Korea Life Blog - Heavy Weekend


There were a couple of instances this weekend in which I tested the limits of my strength. Let's take a look.



There's nothing quite like drinking Coca Cola out straight out of a glass bottle. I love it. Especially this style which is still available in Korea (not the short fat style from the 80s). You can still by them here because they reuse bottles in Korea (been drinking them like this for almost four years and never got sick!) In America, unfortunately, this system wouldn't go over well. Even though the bottles are sanitized, it wouldn't sit well with your average sanitization obsessed American. There they have a deposit on the bottles and just smash them to pieces upon redemption. Last I knew you could still by these Coca Cola bottles at certain stores, however, but when I was home last time I didn't see them anywhere. Here, they are for sale pretty much everywhere. Unfortunately, mostly restaurants use them and stores won't sell them individually for practical purposes. That means I have to buy them buy the case. The store is about a kilometer from my home. It was a long kilometer but I managed to make it home, sweating, my muscles ready to give out. It was a good work-out and I celebrated by drinking a cold Coke.


Julie and I went to Homeplus this weekend. We were going to eat there but as Murphy's Law would have it, there were having a norae bang (karaoke) show in in the food court. Loud and annoying. We decided to check out the Galleria department store down the street. I'm glad we did. After Popeyes Chicken and ice cold Naeng Myung (chilled noodle soup), we did a little shopping in the grocery store below. Check out what I got:


All wines were 20% off. I got this bottle of Yellow Tail Chardonnay from Australia for a mere 11,000 won. As lucky would have it, they threw in a "service" bottle of French table wine. They also carried four kinds of cheeses including this Danish Brie you see here which cost 6,000 won and is well worth it for a treat. As I was going to check out, I shouted with joy as the site of this big bottle of V-8 juice, my favorite drink. If you don't know it, tomato/vegetable juices in Korea are sweet, not salty. I don't like them sweet much, although they've grown on me somewhat. I'm sure there are other places to buy this, but I haven't seen any lately, and never in Nowhere-dong. It cost 7,000 won - expensive but again, I don't mind splurging on a treat for myself now and again.

The only problem was carrying all this. I put everything in my backpack which already contained Julie's sweatshirt (once again I told her not to bring it, but she insisted and then never wore it), her purse loaded with change, my camera and a book. It wouldn't have been that bad if we just went home. Instead we went to the Libro Book Store in Suwon Station. I wanted to buy Julie a book for "reading time" later. She spent 2 long hours looking while I walked around carrying this bag. To my anguish, she found nothing. Then we went shopping down below for dinner.

We bought shrimp and vegetable, and I picked up a nice piece of steak, something I hadn't eaten in ages. We had a wonderful dinner - fried rice with shrimp and vegetables, and I cooked up the steak with broccoli and mushrooms in wine sauce. Delicious. The Australian Chardonnay tasted wonderful, best wine I've had in Korea. Julie even had a piece of Korean style (terrible) cheesecake for dessert. A little later we had more wine and enjoyed the delicious Brie cheese.

My back hurt from having carried that heavy bag all day. Julie made it up to me with another hour long massage. I have to confess I am very lucky - she gives an amazing massage and her hands never seem to get tired. Unfortunately (or maybe a good thing, depending on how you look at it) she can't handle alcohol. After three small glasses, she was totally drunk fell fast asleep three hours before me.