Animal Cafes & Korea's Cafe Culture

Animal Cafes:
In Korea there are very interesting themed cafes ranging from a wide variety of things.  Today I will just focus on the animal cafes.  They're the coolest kind of cafe in my opinion and kind of like a petting zoo tea party in way lol.  There really isn't another way to describe it.  I recently went to a racoon cafe located in Hongdae (half hour from Chung Ang University by subway).  The entrance fee is 6,000W and the entrance fee is mandatory but buying drinks or food is not.  Racoon cafes are only one type of cafe here.  There are sheep cafes, cat cafes and dog cafes as well that I have heard of.  And yes, you eat in the same room as the animals.  Real animals that let you play with them.  In America racoons are seen as wild, untamable and rabid/disease infested for the most part.  However, in Korea the racoon cafe has only domesticated racoons that very well taken care of and up to date with the vet visits and health.

Outside an ABCMart is this sign.  It tells you that the racoon cafe is on the 4th floor above the ABCMart.  The entrance is to the right of ABCMart if you're facing the inside of it.  

When you enter you have to first take your shoes off, put your bags on the lockers (not pictured) and put on a pair of sandals that are randomly distributed throughout this shoe rack.  

One of 6 racoons (and 2 dogs) that were in the racoon cafe.  In one section of the cafe is this little play area for the racoons to climb.  They love to be in high places and will use you to get there.  

here is a fat racoon enjoying a full body massage.  None of the racoons are related.

...Eventually he got bored and joined his friend on my back and they both tried to work together to steal my hat.  BTW like skunks, the white variety are 100% domesticated and will not be seen anywhere in the wild.  

While one went down to the ground, this one tried to go for the window to escape

I think..I don't know but having two racoons crawl all over your head and back is the weirdest but funniest feeling ever.  

Cafe Culture:

In Korea the cafe culture is slightly different from America.  Unlike America, there are two types of cafes (themed as seen above, and regular).  However, in a regular you will never see anyone alone.  I went to a cafe alone once in Insadong (about 45 minutes away from the school by subway) just to wait for a friend to finish up a club event and i was stared at the whole time for just being alone.  The barista even wanted to give me my food as a take out order because I was alone.  Cafes in Korea are used for two purposes mainly: dates and studying.  In a bigger cafe like a Holly's or Tom n Tom's there is a high chance of seeing people just on their laptops, but even then they're accompanied by other friends who are studying.  You can see them in there for hours just buried in work.

Here is that cafe I went to in Insadong.  It was pretty small. I have noticed that in smaller cafes you mostly see couples and rarely are there students studying.  In bigger cafes there are more people studying, but still one or two couples sitting somewhere in a corner away from all the students.  If you plan to hang out at a cafe in Korea, just remember to bring a friend haha.

IMPORTANT: Alien Registration Cards

The Alien Registration Card (ARC) is for anyone staying in Korea for more than 90 days.  If you do not get your ARC within 90 days, you will be deported from the Korea, so this is pretty important.  Depending on where you are staying in the greater Seoul area/in Korea, your respective immigration office may be different from mine but for me (and anyone living in the general Dongjak-Gu area) our immigration office is located in Omokgyo (go from Heukseok to Yeouido, transfer to the purple line and go north to Omokgyo).  Getting to the immigration office in total (transit and walking) can take anywhere from 45-60 minutes.  I also recommend leaving 2 hours early to avoid any troubles.  I went for my ARC and I was half hour late for my appointment.  However I was able to make a new appointment.  There are also signs posted that state that it will be impossible to be seen without an appointment so you NEED an appointment in order to be seen by an immigration officer to get your residency taken care of.  The ARC is your residency card telling the government that you are a Korean resident and allowed to be in the country for as long as your visa allows.  WARNING: if you miss your appointment 3 times, you will no longer be able to make appointments, so try your hardest and do whatever you have to do in order to not miss your appointment.  Since I have not applied for my ARC yet, I do not know how long it takes to receive but I have heard that it takes about 3-6 weeks, so go early on.  The immigration office is easy to get around in.  If you're from America though, you will see that it very similar to the DMV and Social Security Office so be prepared to wait.  Although these officers do NOT wait for you so pay attention to the screens displaying the appointment numbers.  When you first walk in to the immigration room, the list of appointments for the day will show your appointment number and time.

