Alright... i've finally finished the FIRST day of our Jeju trip so i'll link to it here.
So it'll be the same as the other one cos i drafted it ages ago so it'll register under that date also, i'm going to let you guys read it despite the fact that it is technically unfinished.. because... as is.. it's already a huge post, lots of pics.
So here's day 1 of Jeju island
Enjoy.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
So i went to a 찜질방 (jjimjilbang)
SO today was a relaxed Sat-day got up around 12 after sleeping late no thanks to my gaming addictions but anway that's neither here nor there.
I give Nicole a ring and ask her what's happening and we organise to visit a 찜질방 with me being the 3rd wheel to her and her bf, which i didn't particularly care about seeing as i could just wander off and do my own thing and let them go all smoochey smoochey if they want to.
So anyway i meet up with them on the bus and we head over to Wangsimni and head in...
Turns out that the bf is a presidential guard...... pretty cool huh? He finds it pretty boring just listening to the radio and hearing the President move from place to place. He wants to be a detective actually :P even though technically that'd be a demotion.... more excitement he says.
So we go to the counter and pay 5000 to get into the place and head to the shoe lockers before getting our clothes and changing, putting our own clothes into one of the 5 banks of lockers numbering 1- 400 sumthing..
nearby is a door o what appears to be some kind of giant wet room......
Basically one word to describe this place is ...... ENORMOUS.
I go down stairs to find a HUGE floor space in total probably the same as a goodly sized function hall. with 4 different temperature sauna rooms (everything except the sleeping rooms here are unisex) (36 67 75 86 degrees) all with people sleeping in them soaking up the heat.
BUT WAIT! there's more!! after the soaking in the hot rooms you get out and head into the cool room...
This cool room is like an inside out igloo.... the snow's on the inside.... cooling elements run along the walls of the domed interior with the "ceiling" (if a vaguely spherical room could be said to have a ceiling) lined with white, quartz-y looking rocks (to reflect the cold i'd imagine). YOu sit in here and cool yourself down before heading back out and soaking up more heat.
I also had a go at a full body massage with extra attention on my back cost me $60 for 90 minutes.... which isn't all that bad really. not a bad massage... but then i'm hardly a connoisseur for massages seeing as my muscles are for the most part quite supple and loose.
basically i just wanted to say that this place was enormous.... oh btw those sleeping rooms have... maybe 50beds arranged in bunks for anybody to sleep on, the rooms are a comfortable 20 or just below degrees and thus you don't need to worry about blankets. but it seems that people were sleeping everywhere.... on the floor, in the movie rooms, the sauna rooms, the 'bath' room (where you shower.... i'll explain the whole process to you in a bit) everywhere!!! mainly cos the entire place is designed for nothing but rest and relaxation.... inside the same facility is a video games/pc bang, a noraebang (sing K), a small restaurant, dvd rooms as well as 2-4 large public movie rooms not to mention the gym, also availble is a ice cream and a fresh juice bar.
The crazy thing about this place is that it costs $6 if you don't buy anything from the shop etc etc and you can stay there for pretty much as long as you damn well like in fact you can even arrange to sleep there over night if you want to.... but basically it's all very cheap.
So now onto the explanation of 'bathing/showering" at a 찜질방.
1 remove clothes and walk from the lockers to the bathing.... hall i'll call it because room is an insult and chamber makes it sound smaller than it is.
So i open the door to find 3 large circular pools right near the doorway with 3 frogs sitting on top of where they join forming a water feature with them spitting water into their respective pools.
to the left into the closest corner is a bank of your typical shower blocks.. with the main defference being that the dividers are a token addition made of clear glass, more to stop water splashing over that for any real privacy.
The reason for the lack of privacy is that, because this is all found in the men's section... everyone's walking around naked. :S no it wasn't pretty.
So me.. and Jordon (whom i'd only just met maybe 4 hours previously) is now walking around naked :S but he says he's going to teach me how to shower korean style.
1/ shower off, use body wash or soap to cleanse body and face
2/ get into the spa (40 degrees) and soak for .... however long you want really
**i'll also add here that on the wall of one of the spas a guy was just sleeping there totally naked :S***
3/ get out of spa and go to the squatting showers
*these ones are the same as the one you see with the Japanese ones which you use before entering an Onsen*
4/ get your scouring pad and go to town on yourself.
*now another interesting "hoi ha ngan gai" part for me is when Jordon told me not to worry abotu my back because as friends it's expected that we scrub each other's backs ...
this is what I said "oh... of course... sure thing "
this is what i thought O_O "YA FKN WANNA WHAT?!?!?!!?!"
BUUUUT when in Rome.....
so i turned around and he scrubbed my back and i scrubbed his (yeah yeah yeah gay gay gay go on say i KNOW you're thinking it)
i'll note that i'd only just met this guy and just did stuff i wouldn't even consider asking let alone doing with any of my friends... ah but then Aust is Aust and Korea is Korea.
so after scrubbing we rinse off and head back over to the first set of showers to rinse off some more and wash hair if so desired.
