Ulsan, Korea

One hour flight from Dalian to Seoul, 40 minute bus ride to change airports in Seoul, one hour flight from Seoul to Ulsan, then a short taxi ride, and I arrived at my hotel. It was a seemingly uneventful Wednesday night, until you realize that my summer roommate from Wrigleyville is also in Ulsan. For those of you who don't know, Matt is/was/forever will be the main driving force to staying out late and drinking in any situation, no matter the country. This is Matt, affectionately called Woj, occasionally called drunk asshole, steyl-master, or hey Vinny. He put this picture on my door and I left it there until I checked out. I have no idea what the hotel staff thought about this bizarre, yet savvy move.

Lucky for me Matt had already scoped out the bar scene in Ulsan, which is actually a pretty nice city with a lot of industry. After meeting Chief Mezera and teaming up with him and fellow coworker, Alex, our group of 4 went out for dinner. A night of Maekju and Soju commenced that ended with a karaoke bar at 3am. This led to possibly the most uneventful first day on-site ever on Thursday. Stringing this together with a 5:30am debacle on Friday, and I had a good first week in Korea.

Ulsan Pictures

The food here is a bit of a guessing game. I mean, it's going to be spicy; you don't have to guess about that. The Korean BBQ is really good, lots of good meat, and a lot of food with good flavor. I just never liked spicy food too much, particularly kimchi. Kimchi is aged (rotten) cabbage in some sort of spicy chili bean weird pasty sauce that is applied to a lot of foods. I happen to think it's one of the most disgusting things I have ever eaten, but that's just me. Good thing it is served as a side every single day. Mezera has adopted the habit of taking one piece everyday and then never touching it. Woj insists that it is an acquired taste, so he gets a piece everyday and forces himself to eat it first while he is still hungry. I doubt he has gotten any closer to acquiring this taste. I like to try everything once and follow it up with "That's the last bite of that I'll ever take."

Bitter Kimchi Face

To get an idea of what kimchi is, as well as the hilarity surrounding this food, watch the following youtube clips.

Korean Kimchi
Kimchi Burger

Another rookie mistake I made was in purchasing toothpaste. The toothpaste said "Cool Green." Sounds like a minty blast of freshness, no? Guess what? It has the flavor of green tea. That's not a good toothpaste flavor just to let you know.

Hands down, best part about Korea...Jewelry. Jewelry is a pop band with some jams. Sure I have no idea what they are saying, but they are sexy and some of their refrains are in English. Check another youtube clip here to see what I'm talking about. Jewelry - One More Time Try to go out for 15 minutes without hearing this song. You can't.

Oh, I didn't mention that we found a bar called Purple Haze near the university with a beer pong table and occasional tournaments. I was not there for a tourney, but we crushed some people in the bar a couple times. Check my pictures to see more.

This is an intense stare down at a karaoke bar. Like two suitcases. JACKED! I think I won this round. My face is more serious.

I hate to incorporate work into my writings, but the irony is funny to me. My company specifies a 150mm insertion depth of thermocouples into vessels, but the Koreans accept 75mm. If you aren't very good with metric dimensions, I'll just put it this way: Americans require at least 6" of insertion, but the Koreans are satisfied with 3". Booyah!!! Walking into the men's locker room at the hotel gym is like venturing into a field of baby carrots. Booyakashaaa!!!

I have to head to Japan for a short job now, but hopefully I will return to Korea. Woj is supposed to be in Ulsan until Fall, so if I can come back we can have more 'who's more jacked' contests.