Eventful Weekend Time #6

Here's Conan the bartender playing with fire:It was someone's birthday on Friday and as a present they got to see Conan juggle and do bar tricks with fire. It was definitely pretty cool, but it would not be the last time this weekend I'd see bartenders with a secret arson fetish.

Friday night was begun with a group of us going to Tacoholic, a newly opened Mexican restaurant that is actually pretty good, although you wouldn't know it when you get your chips and salsa. Potato chips with a duck sauce concoction is not authentic Mexican. Sorry, boys. Anyway, the night's proceedings are a little blurry at this point for obvious reasons, but I do remember going to a club and asking someone to marry me. Also, urinating in a stairwell is still not OK, Korea.

On Saturday, I took the KTX to Daejeon. Another notch on the Korean city belt. My reasoning was to visit my orientation roommate and go see our respective teams, the Daegu Samsung Lions and the Daejeon Hanwha Eagles duke it out in a pretty epic baseball match. Before I get into that, I want to talk to you for a second about the KTX TV. In each car, there are about 4 TVs overhead that show some really strange stuff. I gather that it's some kind of "news" station, but the "news" that they show would be worthy of a knock off Korean Willard Scott. First, I got to see interviews with Amurrica's finest citizens about racing riding mowers. These folks are so determined that they'll even race when it's raining and they get covered in mud. Ah, what great exports we bring to the Land of the Morning Calm. Then, it switched to somewhere in Austria where a guy dressed in a Spongebob Squarepants foam outfit did a ski jump into a pool of water. Then some guys took a truck down the ski jump and it, surprisingly, fell straight into the pool like a giant truck would naturally do. Finally, there was a segment on some dude making what may have been the world's longest noodles. He just kept stretching them out in this warehouse.

So, baseball.

You've already noticed that Samsung has put their label on something else. Beyond that, we had a beautiful day for a great game of baseball. My team, the Lions, eventually lost, but the score was 11-9 when all was said and done. There was a grandslam involved (no, not from Denny's), a pickle, a few game changing errors, and lots of really enthusiastic fans. They even have cheerleaders who cheer constantly. Those football cheerleaders are wusses compared to these girls. One of the highlights was when I found out they had those greasy, nasty french fries that you get at sporting events in Amurrica. Felt like home.

Afterwards, we hit the downtown area of Daejeon with the crowd we met at the game, and enjoyed some pretty spot on Italian food. I know, I'm eating Mexican and Italian food in Korea. What's wrong with me? Well, you know what, damn it, I eat Korean food every weekday. Weekends are my time. Just let me enjoy them.

We then popped my live bar band in Korea cherry at The Yellow Taxi. It was really actually kind of cool. You know how usually bar bands are. Well, imagine if you will, three university students just tearing up the jazz like they were majoring in it. The pianists fingers were dancing, to use a cliched phrase, the drummer was hoppin', and the bass player tore it up right. It was different, but it created a really mellow atmosphere that was only ruined when we spotted this sign across the street:
Look closely and you can see the man's bait and tackle and the woman's dirty pillows. Korea, subtlety is not one of your charms. I'm not sure what goes on in this bar, but it certainly catches your attention. Marketing at its best. I saw the second fire breathing bartender afterward and eventually ended the night approximately when it should have ended. You know how some nights can go on for an hour or two too long and other nights you wish you had stayed out. This one was timed well.

The KTX ride home today was highlighted by the guy next to me. He was trying to sleep, but like clockwork, every five seconds he would nod off and catch himself and then straighten up. He did this forever. What I don't understand is why he didn't just adjust himself so he could rest his head stably somewhere. People are strange when you're a stranger. I never look forward to school tomorrow. Oh, well, Monday's gotta come some time, right?