, "We've been dating for 62 days".  Reaching the 100-day mark is a very special occurrence for couples, and they usually celebrate this milestone anniversary by giving one another gifts.  Every 100 days after this is also a reason to celebrate (i.e. 200 days, 300 days, etc.)  Think it might be hard to keep up with the exact number of days?  Don't worry, there's a phone app to keep track for you!

Another way couples show their love for one another is by wearing couple clothes/outfits.  It is very common to see couples walking down the street wearing matching shirts, shoes, pants, hats, and even socks.  Sometimes they just might wear a matching shirt, or a matching shirt and hat, but other times, they wear the exact same outfit head-to-toe.  I am very curious as to how they coordinate this; do they text each other before going out and say, "Hey, wear your striped shoes and black button-up shirt today"?  I may never know.  I used to find these matching clothes a little ridiculous, but the more I see it, the more I think it's quite cute.  Another "couple" signature staple is the couple rings.  Not sure if someone has a girlfriend or boyfriend?  Look at their hands.  If they are in a relationship, they will most likely be wearing a couple ring.  Once couples are married though, you would think they would continue wearing rings, right?  Well think again.  Most married Korean couples don't wear wedding bands or any type of ring to signify that they are married.  I'm not really sure why couples wear rings, but after marriage you take them off.  So how do you know who is married or not?  I guess you don't really know, but kind of just assume.  If a Korean is over 30 and not married yet, they usually get a lot of pressure put on them by family members to find a spouse.  So I think most people assume that once you're over a certain age, you're most likely married.  Also, the couple clothes stop at marriage as well.

Two different couples wearing matching "couple" shirts

Couple Shoes

I observe a lot of this couple culture on the street just by walking around in town.  Things like couple clothes are very obvious symbols of a relationship.  Other things I notice are how doting the Korean guys are on their girlfriends.  I often see the men carrying their girlfriend's purse...and with no shame! (not that there should be any shame in carrying a women's purse, but I definitely don't see this being done in the U.S.)  And if it happens to be raining outside, you best believe that the woman is not holding the umbrella, because that is left up to the boyfriend to do. Little gestures like this are things I notice a lot just because it's different than what I would see at home.  

One thing I found very interesting is that families play a limited role in Korean couples' dating process.  Korea is a very family-oriented society, so I expected parents to be somewhat involved with their son or daughter's relationship; but actually, I've found that almost the exact opposite is true.  Many times, parents don't meet their kid's boyfriend/girlfriend until they're getting engaged.  Meeting the parents here is a pretty big deal because it means the relationship is very serious, like on a marriage level.  Of course not every Korean relationship is like this, but from what I've heard from both Koreans and non-Koreans, meeting the parents usually occurs very late into a relationship.  I find this odd for for various reasons, but one reason especially being that the majority of Koreans live with their parents until they get married, and only then do they move out.  It's very common to be in your late 20s or even into your 30s and still living in your parents' house because you're not married yet.  Korean couples almost always hang out outside of the house (i.e. coffee shops, movie theaters, doing outdoor activities, etc) because going to one another's house would mean having to meet the other's parents...and what Korean wants to face that, especially after only 200 days of dating.

Well, I hope you enjoyed reading about Korean couple culture.  It has definitely been one of the more interesting topics I've learned about in my time here.  Remember that this is all generalizations too.  Obviously not every Korean couple follows these traditions/rules.  And I don't have any first-hand experience, but I have learned a lot about couple culture through my Korean friends.  It's always fun to hear about differences from one culture to the next, especially about a topic like dating.


























  

     

Stuff Koreans Do: "Asking Who is the Most Attractive"

So I am going to start a new segment of my blog titled, "Stuff Koreans Do", which will be similar to the popular YouTube videos, "Shit [insert type of person] Say".  I'm hoping that this segment of my blog will allow readers to understand a little bit of what I see/hear on an almost daily basis from Korean friends/coworkers/students/strangers/etc.  These will be subject matters that still confuse/astound/or interest me even after being here for 9 months.  I hope you enjoy!

My first segment of "Stuff Koreans Do" will discuss the topic of beauty ideals.  I have yet to write a proper blog post about this, but beauty standards are taken extremely seriously here.  Korea is one (if not THE) world-wide leader of cosmetic and plastic surgeries--but more about that in another post.  In this post, I want to tell you about one of the first questions I encounter when meeting a group of Koreans.  It never fails, upon meeting a new group of people, someone will always ask me or my friends to pick:

"Who is the best looking/most attractive?"  

(of the group)  

It is such an awkward question to be asked altogether, much less after knowing the asker of the question 10 minutes after meeting!  But to Koreans, this type of question is standard conversation.  One particular instance where I remember being asked this question was when my friend Cara and I were at the local bar, Rock and Roll.  We happened to be sitting at a table next to a group of 4 younger Korean guys, and we were casually talking to them.  Of course, their English wasn't perfect, but we were able to communicate some.  After talking a few minutes we were both asked to choose the one guy of the group who we thought was the most attractive.  Koreans are very self-aware of their attractiveness level though and accept it.  They know if they're pretty/handsome or if they got the short end of the stick in the looks department.  Because of this, the most attractive person at the table will usually be the one to bring up the question "Who is the best looking?".  Funny, right??

When asked this, I typically try to dodge the question the best I can.  I will compliment each of them on something, or say looks don't really matter, or something along those lines, because who wants to answer that???  Anyways, this is definitely a question that gets brought up when meeting new people and although I come to expect it now, I still find it strange.

Tokyo, Japan

Lucky for me, there were two national Korean holidays last Monday and Tuesday (Children's Day and Buddha's Birthday) that resulted in a lovely 4-day weekend.  Some friends and I decided to trek over to Tokyo, Japan (the biggest city in the world!) to take advantage of our time off.  Tokyo was about a 2.5 hour flight from Seoul, which was longer than I expected.  My friends' left on Thursday (because their schools were nicer than mine) so they left without me, so I flew alone and met up with them on Saturday.  Narita International Airport in Tokyo was about an hour and a half from the actual city, so after my flight, I had to catch the bus into Tokyo.  My phone doesn't work anywhere outside of Korea, and I was unable to pick up a wifi signal at the airport, so I had no way to contact my friends about what time to expect my bus to come in.  I was a little nervous, but luckily they tracked my flight and guessed (correctly) my arrival time, so they were waiting for me.  Once I got in, we called it a night because it was pretty late.  For the first couple nights, we stayed in an apartment that we rented.  It was small, but doable since we weren't going to be there too long.  The apartment we stayed in was in the Shinjuku area of Tokyo, which we discovered was also nicknamed "Korea Town" because of the large Korean population there.  This was totally by accident, as we didn't realize this when we had booked our accommodation.    

On my first full day in Tokyo, I got to cross off quite a bit of stuff off my Tokyo to-do list.  First, we had to take the subway to  Akihabara.  As I have mentioned before, I'm a huge fan of the subway system.  I've used subways in multiple cities and it is by far the quickest, easiest and cheapest way to get around any major city.  Well Tokyo's subway definitely threw me for a loop.  Yes, it was cheap and quick, but definitely lacked on the "easy" part.  It was so confusing, because each different line is owned by a different company so it can make transferring from stop-to-stop a little tricky sometimes.  Luckily, my friends had kind of figured it out by the time I arrived so I just relied on them to lead the way!

So our first stop was Akihabara, which is Tokyo's infamous anime area.  There were multiple anime shops (toys, comics, etc.) and even the buildings were covered in anime posters and designs.  I'm not a fan of anime, but it was interesting.  While in Akihabara, we stumbled upon a 7-story sex shop.  Well, of course we went in...it was a 7-story sex shop, so why the heck not??  Lots of interesting people and things in there to say the least.  I should also mention that porn is illegal in Japan, but that doesn't mean there aren't ways to get around that law.  Japan is known for it's pornographic cartoon comics, which includes tentacle porn.  Tentacle porn involves tentacles (yes, tentacles from sea animals like octopus and squid..) and women.  Use your imagination and you'll know where I'm going with this....if your imagination is inadequate, just Google it.

An example of the anime artwork on buildings.

After that adventure, we decided to check out the maid cafes which we had read about on a list of "Tokyo Must-Do's".  Basically, a maid cafe is a cafe that is decorated like a childhood girl's dream.  Lots of pastel colors and decorations.  All of the waitresses are "maids" and dress the part too.  They are required to talk in high, squeaky voices.  I believe these cafes were created for Japanese men, as they think the act the maids put on is cute, but now the cafes have become popular for tourists.  The cafe served a variety of food including alcoholic cocktails, ice-cream sundaes, pancakes, cake, etc.  All of the food was decorated in a cute way.  I got the "Roar, Roar" ice-cream sundae which included cookies and whipped cream to make it look like a bear.  I noticed another table ordered pancakes and the waitress was drawing faces on them with syrup.  At one point, the lights dimmed and a disco ball came on and one of the maids did a dance performance.  It was a fun experience, but unfortunately pictures were not allowed (only pics of food could be taken), so I don't have many digital memories of the cafe.