After washing up you towel off and go to large mirrored areas where you can cotton bud your ears and then moisturise your skin.... and most importantly stare lovingly at your beautiful self, resplendently naked.
*cough*
Anyway. That was my first experience at a 찜질방.... an experience i am DEFINITELY going to be repeating in the near future. Maybe i'll even have picture ;)
Laterz
I give Nicole a ring and ask her what's happening and we organise to visit a 찜질방 with me being the 3rd wheel to her and her bf, which i didn't particularly care about seeing as i could just wander off and do my own thing and let them go all smoochey smoochey if they want to.
So anyway i meet up with them on the bus and we head over to Wangsimni and head in...
Turns out that the bf is a presidential guard...... pretty cool huh? He finds it pretty boring just listening to the radio and hearing the President move from place to place. He wants to be a detective actually :P even though technically that'd be a demotion.... more excitement he says.
So we go to the counter and pay 5000 to get into the place and head to the shoe lockers before getting our clothes and changing, putting our own clothes into one of the 5 banks of lockers numbering 1- 400 sumthing..
nearby is a door o what appears to be some kind of giant wet room......
Basically one word to describe this place is ...... ENORMOUS.
I go down stairs to find a HUGE floor space in total probably the same as a goodly sized function hall. with 4 different temperature sauna rooms (everything except the sleeping rooms here are unisex) (36 67 75 86 degrees) all with people sleeping in them soaking up the heat.
BUT WAIT! there's more!! after the soaking in the hot rooms you get out and head into the cool room...
This cool room is like an inside out igloo.... the snow's on the inside.... cooling elements run along the walls of the domed interior with the "ceiling" (if a vaguely spherical room could be said to have a ceiling) lined with white, quartz-y looking rocks (to reflect the cold i'd imagine). YOu sit in here and cool yourself down before heading back out and soaking up more heat.
I also had a go at a full body massage with extra attention on my back cost me $60 for 90 minutes.... which isn't all that bad really. not a bad massage... but then i'm hardly a connoisseur for massages seeing as my muscles are for the most part quite supple and loose.
basically i just wanted to say that this place was enormous.... oh btw those sleeping rooms have... maybe 50beds arranged in bunks for anybody to sleep on, the rooms are a comfortable 20 or just below degrees and thus you don't need to worry about blankets. but it seems that people were sleeping everywhere.... on the floor, in the movie rooms, the sauna rooms, the 'bath' room (where you shower.... i'll explain the whole process to you in a bit) everywhere!!! mainly cos the entire place is designed for nothing but rest and relaxation.... inside the same facility is a video games/pc bang, a noraebang (sing K), a small restaurant, dvd rooms as well as 2-4 large public movie rooms not to mention the gym, also availble is a ice cream and a fresh juice bar.
The crazy thing about this place is that it costs $6 if you don't buy anything from the shop etc etc and you can stay there for pretty much as long as you damn well like in fact you can even arrange to sleep there over night if you want to.... but basically it's all very cheap.
So now onto the explanation of 'bathing/showering" at a 찜질방.
1 remove clothes and walk from the lockers to the bathing.... hall i'll call it because room is an insult and chamber makes it sound smaller than it is.
So i open the door to find 3 large circular pools right near the doorway with 3 frogs sitting on top of where they join forming a water feature with them spitting water into their respective pools.
to the left into the closest corner is a bank of your typical shower blocks.. with the main defference being that the dividers are a token addition made of clear glass, more to stop water splashing over that for any real privacy.
The reason for the lack of privacy is that, because this is all found in the men's section... everyone's walking around naked. :S no it wasn't pretty.
So me.. and Jordon (whom i'd only just met maybe 4 hours previously) is now walking around naked :S but he says he's going to teach me how to shower korean style.
1/ shower off, use body wash or soap to cleanse body and face
2/ get into the spa (40 degrees) and soak for .... however long you want really
**i'll also add here that on the wall of one of the spas a guy was just sleeping there totally naked :S***
3/ get out of spa and go to the squatting showers
*these ones are the same as the one you see with the Japanese ones which you use before entering an Onsen*
4/ get your scouring pad and go to town on yourself.
*now another interesting "hoi ha ngan gai" part for me is when Jordon told me not to worry abotu my back because as friends it's expected that we scrub each other's backs ...
this is what I said "oh... of course... sure thing "
this is what i thought O_O "YA FKN WANNA WHAT?!?!?!!?!"
BUUUUT when in Rome.....
so i turned around and he scrubbed my back and i scrubbed his (yeah yeah yeah gay gay gay go on say i KNOW you're thinking it)
i'll note that i'd only just met this guy and just did stuff i wouldn't even consider asking let alone doing with any of my friends... ah but then Aust is Aust and Korea is Korea.
so after scrubbing we rinse off and head back over to the first set of showers to rinse off some more and wash hair if so desired.
