Way-gook-in' it up in Korea!: 광주에 각치 가요!! Gwangju trip!

So today was the day that I had planned a get-together with several other ETAs in Gwangju, which is about an hour and a half by bus from Suncheon. It is the capital of our province. Anyhoo, got up at 6:30am to have breakfast with the family before they all headed off to school (haha!). I ended up leaving my apartment around 8:45 to catch a cab to the bus station. I bought my ticket for Gwangju (they have machines where you can just push a button for the city you want to go to and get the ticket right there!!) all by myself!! I ended up sitting by a young girl my age and we started talking. It turns out she lives in Yeosu (about an hour south of me on a peninsula) and goes to university in Suncheon. I jumped on the opportunity to exchange emails and phone numbers so maybe we can hang out in Suncheon, or definitely when I visit Yeosu I hope she will show me around. I got to the bus terminal in Gwangju a little early, but that was fine with me. I met up with Anne and Stephanie!! It was so nice to see them. Also, I randomly got talked to by some Jehova's Witnesses. They gave me this booklet and asked if I had ever though about life after death. I told them from the get-go that I was Christian, but for some reason they kept on talking to me about it for about 5 minutes. Then they asked where I lived, and I said Suncheon, and then they asked what neighborhood and I thought that was a bit creepy, so didn't tell them. Anyway, first time that happened!

We took a cab to the Gwangju Biennial -- the "huge" art festival going on there right now. It took our cab driver a little while to figure out where we wanted to go -- it turns out, they say biennial more like "bee-en-ee-eh-lee" or something like that. Anyway, we made it just fine. There was a huge crowd of middle school girls in the entrance and they were all wearing their school uniforms and swooning over something. So, of course we went to check it out. Turns out there were some b-boys (or beat-boys?) -- anyway, break dancers -- performing. Break dancing is really popular in Korea. It was fun to watch for a bit. Then we entered the free part of the art festival, and saw just an odds and ends assortment of stuff -- I wasn't impressed by any of it. We went back outside and headed up some stairs where we found the entrance to the main exhibition, but turns out it cost $12 to get in. None of us wanted to pay that much for something that could turn out to be as un-thrilling as the previous "free" part of the exhibition. So, we opted to just go back to where the dancing and singing was going on. Turns out there was a magic show too! Anyway, then Anna & Kirsten came to meet up with us. The 5 of us squeezed into a cab and headed to the main downtown/shopping area to get some lunch. We decided to go to Pizza Hut. We got 2 pizzas and a pasta to split amongst ourselves -- the pizzas here are tiny. Anyway, the Hawaiian one had real Pizza Hut style crust!! It was delicious. The Margarhitta pizza had really fresh basil and tomato -- yum!!!! ^^

We walked around the shopping area and the "art" street for awhile, waiting for Leigh to meet up with us. Then we went for Patbingsu!! It was amazing, but of course not as good as Ice Cool. Then we decided to head to the May 18 Cemetary (there was a huge revolt/protest here in 1980(?)) and so we caught the subway. Well, we realized when we were heading into the underground mall before the subway that this Korean man was following us!! He had been following actually pretty closely and mumbling things. Well, we go through the mall and he stays with us. We buy our tickets for the subway, and he followed us on. We decided to head to Leigh's family's apartment instead of the cemetary, to try to lose the creepo. Then he got off the subway when we got off and continued to walk through the neighborhood until we were approaching Leigh's apartment complex. We decided it wouldn't be good to go to her building bc 1. he might try to follow us inside and 2. he would know where she lives. So, we took a detour to a small convenience store. Well, he followed us in there too. So then we tried talking to the store owner and telling him that this man was following us, but he didn't understand. Finally, when we were leaving and the man made to follow us again and we said "an-i-oh, ha-ji-ma" (aka, no stop) I think the owner caught on, and maybe he didn't let the man follow us. Either way, when we realized he wasn't following us, we took off running through the parking lot and into her building. YIKES! It was scary. We half expected him to suction cup his way up the building wall to her apartment!! He definitely followed us for 45 minutes -- we think he was slightly drunk and/or slightly mentally retarded. It was by far the creepiest thing that has happened to any of us in Korea so far.

So we spent some time recovering in Leigh's family's apartment. A little later her family came home and we met her 2 cute host sisters -- one is 4 and one is a soph. in HS. The younger one was so crazy and energetic! The older sister was quite, but very smart and good at English. Anyway, after eating some monster-sized grapes we headed back down town to get dinner. (It was too late by this time to head out to the cemetary) Thankfully the creeper wasn't waiting for us out in the parking lot. We headed back downtown and found a samgyepsal restaurant (Korean bacon). It was so delicious!! Betty, Yoo Jin, Caitlyn, and Jackie ended up meeting up with us there, so there was quite a gang of us. We had lots of fun discussing different teaching and host family situations we've had and how everything is going for each of us over delicious bacon and soju. It was really nice to see so many people from orientation! I'm glad that I am the only ETA w/in an hour because that makes it that much more special when I can see others!! Anyway, Steph and I caught a cab back to the bus station and each got on a bus that left for home around 9. I got home at 10:15 and my host family was either still awake or had laid down and semi-fallen asleep. Either way the 3 of them greeted me when I got home (the younger one is at a TKE "camp" tonight).

Bedtime now -- I'm exhausted and have no idea what tomorrow has in store!