Insadong, School, and.....CAT CAFE!

On Sunday, I spent the day with my host mom and her daughter Yena. They took me to Insadong, which is a big tourist destination with many traditional Korean shops. It is also a big art gallery district, known for its high end artwork. My host mom's sister owns a shop there, so we went to visit her first. Her store sells items such as traditional dishes, small figurines, and table cloths/place mats. Yena and I went to explore the rest of Insadong, while my host mom stayed to visit with her sister. Insadong is very tourist-y, but not in a bad way. The entire place is lined with shop after shop of uniquely Korean items. The layout of the main building was also intriguing because we started out on the first floor, then just kept walking in circles...well squares to be precise...until we reached the top. The entire way is filled with shops. One of my favorites sold tiny cactus plants that were in tiny pots with diameters no more than 1 centimeter. I didn't purchase any because I'm not sure how well it would survive under my care, or how to safely pack it to come home.

Yena told me that one of the staple items to purchase at Insadong are dung pies. Don't worry; they're not actually made out of dung (at least I REALLY hope not), but they are shaped like the little dung emoticon. I'm not sure why they're dung shaped. It probably started off as a joke and then became a staple of this area, but they actually taste quite nice. They are waffle-like pastries filled with either chocolate or red bean paste.

Monday ended up being a fairly straight forward day of school, then studying. After class, I met with my SNU language partner, and we practiced all of the Korean that I had learned so far. She says I learn very quickly, but I still need help reading sometimes because some of the letters look very similar. It is easy for me to get them mixed up when I am reading words for the first time or trying to read more quickly than usual. I think if I keep practicing, however, I can get a lot better!

Monday night, I went with my host mom to a 24 hour market. She says it is her favorite because of all of the fresh vegetables and seafood. Korean markets are super different from American markets. They don't look too different at first glance, but walking around reveals a much differing assortment of goods. In the US, it seems to me that it is common to see one or two kinds of soy sauce, and only a small display of flour/starch options, but more kinds of cheese than I can count and every shape of pasta imaginable. This market, on the other hand, had at least 50 different kinds of soy sauce and an entire aisle of flour/starch options made of everything under the sun, but only one kind of cheese and one kind of pasta: spaghetti (they had the Korean noodles, but those aren't really pasta). I was also impressed by the selection of fresh fish available. They were selling entire squids, chopped up octopus, several kinds of fish either pre-packaged or fresh from the tank (like you can buy lobster in some grocery stores in the US), something that looked like a sting ray, sea snails, clams, oysters, shrimp, crab, and lobster. It might be more common to see these items in places in the US closer to the ocean, but this was my first time seeing them sold in such a common place. The market was more fun than I expected it to be, and it was definitely interesting to see the difference in food items available here versus Gahanna.

After school on Tuesday, I went with Carina and Daria to Hongdae to explore. It is much quieter than other parts of Seoul, but still plenty busy. We ended up at a cafe to have some dango. I had never had it before, and I didn't understand what it was until I saw it and tasted it. It's often described as a sweet dumpling, but I think the term dumpling is misleading. They're small rice flour balls with different pastes on top (traditionally red bean paste) and generally served with tea (traditionally green tea). We tried pumpkin, strawberry, green tea, and caramel dango, and they all turned out to be very delicious. The lemon tea we had with it was also delectable.

Wednesday morning was what everyone except myself considered to be miserable and dreary. To me, it was a beautifully cool, rainy morning. On the way to school, I discovered that Korean people apparently don't wear rain coats. During the entire hour and a half I spent on the bus to get to school, I saw not a single person wearing a rain jacket (besides myself). I always have found rain jackets more convenient, but I guess the people here feel differently.

In the afternoon, I had my first optional class. I signed up for a traditional Korean drumming class. We practices some pungmul (drumming sitting down) and samul nori (drumming standing up). We also got to try on the masks that are a part of the costume for performances. We learned about the four different instruments used for pungmul. I forget their Korean names, but there were two different drums, a hand-held cymbol thing, and a gong. Samul nori usually has significantly more people than we had, but it seemed to me like it was kind of like a marching pungmul band, except the 'marching' was more of a dance step. The samul nori groups make different formations as they play and dance that look like different shapes from above. We all had a great time learning the different rhythms and making loud, percussive music. Trying on the masks was also pretty fun, although I don't think I'll stick with the bearded look.

Thursday, we had a big performance during school. It was our first real speaking assignment, so we were all pretty nervous. I spent most of the evening preparing for that. My host mom helped me perfect the script. We have a nice symbiotic language relationship because I help her learn English grammar and explain idioms to her, and in return she helps me study Korean and answers all of the questions I have.

When we got to school Thursday, everyone was pretty nervous. We did the performances at the end of the day, and it was a huge relief to get it out of the way. Everyone did a good job, so our teacher was very pleased with our progress :)

After class, we had another optional afternoon activity: Taekwondo. I got a white belt again, and the grandmaster just laughed because he said I should have my black belt (that didn't quite make it into my suitcase..). It was a lot of fun, but I think I will be sore in the morning because I haven't been the most diligent athlete in Korea..although I think all of the hiking has to count for something!

Next came my highlight of the entire week: the cat cafe!!! From the moment I learned that such a thing existed, I made it my mission to find one and go. I went with two girls from the level two Korean language class, Laki and Mengxin. Laki thought I was going to explode with excitement as we walked over the the cafe, and for once my expectations were not disappointed. From the moment we walked into the cafe, there were cats...cats everywhere! They were all so adorable and friendly.

I know there aren't really cat cafes in the US, so I'll explain how they work: when we arrived we had to take our shoes off and store our personal belongings in special bins. Then it cost around $8 to enter, which included a complimentary beverage plus unlimited time with the cats. Inside, the cats are free to roam wherever they want. There are rules for interacting with the cats, like not to feed them human food or pull their tails. We were also not allowed to pick them up, but it was okay for them to climb onto people.

I had an amazing time. Many of the cats were curled up sleeping, which was so cute. A few others were running around playing with each other. We sat on the ground long enough that a few cats curled up in my lap. The cuteness of the cafe and all of the cats was incredible. Most of the other patrons were young (middle school-college aged) Korean girls, although a few guys came by for a while. We were all there to love the cats, and it was beautiful. I'm pretty sure I doubled the amount of pictures I've taken so far at the cat cafe. It was so hard to leave, especially because I had to wake up the cat sleeping in my lap. I will 100% be at another cat cafe several times before my trip is done. What a great way to end the hard-work filled part of the week :)