After washing up you towel off and go to large mirrored areas where you can cotton bud your ears and then moisturise your skin.... and most importantly stare lovingly at your beautiful self, resplendently naked.
*cough*
Anyway. That was my first experience at a 찜질방.... an experience i am DEFINITELY going to be repeating in the near future. Maybe i'll even have picture ;)
Laterz
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
For Her
This post is for one person in particular, and if you don't like it or don't want to read mushy stuff...
FUCK OFF
Still here?
okay...
To you:
I came home to my place and i found it dark.... and silent.....
a fitting return, the dreaded homecoming i was wishing to avoid....
i open the door and was welcomed by a silent darkness, no malevolent presence, merely... an absence of presence, and that was worse in my opinion.
All of a sudden there's no warmth to the place right now, it's like you took all that heat that you make, packed it into your bags and took it with you, but more likely it's the fact that you were here that made this place warm at all in any sense of the word.
The bus took me along the river, over near Oksu station where we were walking hand in hand not even 24 hours ago and yet driving past i see couples doing the same.... couples that were us just last night... and should be us in the coming months...... but won't be...
I am just glad to have had so long with you .... having you to welcome me home, send me to sleep, do my washing, drag me around to go see things, wait for me to do my stuff.... and to have you to wake up to every morning. But now instead of you, i sit here writing this with a soft toy in my lap....
I see you everywhere I look, thinking of places we've been, i drank the rest of the soup thinking of how i made extra effort in making it just for you, thinking how i wish you were drinking it with me. I'm considering going down to GFC and all i can think abotu is how we never got to go there one more time before you left. I don't think i'll stop thinking about how i wish you were here and even as i write this i know that you're in a plane flying to HK..... away from here ... away from me....
it's so cold here now.... so empty..... so..... isolated......
I wish i was on the plane with you to return home with you, and not missing the symbolism that it is you who brings me home....
my eyes are stinging right now.....
and all i want to say....
is that.....
i miss you.
and now it's my turn to post this:
You're in my arms
And all the world is calm
The music playing on for only two
So close together
And when I'm with you
So close to feeling alive
A life goes by
Romantic dreams must die
So I bid mine goodbye and never knew
So close was waiting, waiting here with you
And now forever I know
All that I wanted to hold you
So close
So close to reaching that famous happy end
Almost believing this was not pretend
Now you're beside me and look how far we've come
So far we are so close
How could I face the faceless days
If I should lose you now?
We're so close
To reaching that famous happy end
Almost believing this was not pretend
Let's go on dreaming for we know we are
So close
So close
And still so far
FUCK OFF
Still here?
okay...
To you:
I came home to my place and i found it dark.... and silent.....
a fitting return, the dreaded homecoming i was wishing to avoid....
i open the door and was welcomed by a silent darkness, no malevolent presence, merely... an absence of presence, and that was worse in my opinion.
All of a sudden there's no warmth to the place right now, it's like you took all that heat that you make, packed it into your bags and took it with you, but more likely it's the fact that you were here that made this place warm at all in any sense of the word.
The bus took me along the river, over near Oksu station where we were walking hand in hand not even 24 hours ago and yet driving past i see couples doing the same.... couples that were us just last night... and should be us in the coming months...... but won't be...
I am just glad to have had so long with you .... having you to welcome me home, send me to sleep, do my washing, drag me around to go see things, wait for me to do my stuff.... and to have you to wake up to every morning. But now instead of you, i sit here writing this with a soft toy in my lap....
I see you everywhere I look, thinking of places we've been, i drank the rest of the soup thinking of how i made extra effort in making it just for you, thinking how i wish you were drinking it with me. I'm considering going down to GFC and all i can think abotu is how we never got to go there one more time before you left. I don't think i'll stop thinking about how i wish you were here and even as i write this i know that you're in a plane flying to HK..... away from here ... away from me....
it's so cold here now.... so empty..... so..... isolated......
I wish i was on the plane with you to return home with you, and not missing the symbolism that it is you who brings me home....
my eyes are stinging right now.....
and all i want to say....
is that.....
i miss you.
and now it's my turn to post this:
You're in my arms
And all the world is calm
The music playing on for only two
So close together
And when I'm with you
So close to feeling alive
A life goes by
Romantic dreams must die
So I bid mine goodbye and never knew
So close was waiting, waiting here with you
And now forever I know
All that I wanted to hold you
So close
So close to reaching that famous happy end
Almost believing this was not pretend
Now you're beside me and look how far we've come
So far we are so close
How could I face the faceless days
If I should lose you now?
We're so close
To reaching that famous happy end
Almost believing this was not pretend
Let's go on dreaming for we know we are
So close
So close
And still so far
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