It's been awhile.

    So, it's been awhile since I posted on this thing. The last time I posted, I was still in Korea, studying Korean. I guess I'll give an update on how that went. I definitely enjoyed my stay at Hanyang University as an exchange student. During my second semester there, I met a lot of people from South America, but they were Korean. They loved to party and were welcoming when we went out with them. I drank a lot when I was there and I'm positive it helped me learn Korean faster. There's a lot I'm missing from this update, but if you ever talk to me, you can ask me about some of my stories that I had in Korea. To this day, I still bring up things that happened in Korea and how I want to go back to visit or even live again. The impact it must've had on my life seems great, if you look at it from somebody else's point of view, I suppose.

DISCLAIMER: I GET HELLA ADHD IN THIS BLOG POST AND IT JUMPS AROUND RANDOMLY. IT PROBABLY WON'T MAKE ANY SENSE.

3 years

     Three years. Holy fucking shit. That's a long ass time. Looking back on how I was back then, it doesn't feel like that long ago. Rewind five years, and you're looking at a skinnier, fit, non-cigarette smoking, hardly-alcohol consuming, confident teenager. What happened to me? I could think of so many things, but anything I say is technically an excuse. Hindsight is 20/20 right? 

     As soon as I came back from Korea (which is around two years ago), I started gaining weight. I left Korea with my weight being around 145. I shot up to 155 in a week. After that, I was a solid 165. I was okay with that, but I also wanted to lose weight. In that year, I made friends, lost friends, and even picked up the bass guitar and some DJ equipment. I went out with some Japanese fob girl that I tried my best for, but I ended up falling on my face because when I look back..............man, what happened to the guy that was so confident in his freshman year of college? Anyways, I started working out pretty regularly, putting on some definition, muscle, and dropped back down to 145. When I picked up the bass guitar, I joined a band, which was a makeshift band composed of a mix of beginners and veterans. I put a lot of time into practice, even though I couldn't pick up some things quick enough, while juggling work and finals. We played in a Battle of the Bands two weeks later, and from what I heard through the grapevine, we placed 4th........I think....it was pretty bad though. During that whole time, though, I stopped going to the gym. I didn't go back since. As for mixing and being a DJ, I would do it at parties that me and my friends threw and I got better from watching a few of my friends play. I'd like to thing that I'm good enough to play for a casual party :P I got a girlfriend around this time too, and I'm currently still with her.....although she's in Korea and I don't get to see her ㅠㅡㅠ

    During that summer, I started playing League of Legends a lot more, since my friend just started playing it as well. It was fun, not knowing what was going on and spending countless hours trying to grind up to level 30 so my friends who've been playing for a long time, would play with me more. I started playing badminton again also. Sadly, badminton wasn't enough to keep me from inflating to 165. I practically lived at my friend's house, where she would feed me, give me all kinds of soda and we'd just hang out til badminton, and go home to play League. Through League, she met her boyfriend now, which is a good friend of mine, and I'm glad they're still together. I felt awkward going to the house all the time so I stopped going as much, since school was starting up soon and we had a badminton tournament coming too. Oh shit, I just remembered I went to Las Vegas to play at the EVO2K13, which is considered the biggest fighting game tournament in the world. Pro's from all over the world came to play and it was like seeing celebrities for me. I played Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and a few other games, but I went mainly to play Tekken. I still remember how I lost and I'm still haunted by that loss....on the bright side, I did happen to come back with some extra change in my pocket. Going back to the badminton tournament, I played in that tournament, not as fit as I used to be, and did alright, but I got a wrist injury. It still hurts a little. I keep using it as an excuse not to work out, but I bloated up to about 185~190. That's preeeeetty bad.