UPDATE: You need to take a photo in Korea because the photo required for the ARC is a different size than that of an American passport photo.  Don't worry though, there is a photo booth near the bathrooms in the Heukseok station where you can take your photo and print it out in minutes.  However, some of us may take a little longer taking pictures since it does feel awkward taking your professional photo in a photo booth but that is how it's done here so...yeah.  The cost is 10,000W and you get 8 copies (better to have multiples than not having one when you need it).  At the immigration office there are glue sticks but not scissors.  However, you can bring your own or buy one from the little shop inside the subway.  Check your appointment receipt also for what floor your appointment is on.  Mine was on the first floor (residency for non-Chinese) but the ARC room was on the third floor.  This did not help with the fact that I was already half hour late.

Chung Ang's First CKEP Trip

On September 24th Chung Ang University's international office had their first cultural field trip of the semester.  We Went to a folk village somewhere in Seoul.  They never said where the village was located (my google weather app said I was in Bora-Dong) but it was less than an hour away (in good traffic) and we took a tour bus.  Signing up for this event was very competitive.  There were 150 spots and 250+ international students so...yeah.  Sign ups started at 9am and some students were out of luck because they had class at that time and by 11:45 the list was filled up (from what I heard that day).  One thing your GLAM will stress to you is that in not signing up for the global fair, or signing up for this event and not attending, there will be no chance of you attending future CKEP events (whose sign up list does get smaller and smaller).

At the folk village there were many actors portraying what life would have been like for a Korean living in the Joseon era.  

Here I am taking a rest by a lake.  Around the village there were rest areas where people could just sit around (or nap) after a long hard day.  Only rule was that shoes were not allowed onto the gazebo.  Also, there is a boat behind me.

Here is that boat.  I don't exactly know its purpose but I do know that this was a typical kind of raft for the time period we are supposed to be in.  

Here I was taking a walk through the tunnel of gourds.  Gourds of all different shapes and sizes were dangling above wrapped around an archway and made a tunnel.  It felt nice and cool in there.  Korean mythology states that fairies lived inside gourds but that every now and then there would be a goblin with a mallet or some kind of similar tool ready to pop out and hit you.  

I don't fully understand the purpose of these but they were on a lot of trees and I thought they were interesting looking.  

This was a sign letting people know where certain things were and how far away they were.  You can't see but the words are written in Korean, Chinese, Japanese and English.  

Here is a cow.  There was a man demonstrating what cows were used for back in the day.  It was interesting to see and learn about the cow.  

This is probably a classroom.  The area was tucked away a little and I couldn't see everything well due to a massive hornet trying to bite me.  I had literally enough time to get this shot and run away.  The hornet was so big you, it was about 2/3rds as long as a typical male's index finger and twice as fat.  Therefore, I can't fully say what this room is but it was still pretty cool to see.  

Walking down the main road there were huts like that off on little side roads.  Interesting to see.  The only one i saw was the fortune teller's hut.  Another thing is that some stuff was blocked off due to the current filming of a Korean Drama (but I can't really say which one since I wasn't paying attention to the title on any of the posters I saw hanging everywhere).

Walking towards the eating area in the village I saw this cabbage patch.  I thought it was really cool how they have agriculture here in the village and actually harvest and sell the fruits and vegetables they grow here.  on the other end of the cabbage patch way in the back there in the picture is where the horses are.  That is also where the equestrian martial arts performance is held.  It was pretty cool.  Like cirque de soleil on horses. 

When we first arrived to the village we got to see this.  It was a form of traditional dance (that was fused with a little modern dance for show like break dancing) and was a fun show.  the ribbon dancing was the most mesmerizing.  

Here is a friend of mine getting his picture taken with one of the dancers after the show.  They were really happy to take pictures with the audience and even answered a few questions about the dances they did. 

