First Ski Trip of the Year: Konjiam Resort

Konjiam Resort had as special 50% offer through last Thursday, so we had to take advantage while we could. We paid about 20,000 won for the night session (21:30-00:30). The snow was great, though they only had one trail open at the time, so everyone and their brother who went to take advantage of that 50% offer was on that one slope. That part was not so fun. Even though Konjiam is a small mountain (by my Vermont standards) I was pretty exhausted after 2 hours of skiing. Besides the fact that only a few days before I was so sick I had to skip work, but I'm also terribly out of shape. But, it was a good warm up round for better skiing to come, I hope.

With all the cold weather we've been having, they were blowing snow like crazy. I would expect them to have more trails open very soon!

Snow and Daido Moriyama

 My co-worker introduced me to the work of Daido Moriyama yesterday. He is a Japanese photographer famous for high-contrast, black and white images. He tends to shoot in 1600 ISO to overexpose the photo, and then overdevelop it in the darkroom making for a really interesting effect. But the coolest thing about this kind of work is that it's incredibly easy to imitate on your own. Since his style is not so much using a tripod and lining up each shot with precision, but more of a haphazard kind of shooting style, you don't need any special equipment and you can shoot as you walk along the street (moving), even at night. The high ISO speeds will let you use faster shutter speeds for surprisingly clear shots at night. Then you need to boost your contrast and sharpness (I opted for highlights over sharpness because the sharpness tool on my photo editor is really terrible) on your camera or in the post processing. It's basically night photography made simple. These are some of the best shots I took tonight in the snow:

Let me know how mine stands up to the master... This was my first try..

FC Seoul, K-League Champions!

We arrived at World Cup Stadium a bit later than hoped and found ourselves overwhelmed in a crowd of people all trying to get into the stadium for FC Seoul's championship game against Jeju United. We found out that the total number of tickets sold for the game was in the ball park of 59,000, which was by far the biggest crowd we've ever seen at a game. 

The Jeju fans were out in full force. Usually the fans of the opposing team are lucky if they can fill one row of seats, but nearly all of the lower section was full on Sunday for the big game. 

The game was an exciting one. FC Seoul scored the first goal, but it was offside and therefore couldn't be counted. Jeju scored the actual first goal of the game, much to the dismay of the FC Seoul fans. But, then FC Seoul made it's first real goal in a penalty kick not much later. Tensions were high in this final game of the season, and, as you can see in the picture above, a near brawl broke out when Jeju disagreed with the referee's call. 

 Halftime show called for some rather eclectic cheerleaders... 

Finally, the game ended in a 2-1 win for FC Seoul making them league champions for the first time in 10 years.  Players rejoiced on the field...

...And the crowd went wild...

Adi won MVP for the game, since he came back from injury to play this final game and scored a goal in this crucial match.

There were fireworks and awards given.

...Until next year....

Sick Day

I'm taking a sick day today. I don't even know if I get sick days. But I have been feeling really awful. Yesterday I had a fever. I don't think I've had a fever since middle school. I didn't even remember what having a fever felt like. It was awful.  My asthma was kicking up all weekend. And my nose is running like a faucet. I won't describe the pile of tissues next to me that keeps growing as the day goes by. And my head just feels swollen and every time I move too fast I get dizzy and light headed. I went to the doctor this morning, of course by then my fever had broken and my asthma had died down. The doctor didn't look too concerned, but he didn't like the sound of my cough. I got a new cocktail of drugs, plus two inhalers (mine from the states was long expired and wasn't working so well anymore). With the two inhalers it became by far the most expencive drug store visit I've ever had, but, even still it was only 20,800 won. That would have been much more expencive in the states.

Then the boyfriend treated me to breakfast of juk, Korean rice porridge. I'm so lucky to have someone who takes care of me when I'm so far from home <3

Beirut Restaurant in Itaewon

Welcome to Beirut Restaurant,  Seoul's first Lebanese restaurant. It's just a hole in the wall kind of place, but you can expect everything to be made in front of you with fresh ingredients while you wait. The owner is a friendly, talkative kind of guy who can give you recommendations on what to eat, especially if you're like me and know nothing about Lebanese food. As it is more of a take out place, he serves mostly sandwiches, Lebanese style wraps and falafel. Everything is priced right, our two wraps were only 4,000 won each.

Preparing each wrap by hand before baking in the oven.

 Making perfect, flat dough circles to prepare the wraps. 

 Herb and cheese wrap with delicious mozzarella cheese

Enjoying the herb and cheese wrap

Lamb wrap with veggies and spice

If there is a new place you want to try in Itaewon, this should be your next stop. As it is a new restaurant, the word needs to get out about this place. Stop by for take out, or eat in one of the small tables inside. It's authentic as it gets here with an amazing chef!

To get here, go up the hill in Itaewon past hooker hill and homo hill and turn left down the next street, heading toward the Mosque. It will be on your left. Check the map for more details.


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Tomatillo

I made my way to the famous Tomatillo by Jonggak ex. 6 yesterday. It's a pretty decent Mexican food restaurant which is reasonably priced and right downtown.

Yummy chili

Yummy nachos

 Yummy chicken burrito

And don't worry, I didn't eat this all by myself.... Yay for yummy food!

DRIPAN Community Art Walk

My friend Eric was performing at another art event in Seoul, so I made my way to Haebangchon tonight to check out his performance and some of the other things going on over there. The first location was the Laughing Tree which was a small art studio.

From there it was time to watch Eric's performance at The Local's garage. We had a drink while we waited for the performance to start. 

As usual, Eric's performance was strange and interesting. He took photos of people on his way to the event, compiled them all into one movie showing each face for a fraction of a second. Then he voiced over the people's thoughts as they walked down the street. 

Then some mysterious bags of paint dyed water came out and we didn't quite know what they were for, but everyone wound up with a bag in their hands.... 

You'll have to watch the video to find out what it was all about. Warning, language is a little strong...

Then we followed the man with the bell to Philly's where we watched some musical performances in the basement. Some excellent free style rappers and reggae artists called The Space Rhyme Continuum performed some very entertaining music for us and then a rather eclectic selection was performed by GT Arpe

The event continued, but I'm sick and the smoky bars was making me feel not so hot, so we bought some meat on a stick from a man outside and then walked back to the subway and home. In fact, it's probably still going on right now (11:30 on Saturday night) if you happen to be in Haebangchon and want to get out of your house.  It's a good time!