      I skipped a buuuuuunch of stuff, but whatever, I can't think of anything right now and I'm only writing this blog because it's 5am and I don't feel like sleeping. I quit League for a bit, started drinking pretty heavily, and now I'm back on League and I try to play as much as I can. I fixed a few relationships and now our bond is even stronger as friends, which is dope. Although, considering how bored I am when I couldn't get myself to start playing League again, I bought someone I don't even know, a monitor. Yeah, wtf, right? Who in their right mind would do that? I wouldn't......but honestly, why I felt like doing that was kind of a.........what would you call it.....a symbol? No.....anyways, I did it because I felt like it was better than spending hundreds at the bar every night. Isn't it? Logically, it's pretty dumb to just buy a monitor for someone you don't know at all. What I wanted to accomplish was to do something nice for someone for no reason, and seeing their joy of getting something like that happen to them, it was a pretty awesome feeling. It's crazy what Hilo can do to you, when it's so.......slow. I think another reason why I did that was because of a recent Vegas trip I took in March. I went with my dad, and both me and my dad lost tons of money gambling. The result, me and my dad buying a bottle of alcohol with whatever money we had left for the day, and going back to the room at around 9pm to drink and hang out. We never do that. NEVER. We talked about all kinds of stories and I feel like I learned how to look at the bigger picture more often. That was probably the first time we had a legit father-son bonding experience and from it, I respect my dad a lot more. This summer, I also started to learn how to cook, because, believe it or not, my dad is probably one of the best cooks IN THE WORLD when it comes to Japanese food. No fucking joke, either. 

     I guess that's pretty much it. I left out so much but I didn't really think as I was typing and just let my hands go on autopilot mode and type whatever the fuck my brain told them to.

Peace.

These past two months or so...

     Sorry for not posting in such a long time. I was uhhh.....busy...okay, not really. The truth is I was just too lazy to sit down and write a blog. So here's a brief update of the past two months and I'll talk about random topics of what I've been doing.

 School Life

     These past two months, I've had only one class that's worth 13 credits. Yeah, that's a one-semester, 13-credit class. It runs for ten weeks and four hours a day, every weekday from 9AM-1PM. The class itself isn't too bad. We actually get breaks, 10 minutes before the hour so it's comparable to having four 50 minute classes. I guess you could say, because of that class, my Korean skills have gone up considerably. Only shitty thing is the homework. I'm actually still behind in all my work. We get homework everyday and even though it's not that hard, it's extremely tedious. Gotta get those done soon... Anyways, I recently had my midterms for this class and I guess I'm alright with my test scores, but I think I could've done better. Oh well, I have the final left and I hope I ace that. 

Shopping

     Shopping here, is pretty great. Yeah, it can get a little expensive, but there's always ways to find something within your budget. One example would be in places like Myeongdong or Dongdaemun. These places have huge department store-style layouts that basically have vendors for clothes. If you go here, make sure you are confident in your Korean language skills or you go with a strong-willed Korean person. These vendors will try to make you browse their stores and buy something. Sometimes, they'll even grab you to look at their stuff. There's really no time to stop and look or they will come and start pushing their products at you. Though, it may sound a bit frightening, and yes, it is, there's a plus to all that they do. You can often bargain with these store owners and haggle their prices down. I went there a few times and came out lucky with a few good deals. One was a sick jacket, that I posted a picture of about a month ago. I bought it for 70000 Won(about $65) when the original price was 99000. So if you're in Seoul and you feel like you are up to it, head to those locations and go to Migliore. If that's not your thing, there is always normal, department stores with a enormous selection of stores to choose from. If not department stores, vendors and stores on the street are also a good place to check out.

Friends, Acquaintences, and People

     I made a good amount of friends while I'm here. The primary group I hang out with are actually a bunch of Japanese exchange students.  Of course, I hang out with Davyn and Waddles a lot too. Or all of us together. I've made a few Korean friends here as well and they're really eager to help me get better at Korean. Sadly, I haven't really seen much of the Korean exchange students that came to UH Hilo, but I didn't really expect to, anyways. One of my friends recently got a girlfriend here, and I'm pretty proud of him. Maybe it's my turn, I don't know...nahhh, probably not. I gotta be helllllla picky here before I get screwed over.  I've made friends with a teacher and she helps me a lot when it comes to speaking and grammar, on top of that, she's kinda cute, so that's always a plus.

Nightlife

     Nightlife. I'd say that Seoul is one of the best places to be for nightlife. On any given day of the week, you can go somewhere and have a good time.
     I'll start off with my favorite bar here. It's called Bar Ireland Yuki. There's actually a handful of locations, but the one I love is the one in Kondae. There's actually two in Kondae, but I haven't visited the other one yet. Kondae, by itself is full of bars and places to eat so it's a pretty cool place to be for drinking. Not many clubs here, but I'll get to that in just a second. I went to this bar so much in the past two months, that I'm one of their regulars now. I talk, or try to talk, with the bartenders when they have time and we joke around about a bunch of stuff. In the beginning, I mentioned that I thought the girl that worked there was cute. So, now, the running joke is that I'm her boyfriend. Of course, I'm not and it's all in good fun, but they teased me so much about it!! Even now, when I go in there, the head bartender plays, "Bartender," by T-Pain just to poke fun at me. I'll take pictures of them and post them eventually. All really nice people. We actually had Davyn's birthday party there and they accommodated all of use really well. I have a few videos from that night that I will also post in the future. They put on a show with singing, fire-breathing, free drinks, the works. It was great. I plan on having my birthday there too.

     Next, is the clubbing here. The clubs here, as I mentioned before on Facebook, are pretty sick. I'm kind of tired of them now, after going to so many, but it's fun once in awhile. Lots of beautiful people, good music and alcohol. Just be careful not to get too drunk and do something stupid...seriously. Ask me about it later and I have many stories to tell you. I'll actually tell you one right now. This was back in September, a little over a month ago. I was in Itaewon and one of my friends were hung up over her ex-boyfriend. We stumbled into a club that apparently had some event going on. Three people started dancing on the bar counter and the bartenders lit the on fire and people started cheering. Mind you, these three individuals were not very good looking. I told my friend, "If I go up there, stop being an emo bitch." She said, alright, so I asked the security guy if I could go up there. At first, he said no, so I went back to my group and shrugged. About a minute afterwards, the same security guy grabbed my arm and pushed me up onto the counter. I had to dance with some fat, ugly chick that was trying to make me grope her and all that good stuff...*shudder* So we're dancing and I keep pointing at my friend and I'm trying to get her to come up so I can dance with her instead because I didn't want to dance with this whale of a human any longer...until, the whale did the job for me and started dancing more and more wild. This bar counter, was not wide at all. It barely held my foot on it and I was dancing BEHIND this whale. Goddamn whale hit my leg with her ass and it slipped off the bar counter onto where the bartenders prepare their drinks. She bumped my other leg and I ended up falling off behind the counter on my ass. That fucking hurt and apparently, they security guards thought I was too drunk so they took me off the dance floor and sat me down. I went back in shortly after, of course.

Sightseeing

    Besides all the partying and falling off of counters, there's some pretty nice places in Korea. I visited a few places with my classmates for school and they were really beautiful places. Tourist locations, nonetheless, but it was still fun. The last place I went to was Naminara Republic, where they shot the famous first kiss scene in Winter Sonata. If you didn't watch it yet, just YouTube something along those lines and you should get it. That place is really nice, but I think if I were to go there again, I want it to be winter and with a cute girl, haha. It's a REALLY nice place for a date. Oh, by the way. IT'S FUCKING COLD IN SEOUL. It's fall right now, but it feels like this could be winter. I'm scared of how fucking cold it's going to be in the winter. I bought winter clothes, but I don't think that's enough...

That's about it for now. If you have any questions or places you think I should visit, leave me a comment down below or leave a post on my Facebook.

Half...th? Halfth day of school? Orientation and stuff.

     I just came back from McDonald's which is about a 20 minute walk from here. Ate a bulgogi burger. It's only like $4.50 for a meal and it's so delicious.

