Pleasant surprises

Although Hongdae is the cool place to hang out in Seoul I've mostly avoided it because...well I don't know why. It was partially because the peeps I worked with last year were friends of convenience rather than people I would regularly hang out with and because of the distance to get to and from Seoul last year meant I would have to stay out all night before catching the train back home the next morning.

It wasn't Club Day (which actually happens at night) in Hongdae but Tom and I were out wandering during the daylight hours yesterday and stumbled upon a few things that left pleasantly surprised and excited about the upcoming weekends. Before that we showed each other a thing or two about the areas surrounding Hongdae. I took Tom through this side street between Yonsei University and Ehwa Woman's college where the clothes are actually cool and have that vintage feel to them kind of like in Japan. He'd also never had a Krispy Kreme doughnut so I told him to get in line and act like he was going to buy something so he could get a free doughnut. I went to the bathroom and came out to find Tom blissed out on the glaze. After that he showed me Mike's Cabin - a bar where they have ping-pong, foose ball, and Nintendo Wii. They also have various other boardgames.

We then walked over to Hongdae and found a bunch of nice restaurants, tea, and coffee shops along the way. Just off of a busy strip we found two really cool bars where I could see starting or ending the night. They were both right next door to each other. One looked like something you'd find in Berkeley. It was kind of hippieish and homey, just a comfortable place to be. The other place was just cool and looked like one of the hipster SF bars. Both had on some good chill music and their food menu looked good too. We'll be going back to those places sometime soon.

After some more browsing of CDs and clothes we heard some live sounding music. The first guys we walked by were just noisy but I noticed a poster for the next big event in Seoul. They call it the 2nd World DJ Festival. Last year was a lot of fun. This year it goes from May 3-5. On top of that I have that whole week off so things are getting interesting as spring time hits Seoul.

At the top of this hill we heard some jazzy tunes and found a quartet jamming out - guitar, string bass, snare drum with brushes, and the singer also playing melodian. It was completely unexpected and really cool to see these guys performing out in this park. We watched them for a while as the sunset and night took over. Tom asked the singer about some jazz clubs around the area and he told us a few places to go. We ended a fun, wandering, lazy day with dinner at a Thai restaurant.