"I'm... happy!" (on a coffee shop and bars)

When I go home, and we're hanging out- if you tell me that you're tired and I say, "take a rest!"- you can pinch me. Actually, I'd rather you hit me; I hate pinches. So hit me when I say it. Because I will. And a "I'm happy!" might slip out, or a "finish-e", or "cute-i/ cute-tu"... All these Kanglish, as Koreans call odd smashups of Korean-ized English words and phrases, that we said at first to poke fun at the strangeness have seemingly become part of our normal everyday language. "Take a rest" is disturbingly familiar to me these days, and I barely remember the fact that I didn't really know what that meant the first time my co-teacher said it to me. Also, if I ever tell you that I'm "so-so", it means I'm okay. And then punch me. :) We still think we're teasing when we say these things... but really, we're just trying to be cute like the Koreans, but that's a complete failure because we're most definitely not Korean. Though if I can get away without saying much, I certainly pass for it! ha.

The past week was a good one for discovering some new places to go. As I've mentioned, a friend and I are meeting during the week to study Korean. Wednesday, we went to a coffee shop I'd been looking at for a long time, but was never that interested in visiting. Man oh man, do I wish I've been sooner! I don't have pictures now, but I will definitely take some the next time I go. It's so cozy, and there are couches EVERYWHERE. We ended up in a little nook of the coffee shop, each with our own couch big enough to seat 3 people. It was mellow, comfy, and as a lot of cafes offer, it had free snacks (toast, potato soup, some common bar snacks, and coffee). Coffee, a coffee shop had a coffee pot where you could have coffee for free. 

Yellow Taxi sits on the 4th floor
of Garten Bier in Dunsan Dong

Friday and Saturday, I ended up at 2 bars I haven't been to before. Yellow Taxi only opened a week ago. I was with a small group, and only 2 of us seemed interested in returning, which is a shame because the owner plans to have live music every Saturday. He's a nice guy, and he speaks some English. I had the camera I recently bought from a friend, and he asked me to try to take some photos. Yellow Taxi has a large amount of space, a long bar, free pool, and an outdoor swing indoors- the kind I haven't seen since leaving the states. It was awesome. The downside is the menu pricing. Cocktails tend to run around 7,000 won ($7), with a few bars in Daejeon offering them for 5,000 and up. Yellow Taxi unfortunately does is not one of those kind few. I really wanted to give the owner some business, so I went to buy a drink, but it turned out they were offering the first drink for free- and I wasn't up to drinking another, so I left only having the one. The decor is modern-hip with its mismatched chairs, and there's a giant booth that'll sit a large party. I would definitely like to go back, especially to check out the "western rock band" that'll be playing this weekend. I'm hoping this guy can get his bar off the ground, I like him.

Gupoom is above Franco in Dunsan Dong

The other bar is called Gupoom, and from what my friends believe, it's sponsored by Heineken. It certainly looks like it is with the green decor, and Heineken bottles everywhere. It probably makes more sense when the bar is more full, but the tables on the floor seemed too spread out. Granted, there were only about 3 different groups in the entire bar, but the half we were on felt awkwardly empty to me. Gupoom is separated by a rain of lights. Tables sit on the main floor, and the window side is lined with booth-type seating for something a little more private. The bar as a whole is arranged in a design much more open than a lot of Korean bars I've been to. There aren't the nooks and little corners in this bar that you'll find elsewhere. Alcohol prices are pretty typical for Korea- 9 of us went though about 4-5 pitchers of beer and maybe 6 bottles of soju for roughly 6,000 a person. Granted, these numbers could be way off.