There were two events we could sign up for to do in the end of the trip: pottery or doll making.  I did pottery but i should have done doll making,  The dolls came out cool looking and a lot of the people I was around during pottery class were really creative.  My piece came out looking like a melted vase with a really sad rose bud in the middle.  Not what I went for originally.  Not even close, but I improvised I guess.  Anyway, this was the outside of the pottery area.  I will have my clay creation mailed to me in a month after its heated and prepared.  

I thought the traditional designs on buildings are really fascinating so I had to stop and take a picture.  The design on the rest area was similar but the ceiling had white, pink and purple lotuses painted on the ceiling 

Upon getting on the bus, the GLAMs will give you this map or something similar.  It is a map of the whole village and where certain things are.  The village looks a little bigger on paper than it felt but there was a lot to see nonetheless.  There were also places to get your picture taken in hanbok if you wanted.  

Eating out in Seoul

In Seoul there are a lot of places to go and enjoy cheap/affordable food, especially around cau.  Below are a few pictures from tonight (09172016) when a Korean friend and I went to get dinner at a restaurant called "Dos Tacos" after a tutoring session.  It was a Mexican restaurant located across the street from the front gate and was identical to Mexican food I used to eat back in the states.  The meals came out to 6,000 won a person (tacos and grapefruit juice).  They don't serve horchata though but I didn't expect them to.  

above is a corona poster I sat next to at Dos Tacos.

On the wall behind the waiter is a sombrero from Mexico.

Behind me is the bar area where you can eat if there are no seats available.  Also where people who come alone to eat are sat.  The windows here give a perfect view of the front gate of Chung Ang University across the street.

Dos Tacos neon logo hanging on the wall next to the sombrero.

The sign right above the food window.  This is where food is served.  When the food is served, the cook puts it on the ledge and blows a whistle or rings a bell for the waiter.

Two ground beef tacos.  I like mine plain.  My friend had never had a taco before so decided to try one with everything in it (lettuce, tomato, beef, cheese,sour cream, and i believe green pepper).

My friend at lotte world waiting for lunch to come.  At Lotte World food is a little more expensive but not by much.  A cheap meal around Seoul can go for around 5,000 won. At Lotte World our meals were 7,000 won and 9,500 won.  The most expensive place there charged 15,500 a person and it was a buffet style restaurant.  

During Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) my friends and I went to the main Palace in Korea and had Japanese food after.  I had spicy udon that was served with green chili pepper seeds and green pepper paste.  Very unexpected, very very spicy but it was great.  This meal was probably my most expensive in my 3 weeks here at 9,500 won.  

One day my friend and I decided to get Lotteria (similar to the Korean version of Sonic) and this is regular sized meal.  The fries have significantly less salt and you can actually taste the potato.  Honestly, it did surprise me the first time I had it.  I paid 4,900 won for this.  

Korean hotpot in Yongsan,  This served four people but there were only three of us eating that day.  It was spicy pork and so good.  it was 11,000 and split between three people it came out to a little more than 3,000 won a person.  

Above is a Korean hot soup (I forgot the name of it) but it was very good.  I believe I paid 6,000 won for this meal.  

On my first night in Seoul, for dinner my friend took me to Hongdae for all you can eat bbq pork (and to help me acclimate faster to avoid waking up with jet lag the next morning).  We had 4 plates of pork belly and a bottle of pepsi.  Pepsi here tastes better imo and the entire thing was 10,000 for two people.  

At Lotte World again.  After a long wait (almost half hour of waiting) we all finally got our food.  Quesadillas for me and one of my friends and for my other friend, she had sausage and Omuraisu (a Japanese omelette stuffed with rice).  That drink is called blue lemonade.  It is supposed to be blueberry flavored.  In Korea lemonade comes in various flavors such as green grape, blueberry, strawberry, peach, grapefruit, citron and more. Lotte World's take on the quesadilla though is that it is 1 part cheese and three parts a varietyof peppers.  The taste was...interesting but also only 7,000 won. 

Another shot from the restaurant in Yongsan where we had the spicy pork hotpot.  My Korean friend was properly cutting apart, mixing and serving us all.  The foods pictured are common side dishes in Korea.  Small foods such as pickled raddish, anchovies, kimchi, and more.  

