Where Everybody Knows Your Name Race

Normally in Korea, when I'm without the foreign teachers I work with (meaning Westerners, not Koreans), I see maybe one non-Korean a day if I'm lucky. This is a huge jump from the one or so a week I'd see last time I was in SoKo. Regardless, every foreigner here secretly knows the little tinge of excitement when you see another wayguken ('foreigner' or 'outsider' in Korean... that's what they call us). Sometimes you can't help but wave at the stranger.

There's an area in Seoul where this is definitely not the case. It's quite the opposite, actually. I don't know how it started, but Itaewon became the foreigner hangout neighborhood a while back. I assume it's because it's relatively close to a US military base. Last weekend, I went there for the first time ever. This was on purpose. Some foreigners go there every weekend (some twice or three times a weekend), but I wanted nothing to do with it. It's full of sorority girls and G.I. meatheads, and a bunch of drunken bullshit occurs which I want nothing to do with. Austinites, think of The Aquarium or The Library on 6th Street and expand it by ten city blocks. Sick.

Besides, I'm in Korea, and I wanna feel like I'm in Korea. So why take out all the Koreans? That cultural clash is the kimchi spice of my life right now.

Anywho, so I get taken there (practically by force) by some friends, and all those months I avoided this part of town like the plague.... you know what I actually came to find out? I was absolutely right. This place sucks. There is very little evidence of awesomeness anywhere. I tried a street meat vendor while walking around, and it was really delicious, but then again it was run by an old Korean lady (call them "ajumas"), so I can't even credit that to the whiteys in Itaewon.

Without further ado, here's a bunch of white people getting boozed up in Seoul... click the "HQ" for better sound/video: