Hi 👋
July 18th, Tuesday, I had a brief lunch at a Korean fast-food chain called Mom's Touch which is known for its chicken. I had a mac and cheese chicken sandwich that was higher quality than American fast foods buts still fast food. I then went to a lovely cafe and studied a bit before having a good dinner.
Wednesday, I met up with my language partner for lunch and we had Korean hotdogs 😋 We then went to a board game cafe and it was so much fun! I love board games a lot so the fact that Korea has numerous board game cafes where people frequently hang out was so awesome to me. We played many fun games and lots of yummy desserts. I then had dinner with a big group of CLS students and our resident director (the person who takes care of us here).
Thursday, I went to the Gwangju National Museum with my language partner. The museum was very beautiful and also free. It was also free to experience the XR there. That's right XR, not VR. A step up from VR. The XR was about how the pottery in the museum was purchased at the markets hundreds of years ago and then put on a boat to sell to Japan. The boat, however, went down in the sea and was lost for about 200 years. But, in the 1980s, the pottery was recovered and put into the museum for everyone to see. So, in this XR, you get to be the merchant purchasing the pottery at the stand by playing games to win each piece of pottery, then you have to load the boxes of pottery onto the ship and set sail. While at sea, you talk to your shipmates and hear funny conversations. But then, the ship is attacked by raiders! So, you have to fend them off with your bow and arrow but unfortunately, it's not enough. The boat catches on fire and you crash into a big rock and go down into the sea. You then get to be the excavators in 1980 discovering the pottery once again. The experience was seriously so much fun and I was able to walk around and learn the history of the artifacts at the museum in such a fun and interactive way. And it was a great way for me to practice my Korean 😉
After the museum, I had dinner with my roommate 😁
Friday, I got a little overheated and sun sick so I didn't do anything fun and just rested after class.
On Saturday, however, I went to Busan with my roommate! My roommate planned out our two-day trip to Busan and it was so much fun! The weather was also perfect all weekend. It said it was supposed to rain but it ended up not raining and only being cloudy and windy which was perfect because it meant it was cool 😎
We started Saturday off by meeting up with my roommate's friend who lives in Busan. We all then went to a big market where I have never seen so many different types of fish and seafood. The amount of food and products in this location was crazy! I also had some of the best Tteokbokki I've had so far in Korea at this market (and the cheapest).
Next, we headed to a Conan-themed cafe. Detective Conan is a very popular anime in Japan that my Japanese host family really loves so I also started to get into it while in Japan. The cafe was so cute and all the themed drinks and decorations were perfect.
After the Conan cafe, we went to a different cafe (cafes are really popular here 😂) where we could paint! It was such a cute little area and you could pick a stencil of a picture you wanted to paint, or free paint, and just paint away. We ended up staying there a bit longer than we had planned because it was so much fun. Everyone's paintings turned out beautifully.
I then said goodbye to my roommate's friend and my roommate and I went to the beach where our hotel was. It wasn't too hot and the sand was really soft so it was super nice. We would come back to the beach after dinner so we didn't stay for too long. We met up with some other CLS students that were in Busan for dinner and had some incredible small octopus, intestine, and shrimp cooked in a pot and mixed in rice, or in Korean 낙곱새 (Nakgobsae).
After dinner, we stumbled across this super large and cute-themed cafe (I'm telling you they're popular). It looks inconspicuous at first, with a relatively small tunnel entrance leading down some stairs, but once you arrived, the whole cafe/shop was soo spacious! It was themed from the most used Korean communication app characters.
Next, we headed back to the beach to enjoy some of the beach at night and I dipped my feet into the water to say I'd done it before. We grabbed some sweet treats before heading back to the hotel for bed.
The next day, Sunday, we woke up and had breakfast with the same CLS friends which was pork soup with rice. Then, my roommate and I headed to the aquarium that was underground and under the beach! The aquarium was very big with many floors with so many cool aqua fishies 😊 I always enjoy seemingly childish activities like going to the aquarium or zoo so I had a really great time. My roommate also got a lot of pictures of me 😂 There was even a scuba diver and mermaid show I was able to see! It was really cool to see how Korean culture was incorporated into the show and story.
The aquarium was a blast and at the end, I was able to order the fancy cotton candy made by a robot! It was quite large but so yummy and pretty. But! I discovered quite quickly that the air likes to eat your cotton candy too because the second I stepped outside my cotton candy started dissolving before my eyes! I had to race the air to finish my cotton candy 😂😤 Lastly, we grabbed a 10-won sweet cheesy bread before heading to our next destination.
Our next stop was an art museum in downtown Busan. It was a modern art museum with various pieces commenting on the future of AI. Everything was so cool and interesting, it was a great time.
Next, was my most anticipated spot of the trip, Magnate Cafe💜. Magnate Cafe is a cafe owned by BTS Jimin's dad. BTS is a huge globally famous K-pop group and one of the things that got me interested into Korean a long time ago. This cafe is famous among BTS fans as it is owned by one of the member's dads. The cafe was decorated with lots of BTS merchandise but it was also a really nice cafe! The atmosphere was very nice and the food and drinks were of course really delicious too. It was a nice place to cool down after all our travels. But the big question is, did I see Jimin's dad? And the answer is yes I did. So I now have another connection to fame. And even though I've never seen BTS in person 😔 at least I've been able to see one of their dads 😂
After the cafe, it was time to head back to the bus station. We had a quick dinner by the station, and since the Nakgobsae from the night before was so delicious, we decided to have it again haha. We took the bus back and went straight to bed 😴
That concludes this blog post! 👋
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