A lot of foods in Korea are very cheap and easy to find.  A lot of places are alsoopen 24/7.  Most American foods are also open during holidays while everything else is closed.  So far in Korea I have had Taco Bell and Mcdonald's but i have seen many KFCs and Burger Kings as well.  I also saw one Krispy Kreme.  One thing that surprised me was that at Taco Bell the food was cheaper and tasted way better than it does in America.  the taste is more fresh and has more flavor.  There is less salt in everything here and the portions at Taco Bell were the same for the most part.

Transportation in Seoul

The transportation system in Seoul is rated the best in the world and it probably really is.  If you have ever been to San Francisco, then there is a chance you have taken BART.  (I don't know anything about the subway systems in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, etc so I can't speak for them).  The subway system in Seoul is much more reliable, faster and easier than what I have experienced in California.  

First you want to go to the app store on your phone and search for this app.  Despite whatever other transportation app anyone else recommends, I have found this one to be the absolute best and most reliable.  It also does not crash which is a plus.  It is available on android and IOS (I don't know about blackberry market or windows store though).  You also DO NOT need Kakaotalk for this app and the default is in English (at least it was for me).  This app is strictly for the subway though.  

Second, You will want to get one of these.  It is your transit pass and much more.  It is called T-Money and comes in all sorts of design variations (I was at a grocery store the other day for instance, and they had about 6 different T-Money cards themed after the Kakao friends).  You need this to get on the subway and the bus.  Using a T-Money card saves you 100 won on the bus fare so...why not.  You can have one sent to the airport up to a week before you arrive at Incheon if you get it from thearrivalstore.com like I did.  It came with enough money preloaded to get into Seoul with a little left over.  

Third, this picture shows you what certain symbols on the map mean.  The map will also show where things are like palaces and landmarks so that if you want to visit those places, you know where to get off.  

This is what the routes look like.  They are color coded and numbered with names of stops in both English and Korean.  Heuksok is on line 9.  That is the closest stop to cau and is to the left of Dongjak (blue line/line 4).  Line 1 goes in and out of Incheon.  Yongsan has a subway station but if you want to go there, taking the bus is much faster.

This is the settings page.  You can change the language preference here (Korean and English are your only options).  

This is what a route plan looks like.  I put Dongdaemun here as the destination (Dongdaemun has really nice attractions and a really nice outlet mall called Hyundai City Outlets).  Anyway, this is what a normal route plan looks.  Shows you which way to go from your take off, shows you where to transfer and where to get off.  The estimated time has always been accurate in my case.  What you do to get this so press on Heuksok (your starting point.  You will press "from") and then look for where you want to get off, press "to" and this menu will pop up giving you instruction on how to get where you want to go, the cost and ETT. 

This is the menu on the left side if the map.  It is located to the left of the search bar.  In the search bar you can look for stops if you are unsure of the stop name.  

