Now that I'm back in New York after my week-long visit to Seoul (my first since leaving last August), the whole trip really seems like a dream. Maybe it's the jetlag talking but I guess I've become so used to living in NY that being in Seoul seems unreal. Towards the end of the week I observed on more than one occassion that it's too hard to visit Seoul because I still want to live there; I didn't really have that feeling when I visited Boston and London after having lived in those cities. So maybe I wasn't quite "finished" with Seoul when I left.

On my first morning back in Seoul, I went for a long walk and realized that I still felt totally comfortable there. Although I kept forgetting that you need your ticket to get off the subway (which is not true in NY), just about everything else about being there seemed second nature to me. I still remembered all the little tricks and the locations of all of my favorite places. Even when I saw my friends, it was like I had never really "left"; I just hadn't seen them in a while.

Here are the day-by-day accounts:
On Monday I went to visit my friends at The Princeton Review. Believe it or not, TPR let me stay in one of their apartments for the week, and I didn't even have to do any work (though I offered to train new teachers on multiple occassions). I had lunch with Ina and my friend So Young, and then hung out in a cafe that Ina and I used to visit quite frequently in the trendy neighborhood of Apgujeong. Afterwards, it was time for my super-gigantic "welcome back party" at Platinum Microbrewery, which is probably my favorite bar in Seoul. Not coincidentally, it was the location of one of my going-away parties (yes, there were more than one) and, just like on that night, pretty much all of my friends showed up. Everyone was really happy to see me and to see each other, because a lot of my friends have left TPR and have lost touch with each other, so the evening sort of felt like a reunion. Although the Belgian White beer wasn't quite as good as I remember it, that didn't stop me from consuming more than my share. Afterwards, Caroline (my "little sister") and Barmak (my replacement at TPR) and I went to Sauna International, which was sort of our "secret bar" in the past. Not only did the owner remember me, but he even remembered what kind of music I like. It's nice to be remembered.

I was feeling a bit rough on Tuesday morning and slept in. Then I went to the traditional neighborhood called Insadong for lunch with So Young, and then explored the nearby Jong-no area, only to find out that the Ben & Jerry's shop there is no more. So some things do change, I guess. Then my friend Jae Woo took me on a little tour of his neighborhood, including a stop by the Blue House, which is the Korean equivalent of the White House. We hung out with his dog (who had just had puppies a week or so before) and then I went to Apgujeong to meet my friends Caroline, Sue, and Judie. We had "American style" sushi and then went to the Rock & Roll Bar for a quick drink before calling it an early night.

Wednesday was Dunkin Donuts day. As most of my friends from Korea know, there is a Dunkin Donuts near The Princeton Review, and I loved sitting on their outside deck and watching the world go by. I probably spent about four hours there on Wednesday, visiting with various TPR teachers and hearing all of the gossip that I had missed over the past nine months. That night I went with a number of TPR teachers to O'Kim's, which is a German-style microbrewery in the big shopping mall. It was exactly as I remembered it: good beer but too noisy and too hot. It seemed like the house band changed every few weeks when I was living in Seoul, and this one probably won't last too long. In fact, we had quite a debate as to whether the "girl" who was the lead singer was actually a man or a woman. It was definitely arguable. Afterwards, Caroline and Barmak and I went to a bar called "BTB: Better than Beer." The sign outside read something like "cold beer, good food, and beergirls." Well, how could we resist "beergirls"? We went in expecting something like Hooters but there were, in fact, no beergirls at all. Just a bunch of salarymen. So we went to The Flair. My relationship with that bar is too complicated to explain here, but I guess we went just for old times' sake.

I was looking forward to Thursday because that was opening day of "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" in Korea. I had seen it the previous Thursday in New York and was excited about seeing it on opening day in two countries. So Young and I went to see it and it wasn't as good the second time as it was the first, but I still enjoyed it. Afterwards I had dinner with Ina and Sue, took Ina back to her parents' house (she had been suffering from jetlag all week) and then met Caroline and Barmak at a bar called Jjokki Jjokki near TPR. It's a pretty standard-issue Korean "hof" but they have outdoor seating, which is always a plus.

Friday was Barmak's day off so we hung out, had lunch at a Turkish restaurant (go figure), went to Ben & Jerry's, and did some shopping. That night we met with Sue, So Young, and Jae Woo in the foreigner/tourist neighborhood of Itaewon. I suspect that none of those friends would ever go there without me or Barmak, because Koreans typically don't go there, but my friends always seemed at least interested, if not fascinated, at the prospect of going there on a Friday night. I think by this time everyone (except for me) was tiring of the same old "sitting in a bar and talking" routine, so we sought out some extra entertainment and wound up at All That Jazz, which I believe is Seoul's oldest jazz club. There were surprisingly few foreigners in there but the music was really good and we all had a great time. Afterwards, Caroline joined us and we went to the Three Alley Pub, scene of many (in-)famous nights out.

On Saturday it was definitely starting to feel like summer, although I know very well that it will get a lot hotter there (which is why I visited in May and not July!). Ina and I went to Apgujeong for lunch and then we met her roommate from Chicago and her roommate's friend. The four of us did a little shopping and then went to a Korean bbq restaurant. This particular type of bbq (called "sam-gyeop-sal") is probably my favorite type of Korean food and I was quite excited about it. After having one round of the "normal" style, we decided to crank it up a notch and get the "spicy" one. It is well documented that I don't like spicy food that much, but I was outvoted 3-1 and I am trying to get used to it because Ina likes it so much. But this one wasn't just spicy; it was like nuclear meltdown spicy. Even Ina and her roommate (who is Korean) admitted that it was really spicy. I figured that I would "endure" and just choke it down, but it was pretty rough. I tried to wash it down with soju, the evil Korean liquor that I really hate, but that just made it worse. I survived, though. Late that night, my good friend Eric arrived in Seoul for his fourth tour of duty in the TPR summer program. This time he brought his wife, Apple, and it was the first time we had the chance to meet her. Unfortunately the airline lost their luggage but they seemed to be in good spirits.

By the time Sunday rolled around, it was so hard to believe that my visit was almost over. I went with Barmak, Eric, and Apple to the Doosan Bears baseball game. They are the team that I support in Korea but I used to call them the "Bad News Doosan Bears" because they were really bad over the past two years. This year they are a lot better and they were winning 4-0 after one inning and 5-1 after two. However, it was all downhill from there and they ended up losing 9-7. Oh well. We did get to see a bench-clearing brawl, though, which is pretty rare in Korean baseball. After washing up, it was time for my going-away gathering at (where else?) Platinum. With a few exceptions, all of my friends stopped in to say "good bye", though I guess there wasn't the same amount of sadness as when I left last summer, because everyone knows that I'll probably be back sometime soon.

Ah yes, there is the question that came up like, a million times? Will I ever move back to Seoul? I guess I would like to, but I don't think I want to teach English anymore. I would, however, love to teach in another capacity, and I've heard that some Korean universities hire teachers with American PhDs to teach subjects (like computer science) in English. I don't know whether that will really happen, but I guess it's an option. I would really like to visit again at Christmas, but more likely my next visit would be a year from now. That seems like a really long time, but if the next year goes by as fast as the past week did, I should be drinking beers at Platinum before I know it.

And of course, there are pictures and even more pictures!!