My swagger is Mick Jagger

After being inundated with K-pop, it's nice to reflect on some US cats that still rock it hard. Yes, M.I.A. is pregnant, Kayne has a rad MJ fade, but it's great to revisit a legit rap performance.

p.s. Lil' Wayne is still the best rapper alive. He's got the hardest bars, call him the warden.

GRAMMY'S - SWAGGA LIKE US
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Vacation: Part II

Here's the second set of photos from my recent vacation. My friend and I headed down to Haeundae, Busan for 3 nights of fun in the sun.

We ended up staying in a very nice hotel 5 minutes from beach that had shuttles running every 30 minutes down to the ocean. I was a little scared because the weather forecast called for overcast clouds with a chance of rain. Not exactly the ideal time to be beach bumming. But, as it turns out, the weather wasn't bad at all and the day was actually perfect the day we went swimming. Here we go...



Seoul and Busan are really on opposite ends of the country. A normal bus takes about 4.5 hours to get there, 6 hours if you factor in holiday traffic. Thankfully, Korea put in express trains (KTX) that do the trek with one 5 minute stop at 300 km/hr. It took us a little under 3 hours from point to point and was quite comfortable.



Here's our train pulling up. They hold quite a few people and we were able to get tickets for our trip 30 minutes before departure.



A pit-stop at the Fuzzy Navel before hitting the water. We had some burritos here (I haven't had one in months). It was really windy and our table outside blew over, including our meal and drinks. The bartender was really apologetic and gave us new food and drinks. 10 minutes later we were at the bar taking free shots with him (pop-itts [haven't had those since college]). We ended up meeting some people from England that joined us for the festivities. This particular drink is called the Black Mexican and was quite good.



The main beach, Haeundae. This place is INSANELY busy... but that's what we were aiming for. As I said before, beautiful weather that day. The summer gods looked favorably upon our trip.



A shot in the opposite direction. The tubes and umbrellas are available for rent at about $5 for the day. Of course we got some. I haven't had that much fun swimming in a long time. The waves are just about perfect for floating out in the ocean and also getting flipped by the occasional big one. The ocean itself was packed. I was being rocketed by a big wave, moving pretty fast and the tube and myself rolled over the head of a small child in front of me. He was shocked but wasn't crying. I didn't see any news the next day about a broken neck so I assume he was okay.




The boardwalk along the beach. Farther down, where the beach bends, we had some of the best seafood I've ever had in my life the night before. Sashimi, or Korean sushi, or whatever, is raw fish served without rice. Ocean fresh!



Yeah, this place is packed like sardines inside of a crushed tin can.



The ever-diligent lifeguards. These towers were spread all along the beach, about 100 yards apart. They also had buoys about 150 yards out you couldn't swim past in addition several more lifeguards on jetskiis patrolling the line. Pretty controlled area but is understandable considering how many people were there.



An old fishing boat farther down the coast.



A few from a rooftop where we had dinner. Some guy from San Diego was running the place and gave us some free drinks to help celebrate.



Back down on the boardwalk after dinner. They had a live Pansori event that was pretty cool. I had to fight my way to the edge of the audience to snap a few choice shots. Really interesting and these guys had tons of energy.


All in all, I had a great vacation. We did most of the things I wanted to do, and a few other non-planned ones. Good times.

Vacation: Part I

Ahh, summer vacation. I had a week off from work last week and tried to put it to good use. Had a good friend fly in to visit so I tried especially hard to make the most of it. There are still so many areas in Seoul I haven't been to, and each time I find a new place it just leads to more cool locations. Bottom line: this city is BIG.

I finally got around to going through my photos. There's a lot to post and write about so I'll break this into two parts. Part I:



My friend and co-worker offered to drive to the airport and pick my buddy up with me. After picking up my friend from Incheon we headed straight out to dinner. Tonight's main course was dak galbi. Everyone at work wanted to meet my friend so we had close to 10 people at dinner. This is the restaurant we ate at. Very good.



Soju turns Clark Kent into Superman. After dinner and drinks we went walking to the second place and saw this. You basically pay $5 to crush plastic plates with your fist. I've tried it a few weeks ago and got through about 7 plates. If you get over 10 you win a stuffed animal, or some other random thing.



The street right by my house in Sincheon. It basically looks like this every night. This is also where my co-workers and I eat lunch each day. If you don't feel like taking the subway anywhere and are in this area, this is where you come to enjoy the evenings.



Inside the ubiquitous noraebang. I've written about this many times before so, yeah. This is the inside. Some of the more ambitious non-Koreans attempt to read/sing in Korean but is often hard to keep up.




The spread at my favorite galbi restaurant near my house. My friend really enjoyed it, too. The two ladies that always work there are sooooo nice. I try and converse in my kindergarten Korean and they love it. They tell me to call them 'e-mo', which means aunt.


Same restaurant. I probably eat here once or twice a week.



On Sunday we headed to Jamsil Stadium to watch some KBO. There are few Seoul teams but some of them share the stadiums and trade off games. Which team you cheer for decides which side of the stadium you sit in.



Doosan Bears section. Fans here are rabid and cheer after every pitch as if they had just won the World Series.

After a 30 minute rain delay (still monsoon season) it was back to ball.



My co-worker's daughter, Hae-bin. This is her first baseball game and she had a good time. So cute.




Seoul Tower sits on the top of a large hill/mountain thing right downtown. You take a cable car to the top and then enjoy the view. It's similar to the Space Needle in Seattle. They have a restaurant, gift shop, teddy bear museum, bench presses (not kidding) up near the tower.


About a billion locks with notes attached to them. It's a tradition with the youngsters to write a love note and then lock it to the fence by the tower.



A shot of the city from one of the decks. I guess you can see most of Seoul from up here.



There is a light show at the tower that runs nightly. I thought this was a cool effect.



After the tower it was back down to the city for some drinks. This area is called Myeon-dong and is one of the better-known shopping districts. It gets very busy during the day but thins out at night because most of the places here are clothes shops.

The next day we headed down to Haeundae for a few nights. I will post those pictures in the next few days.

I heard it was 107 F in Portland right now. I will gladly trade that for this sticky, hot, humidity that makes you sweat buckets within 2 seconds outside. Deal?