Halloween Edition/ Korean Style

So, I'd like to start this entry by pointing out that I do not believe it is already November, I believe it's a giant conspiracy to confuse me; the conspirators even did a good making it feel like November outside this morning. Anyway, as everyone knows, this past weekend was Halloween and I was lucky enough to spend it here in Korea with some pretty cool people. I started off the weekend hanging with the crew in Hanam. I met Glendon, Andy, Braden, etc over at Bertus's apt where they were getting ready to play some poker. I should have joined them as I've been dying to play cards lately but I wasn't planning on staying out to long as I had the 10k to run at 9 in the am. I ended up staying later than desired before heading over to Glendon's to put my Halloween costume together!

After walking over to G's apt I start getting everything out to make my costumer, which is the cover of the Office Space movie in which a guy is completely covered in post it notes. The best part of the costume is that even if people don't know the movie (Shame on you), they still enjoy writing on the post it notes. Now the secret with this outfit if you truly want it to be a success is that you have to take the time and glue the post it notes on. I'm guessing you can also use super glue but I like using a hot glue gun. I had picked up a HGG and glue sticks on the way in to town and was set. However, after turning on the gun to get it heated up I realized I had purchased the wrong size glue sticks, they were way too large. I tried trimming them down and pushing them through the tube with no luck. After a bit I finally realized I could just cut the glue into small pieces and simply stick it on the post it note and apply the gun to it and get the desired effect. This ended up working to perfection, but it took much longer than if I'd bought the correct sticks/gun.

Glendon got home around the time I was finishing up the pants, around 4am, so much for going to bed early so I could get some rest for the race. After finishing the outfit, I sat around and chatted with G for a while and ended up not going to sleep until around 5:30 and needed to get up around 6:15 so I could catch the bus and hop on the subway and get all the way over to the World Cup Stadium where some Chingu's and I would be running a 10k at 9am. I had the same initial feeling when I woke up that I had when I ran the DMZ 10k, Holy Crap I should have slept more. I made my way over to the Stadium and ended up getting there in great time, about 8:15, more than enough time to get loose and chat with everyone. Many of my friends were running with their costumes on and it was quite hilarious. I don't think I could have run in mine if I wanted to and I really wanted to put in a good time.

Received a surprise before the race as well, as the hoodies we all ordered for our running team "Team Dirt" (Yes, I know, appropriate) had actually come in. Yes, I now have two coats for the winner, sweet! Ok, so after getting the hoodie and stretching we headed over to the start of the race. Now, I've not run a ton of races but I have run several now and most are the same: Mapped off fairly well, blocked off, etc. This race wasn't too hard to navigate but definitely interesting and there were people walking, biking, and driving where we were running. I nearly ran into a dump truck as I rounded the corner at the 5k mark. The first half of the race was not the most enjoyable as I was paying for bending over for several hours making my outfit, my back was killing me. Thankfully it subsided about half way through and I ended up finishing the race in a very respectable 53:23.

I stayed around for a bit after running the race and talked with those around but I had to head out shortly thereafter to head to Jongakk station for my dentist appointment. I hated to leave everyone as we were having pot luck at noon, but I knew I'd be back before too long and hopped on the subway. After my appointment I walked across the street and stopped in Subway. I've really been crazy subway here lately and I thought I had just ran a 10k and been to the dentist all before noon, let's do it. Plus with the festivities to follow I knew some bread in the stomach would not be a bad idea. Afterwards I jumped back on the subway and met back up with the crew in front of the stadium. They had already begun in the festivities and everyone now had on their costumes. We had a guy as a French Maid, my friend Andrew who is a big guy like me as a slutty high school girl, as well as a Wolf, John Lennon, Lobsters, Scream mask, a couple giraffes, a pirate, pippy longstockings, a turtle,twin fairies, and of course Post It Note. The looks of people, especially the Koreans, when i first put on my outfit was AWESOME, they didn't know what to think. I must point out now that Korea does not celebrate Halloween, so all of our costumes were especially intriguing to them.

It was a great time, as we sipped on Makeli, took shots of Soju, Soju cocktail, and drank a few beers. We had a great time hanging out with everyone in the area and of course were asked for a slew of pictures as people were shocked by our outfits; did I mention there were twin fairies (Males)! Towards the evening we packed up shop and headed for Hongdae, one of the big foreigner spots in Seoul. It was dinner time and we all definitely needed to grab some food before starting the night time activities. While heading to the restaurant, Pippy and I got lost and were standing in front of another establishment that simply has a clear plastic outside wall and everyone was staring at us, YES! Pippy was not a fan of this but I thought it was funny. Finally we found our party and chowed on some food before heading to GoGo's bar. GoGo's is a pretty cool bar and we had a great time and ran into lots of other characters and my outfit continued to get signed there as well.

After getting our feel of GoGo's we hopped outside and decided to stop at Zen Bar, which is one of my fav bars in Hongdae. It has a pretty good atmosphere and it has decent amount of room. The only thing that really stunk about Zen this night is that it ran out of beer! Around 4:30 it seems I was finished for the night, um, morning. As I walk outside I hear someone yelling my name and I turn around and it's my friend Roz. I'm glad I ran into her as the Subway didn't start for another hour so we just sat down and watched everyone as they slowly drug themselves out of the bars and like us waited around for the subway. Once the subway started we walked down to the station and I had a problem. I couldn't remember where I had left my stuff. Luckily it only took me a short time before I found it and was on the way home. I must have enjoyed myself the past almost 24 hours because I was suppose to go about 15 stops on the subway and apparently I fell asleep and had already went one full loop on the 2 line and was near where I had started, lol. Needless to say this revelation helped me stay awake and make sure I got off at my stop this time. Once I found my stop I made my way onto the express bus and Ildong.

I'd have to say this was a great Halloween. I'm very happy that I chose the costume I did as it was a huge hit and allowed me the opportunity to talk to people of all ages throughout the day and I enjoyed having little ones and older ones alike sign my outfit. All in all, it was an AWESOME halloween. I hope yours was just as great!