Korean Oddities

I'd like to tell you a bit about some of the other strange things in Korea (or at least some of the strange thoughts I've had).

It is in the middle of the rainy season right now, so everyone walks around with umbrellas. Most stores and restaurants will have an umbrella tub at the front entrance to put your rainy and wet umbrella in. I went and bought a cool umbrella with blue sky and clouds on the inside of it. It's very cool.

Today is Sunday and I spent the entire day lounging around and relaxing. It felt wonderful. I really needed the rest!

Next weekend, I am going to go to the mud festival - a big event where everyone gets together and gets covered from head to toe in mud. I will send some pictures when I do. It should be a blast!

It's kind of funny - Korean pets are dogs, but are really just glorifed rats. Miniature dogs are all the rage and people walk their mini-dogs all the time. It's very funny. I haven't seen many cats at all - the only ones I've seen are the stray ones, which look very feral and gaunt. I wouldn't want to approach one!

Stores that have grand openings have women who dress up in skimpy outfits and who dance in front of the new store. It's odd - they have loudspeakers and do their little prozakk'ed popstar dance. I suppose that it's to attract people to come into the new store. I guess it works, I dunno.

Everything here is condensed - stores and restaurants are compacted into 6-story buildings. There are open hallways that extend into the buildings where you take the elevators up to the store you want. Advertisements are on the outside of the buildings as neon signs extending up the whole length of the building.

I will post more later. Right now, I need to go get some sleep. It's late and I don't want to lose the benefits of the sleep I gained today. I'm still working on posting those pictures... Hopefully in a little while! We'll see!