The Dorms

          The dorms at Chung Ang are very different from anything I have seen in America and there are strict rules to living in the dorms.  The way you get into the dorms, the rules and how the actual rooms look are different from what I was used to in San Francisco.
          When I lived in the dorms at San Francisco State University, I lived in like an apartment.  We had a key to the mailbox and a key to the apartment/dorm we lived in.  At Chung we get a sort of key card.  It is a simple blue card.  It has your room number and bed space on it.  (A is to your left when you walk in and B is to your right).  There are two people per room.  What may seem kind of weird at first is the guest rule.  The guest rule is that there are no guests allowed in any of the rooms.  If a guest is caught in a room, both the guest and the host are kicked out.  Chung Ang is big on the protection of privacy.  However, people in the dorms can visit each other's dorms...if they are the same gender.  Men and women are separated by gender.  One half of the building is women and on the other end of the building is men which brings me to how you enter the dorms.
          The way to enter the dorms is by far the weirdest but most interesting thing I have ever seen.  It is a gate that you put your student ID into.  Sounds simple enough.  The weird part though is that after that, you must put your hand into the machine so that it can read your blood through your skin (it doesn't take any skin or blood samples).  If a guy tried to go to the girls' side of the building he wouldn't be recognized on that system.
          The rules to the dorm are simple but somewhat strict.  We can't cook anything in the microwave that will give off a smell (or ramen).  That means no fish, no sweet potatoes, no corn, etc...Curfew is 1am.  The doors to the lobby close at 1am and so do other facilities like the laundry room.  The penalty for coming back to the dorm after curfew (and before 5am) is a loss of 5 points.  There is a point system in the dorms.  We are all given 20 points.  Once we lose those 20 points, we are kicked out.  If we lose some points we can get them back by doing stuff around the building.  The one rule that can get you kicked out on the spot is having guests that don't live in the dorms be in your dorm.  Theft is another rule that can get you kicked out on the spot.  If you are caught stealing from your roommate or another resident, you're done.
        The dorms have little shops, 2 cafeterias, vending machines, a ;laundry room, a computer area, study area, a gym, and an area to hang out and watch tv.  The international students are also separated from the domestic students (an international student will not be paired with a native Korean as a roommate).  International students are paired with roommates from their home countries (in some cases if you are an American you can be paired with a french person who was an international student in America right before arriving at cau, FOR EXAMPLE).  We are also not told who we are rooming with until we meet each other in our rooms while unpacking...
          Below are pictures of my room when I arrived.  The dorms will provide you with a mattress cover and that is it.  If you want to buy bed sheets, you can go to the big E-Mart located in Yongsan.  It is about 10-15 minutes away by bus (bus 151).  The stop will be "Sinyongsan station).  My sheets were on sale for $70 (cheapest set i found after 3 hours of searching the mall).  The bathroom also does not have a door as you can  sort of see in the picture of the shower where I am standing just outside the bathroom (the toilet stall is right next to the shower and the sink is right in the middle.  The doors are frosted glass and tinted a very light blue).  I went to Daiso near the school and bought a shower rod and curtain and used that as a make shift door for privacy.  Buy air freshener as well.
          One final and important thing, your room key card powers your room.  If it is taken out of the power slot, it turns off all the power in the room.  So if one person leaves, the other person should out their key card in the power slot thing so that the power in the room is not turned off.  Because with the power off, nothing charges...

Shower in the bathroom.  The bathroom is set up more western style and the only bathrooms with doors are the handicap styled rooms (which are also a little bigger)

The heater/AC.  It is a lot simpler than it looks.  Push the orange button to turn it on.  the arrows are for whichever way you want the temp to go. 

Cheap Plane Ticket!?!?!?

             Airfare hack: For those of you wanting to save money on airfare, this is probably going to be a life saver (if you don't already know this).  The absolute first thing you want to do is open google chrome.  On google chrome, go to the top right of the page and you will see the three horizontal little lines.  Click that and then click on the option that says "New Incognito Window."  The reason you want to do this is because when you visit a website for plane ticket prices, it is like signing into the page without actually signing in.  Your computer leaves a signature on that page and every time you return to that page, plane ticket prices will have gone up a little bit.  However, when you go incognito, the website doesn't recognize that you have been there before and will therefore keep the ticket prices the same.  Now, what I did was I went on a travel site (I think travelocity.com) but I am not 100% sure.  I don't remember anymore.  However, I do remember that when given the option to compare prices I clicked on every option they provided me.  A lot of windows opened and comparing prices did take time.  Especially since there are two major airports close to my hometown (SMF and SFO).  One thing that makes it cheaper to begin with that i noticed was that if the airport is closer to your destination, the likeliness of the plane ticket being cheaper is slightly higher (since there is a fuel surcharge).  After a few minutes I noticed that SFO had cheaper prices.  I knew that I wanted to leave America in the morning so that I wouldn't have so much jet lag.  For being my first time ever to leave the state (let alone, cross the international dateline) I am glad to say I did not have any jet lag. Anyway, I searched for flights leaving SFO and compared prices among websites and i found my ticket 3 months in advance on cheapfareguru.com and jumped on it.  After traveler's insurance, taxes, surcharge and other fees, my plane ticket came out to $399.98 one way!!!   I flew United Airlines one way and got from San Francisco to Incheon in 10 hours.