Orientation

     Today was our orientation for school. The day started off like a regular school day. I think my alarm went off and continued to go off for ten minutes. I knew something was making noise, but I didn't know what the fuck it was. So, I kept sleeping. Then, I finally realize that it was my fucking alarm that was going off. I got up, showered and got ready. Right when I was going to leave the damn room, I couldn't find my wallet. I freaked out because I thought I fucking lost it the night before or something...come to find out that it was hiding behind my stupid curtains. So I got to the orientation and it was nothing but a loooooong presentation. I mean, it was kinda cool and all, but I didn't expect orientation to be such a long presentation. Also, we were all supposed to get mentors today, but that failed because I didn't get mine. Apparently, I was one of the few people who's mentors didn't want to come to the damn orientation. So while everyone was off hanging out with their mentors, I was cruising in my room. Oh well, I got to catch up with Phil during that time, so it's okay. Love you, Phil.

Myeongdong

      Davyn calls this place Mingding. He calls Dunkin' Donuts, Dinkin' n' Dinkin's...he says he doesn't know why. By the way, Davyn's my roommate. He came back at around 2PM and we didn't know what to do. I wanted to check out some kinda shopping district and he said Myeongdong is a pretty good. We decided to contact some people and Hyejin said she'd come. Our friend Joon said he'd come too, but I didn't realize he told me he'd meet me there. My bad, bro. We jumped on the subway and caught a train to Myeongdong and HOLY SHIT, it was so fucking hot AND humid. It was nasty. We met up with Hyejin and then went to Starbucks. Shitty thing about Korean Starbucks is that it's the most expensive coffee in Korea. The venti black iced tea back home is pretty cheap, about three bucks or so. Here, it's around $5 for the same and it's a little smaller. Failboat. We did some catching up with her and moved on to Forever21 where Davyn and I did some clothes shopping in the men's section. They had 7000 Won v-necks on sale so I bought one for later. It looks pretty nice, it's a bluish, tealish color. We shopped around and went to some places like ABC Mart which is actually the biggest shoe store in Korea. This one wasn't big, but the business itself is huge. Davyn found shoes he liked and he was gonna pick up a pair, but they didn't have his size. After more walking around, poking our noses into shops here and there, we decided to eat dinner. We ate jjim dalk which means steamed chicken I think. It looks like stir-fried vegetables and chicken. It tasted delicious. I'll post up a pic later. I'll post up pics that are relevant to this here and most of the other ones I took on my Facebook. We ate, then decided to go back home. 

Wangsimni Plaza

     Davyn wanted to check out Wangsimni Plaza again before we went home for the shoes he wanted because they have an ABC Mart too. We actually came here before to go to E Mart which is basically like a supermarket and and a department store combined. Pretty cool. We bought most of our necessities there a couple days ago. We wandered around the huge ass shopping mall for a bit afterwards and decided to hit up E Mart again for some water. What's funny is we ended up not even buying water. I bought a Hite Dry Finish, which is pretty damn delicious. Davyn bought a commemorative Bacardi Superior set that came in a cool box and even came with a bottle of Coca-Cola. On the way home, we saw the arcade near our school and decided to hit it up. I finished drinking the beer I bought (yeah, I was drinking out on the streets because its totally allowed here), killed my cigarette, and jumped on a Tekken 6 machine. These guys knew what they were doing, but the way they played just irritated me and had me laughing at myself. The shit I would get caught by was fucking stupid. I played a guy that played Law and spammed all kinds of lows and jabs. I beat him and then his friend jumped on with Armor King and would not stop spamming fucking sweeps. I blocked most of them and just punished him, but just his playstyle in general irritated the shit out of me. After that, we cruised around in our room after walking home and decided to go to McDonald's to get bulgogi burgers. Fucking delicious. That's it for today, I'll post some pictures up soon. 

 

Shoooooooooooots.