Settling In

Koreans love their coffee shops, clearly.

 

This delightful place is my favorite coffee joint. About $4 for a coffee, but you get a slice of cake and bread included in the price!

 

Lake near Duryu Park in Daegu.

 

Champion

 

Well hello again! I have been in Korea for a month now if you count the time for the flight over. It has flown by, but at the same time I feel like I have done so much in such a short amount of time. Though I have plenty more to do! Starting with really settling in to my apartment. I still need more hangers, decorations, a table for the kitchen and other odds and ends. But payday isn't for about 10 more days, so that will just have to wait a bit longer. I will certainly be hitting up Costco to get many of my supplies and most of my food.
I am so glad to have a Costco here! I will certainly branch out and shop the local places, but sometimes a girl just needs Costco. Especially because they have cheese... real honest to goodness cheese. Any where else you're going to find different flavors of individually wrapped cheese that is essentially just different colors of American cheese, which is fine and dandy for melting on things. But I like my cheese and a variety of cheese at that, so this homogenous "I'm not really cheese" cheese thing would be nearly too much to bear. Thankfully Costco swooped in to save the day!
But I must say I am glad to get my Korean lunch each day at school. It's nice to ensure that I have at least one Korean style meal five times a week. And I am also looking forward to trying out the many different restaurants in downtown. They have everything you could want, from Italian to Mexican (well I mean obviously it's not like home, but I'll take it!) to Indian to Vietnamese to good old American.
There really is a lot going on in Daegu. I plan to visit the tourist information center soon to get a good idea of what I need to see and do while I am here. Last weekend I went to Busan with Lindsey, my neighbor. I am really glad she lives in my building as well, because it has helped me to settle in having a person I can truly communicate with, and she is a cool lady! We went to Busan for the Oktoberfest at the Nongshim Hotel. Last year I was in Germany at the real shebang, so I was excited to check out another "Oktoberfest." The beer, food and atmosphere were all really great. The weizen and pils were quite tasty and really compared to the beer I had in Germany. I took part in the beer chugging competition and definitely won. I got a 20,000 won certificate to use at the event, so I bought some delicious, overpriced chicken with no qualms! It was a fun weekend, and I was happy to travel outside of Daegu.
I am heading back to Busan soon... in 13 days, but this time I will be with Shanna! I am so excited for her to come and visit. It will be great to see her and get to spend a few days together. It's so fun knowing she is only one country away instead of on the other side of the world! I really hope we can hang out often while we are hanging out in Asia.