"Roar, Roar" Sundae

The maids at the Maid Cafe (not my picture, I found it online)

After we filled up on ice-cream sundaes at the maid cafe, we made our way to the infamous Shibuya Crossing, aka the "Times Square" of Japan.  It's a major intersection and when the "walk" light signals the go ahead for pedestrians, watch out!  There are hundreds of people crossing the street at once and it was very crowded.  This area also was a major shopping district with stores like Hermes, Gucci, Guess, and others.

People waiting for the "Walk" signal

Crossing the street...so many people!

All the hotties must hang out in Shibuya

After eating Japanese curry (yes, curry! It's randomly popular there), we headed to the Roppongi District of Seoul which is supposed to be good for clubbing and night life.  We had asked around about good places to go out and were lead to Club Six.  It was pretty much all Japanese people, but we had fun dancing and drinking.  A group of Japanese girls came up to us on the dance floor and were practically our own personal fan club all night.  They didn't speak English but they loved us and our dance moves so much that they imitated almost everything we did!! We were definitely popular!  Two of my friends had to leave early, so Cara and I had to take a taxi home.  We weren't thrilled about taking a taxi because we had heard how expensive they were in Japan.  In Korea taxis are really cheap, so we were less than thrilled when we had to pay $30 for a 10 minute ride.  Boo you, Japan!!

At about 5am that night, my friends and I awoke to find our apartment shaking rather intensely.  I was pretty groggy and initially thought one of my friends was shaking the bed, but I was wrong.  We were experiencing a 6.0 EARTHQUAKE!  It lasted about 20 seconds, but it seemed longer than that because everything was shaking so bad.  We fell back asleep afterward, but when we woke up a few hours later we had remembered what happened and looked it up online to confirm that we hadn't made it up.  Sure enough, there had been an earthquake...actually, the biggest earthquake Japan has had since the 9.0 one in 2011.  I thought it was really cool to experience a real earthquake, since that is something you just cannot plan!

Day 2

The next day we decided to press our luck at one of Japan's many casinos.  They were literally on every street corner.  Pachinko is the Japanese game of choice, but I opted for the good 'ole slot machines.  I thought I'd have a decent shot at winning some money because my friends had gone a few days before and won $170!  Unfortunately luck was not on my side, because I gambled my whole $10 and lost it all.  But it was fun!

The Casino

One of the things I was most looking forward to doing in Japan was eating real sushi in the place that it had originated.  Well, we finally got our chance and ordered a few rolls.  It was good, but I think I'm too accustomed to American-style sushi, so I was a tad bit disappointed.

Sushi!

That evening we decided to see the Robot Show, as it had gotten really good reviews.  It was about an hour and a half show of pure randomness!  The show featured dancing, drum playing, singing, and robots.  Real robots.  It is hard to explain because there wasn't much order or a single theme to the show, so I'll let the pictures do the explaining.

We waited in the Robot Lounge before the show started.  It was very elaborate!  I felt like I had stepped foot into Liberace's playground.

Posing with one of the robots.

After we had had our fill of robots, we headed to a Prison-themed Bar.  It actually turned out to be a Prison-Haunted House-themed bar.  We sat at a booth, which modeled a prison cell.  We ordered really cool drinks that came in science beakers.  At one point during our time there, the lights dimmed really low and scary music started playing.  Then, people in scary masks and Halloween costumes would occasionally walk by our cell and rattle the bars and open them.  It was kinda freaky!

My drink in a science beaker!

Behind bars!

That night we stayed at a capsule hotel.  It might've been my favorite part of Japan.  Most capsule hotels only accommodate men, but fortunately we were able to book this one, which had a floor dedicated to women travelers.  We paid $40/night to stay there, which was a little expensive, but it was definitely a must-do while in Japan.  There were probably 50 capsules on our floor, along with a communal bathroom and luggage room.  It was super nice and clean which was pleasantly surprising.  Each capsule came with a pull-down shade, a TV, and a built-in radio/alarm clock.  The hotel also provided pajamas for every guest.  I always judge a hotel by the bathroom's cleanliness, and I must say that I would give this place an A+.  I was a little confused when I used the bathroom though, because the stall would play music when you would sit down.  My friends and I concluded that this must've been so that no one could hear you doing your business and gave you a sense of privacy...how cool!!

Hanging out in the capsule! (That's the TV in the top left corner)

Day 3

It was time to take off and go back to Korea.  I really enjoyed my time in Japan, but like any vacation, I'm always ready to go back home at the end.