鬱

Best kanji character ever. :)

Last weekend was a pretty eventful weekend. Friday night was incredibly and intoxicatedly entertaining. After ending work at 11 p.m. on Friday (as per usual), I ended up meeting with my boss (foreigner) and my Korean coworkers in a restaurant near the workplace. It basically resulted in my coming out to my Korean coworkers, which is uncommon here in Korea, apparently. A few seconds of awkward silence ensued, but they all seemed--and seem--to be rather accepting of my homosexuality. The night continued with copious amounts of beer (:/), Korean dishes, and karaoke.

Flabbergastingly, I achieved a perfect score after singing Billy Joel's Just the Way you Are. It's interesting how every ability of mine surfaces--and oftimes improves--after alcohol penetrates the Anarchopolis that is my brain, and basks in its transient rule over the (normally) idle little fuckers.

(Aside: Why the hell do I feel as if I'm Alzheimer'sing at age 25 20? I'm only a quarter fifth of a century years-old. Perhaps this is a portent of a death or complete vegetation before 30?)

Saturday morning consisted of tense neck muscles and a slight-but-noticeable pain in my head. I overcame it without the assistance of Excedrin Tension Headache! :O Then, I went to meet a fellow American homosexual in Korea. He was accompanied by a vivacious gay man, who was insouciant to any fleers and glares of opprobrium that may have been sent in his direction...and he projected a gayness that is more typical of the his gay, black counterpart. Every second of it was amazing, and I happened to be more fond of being in his company than I had been of being in that of the guy whom I had actually gone to Hannam to meet.

We proceeded to Itaewon, and between taxi rides, went shopping for a green shirt for the Vivacious One--which consumed much of our time, ate at a McDonald's in Itaewon, and then we returned to B's (the original guy with whom I had planned to meet up) complex on the base. There, the two of them invested so much energy in prettifying themselves...whilst I was clearly "pre-gaming" for the bars by sitting on the couch, letting my ears take in the house music blaring from the speakers, and (twice) falling asleep whilst waiting for them. I was hoping that my time with them would actually be worth it at the bars.

Fail. While they did keep checking up on me and made attempts to involve me, they spent a vast majority of the time talking about common acquaintances and times from the past. They also used to date, so that also seemed to be an obstacle to my completely having fun. Anyway, they are regulars at the bar (Polly's), so everyone seemed to know them (and pretty much everyone else but me) pretty well. Given my feeling terribly underdressed among the aforementioned situation, it just was not a fun time. B also seemed to be expecting me to invest in his drink!! gjhlkuytudgfs ! Cya. No, I didn't say, "Cya", but I should have. :S I had a Kahlúa milk (again), and then we went to the gay area. (Yes, they have a Boystown/Ni Chome-esque area in Seoul.)

Ser. En. Dipitously., I saw my coworkers in one of the bars. It was on my way to the subway station. Despondence totally disappeared. I joined my coworkers and had a vodka cranberry. :D I even danced atop the 'couch' in the center of the bar. There, I met one of my coworker's gay friends, Michael...and the rest of the night consisted of barhopping between Itaewon and Hyundai, the openings up that only come from alcoholic imbibition, yet another Kahlúa milk, a Long Island iced tea (wow, potent), and the expectedly long taxi ride home. :/ Hyundai was so fun, even if it we did end up there from impulse.

Sunday consisted of two of my coworkers, Michael, and me going to brunch in Itaewon. There, suspicions of Michael arose. While he is articulate, opinionated, and efficient when it comes to his relations, he also seems quite judgmental and quite disapprobatory of me. Perhaps I had misunderstood what it was that he was trying to convey, but nothing was necessarily clarified later--since I didn't really feel like exchanging semi-vacuous insults. I have mixed opinions regarding him, but I'm not going to just write him off as just Another Social Statistic...I don't necessarily want to do so, either. There could just be misunderstandings that need to be resolved.

The food was de-lectable. I had banana and walnut pancakes, and I only succeeded in consuming half of the plate. Banana slices and an undulation of syrup adorned the plate's circumference, and walnuts were sprinkled atop the pancakes, which also had walnuts in them. :)) Also mounting the stack of two pancakes was a mound of vanilla ice cream. I had never had pancakes with ice cream before, but it didn't deprive the pancakes of their delectability in the least. The caramel macchiato that I had been drinking with the pancakes was also superb. It was probably the macchiato that rendered me farctate too soon. :( However, the others indulged in satiating themselves via my leftovers. Albeit it was 17,000 won, it seemed to be well worth it; I'm planning on returning to that place this Sunday as well.

After that, we proceeded down the road and up the street to a bookstore in which all the books are foreign. I bought an Arabic book in there for 3,000 won, since it was cheap enough. Then, we went to the theater and saw 10,000 B.C. in Yongsan. (It only took me three weeks to go to the theater here in Korea...as opposed to some seven months or so in Japan.) It wasn't historically accurate, but it was a great movie nonetheless. The sight of primal, manly men certainly lead to the surfacing of my concupiscent nature, and the intertribal liaisons were, for some reason, rather relieving to see. Digressing, I wish that the color of Evolet's contacts (sky bluish) were my natural eye color.

ahsfasldkfhsdlfkashd mmm

- 10,000 B.C. caveman look

(Steve Strait is his name. wowowow)

Well, that was my afternoon. The movie was nearly three hours long, but it was worth the 8,000 won that I had paid for it.

Oh! So, as everyone else went back to their apartments, I headed to the bookstore to check out the collection of foreign books that was available in Seoul. I.

AM INFATUATED WITH KYOBO.

They had just a vast range of books, aside from their Arabic language/Persian language/Middle Eastern-related books. That was somewhat of a disappointment, because I'd really like to purchase a good book about the Middle East that I could read. As for the Arabic language, there was an English-Arabic dictionary for 50,000 (approximately $50). However, there are many Kyobo bookstores within Seoul, so hopefully there are more books that are available at those locations. By the way, how masochistic I must be: going to the bookstore during the first month of my stay here, knowing that I'm working with a rather limited budget set (even post-advance). There are just so many books there whose prices are lower than they even are in the United States! :D I was certainly taken aback by the fact that I didn't buy anything while I was there on Sunday. Hopefully, I will be able to continue to refrain from bankrupting myself in Kyobo.