I'll take Island Life for 100, Alex - Jeju-do, Day 1

Last weekend, my posse (Romi, Dale, Denise) went to Jeju Island. Its a small island off the south coast of Korea. Its like the Hawaii of Korea. The flight there was an hour. I was soooooooo excited to visit this place because I had heard so many great things. I also really wanted a tan, and to swim in the ocean. The weather forecast said rain all weekend, but I kept up my hopes. Every vacation I have been on while here (North Korea, Japan, China, Muiido, Busan) have been really cold and/or rainy. My expectations weren't really too high.

We left early early Saturday morning. I didn't sleep the night before because I had to meet Denise at 5am anyway. I slept on the flight but woke up while the plan was making its first approach at the airport. The wind and rain were so ferocious that they had go back up and re-attempt the landing. During the loop back around to the airport, we experienced the worst turbulence I've ever been through in my life. I've flown enough to make that statement. It was actually scary and my mind raced back to news about the last plane crash I could remember. In the mean time, Denise was sitting next to me with he head between her knees and barfing into a bag. She filled one and then started on the second. I never ever get motion sickness and I alsmost (almost) felt sick myself.

Once we got on the ground, it was ok. Denise still looked green. We got in a cab and headed to our hostel. The rains were coming down so hard I think Noah was about to make a comeback. We got to the hostel and I fell asleep right away for about an hour. This was 8.30 in the morning by the way so we had already had quite a big day. Mostly I wanted to wait out the rain a little. Romi wanted to get out and do stuff, which was good because I probably would have slept all day otherwise. So we went to the "#1 tourist attraction" on Jeju. It was a shrine with some holes in a grassy field. It was also monsoon raining. My shorts were SOAKED right through within 15 minutes of being outside. Truly, it was as if I had gone swimming in them.
We went for lunch after that. We went to a department store that was supposed to have a good food court. It didn't.

As an aside story, before this vacation I had developed a bladder infection from being on antibiotics from the last time I had bronchitis. Following me? I tried to rid it with cranberry juice and it worked for one day. But by the time we got to Jeju, I had to do something. I went to a pharmacy in the department store. No one spoke any english (usually pharamcists speak english because they are very highly educated), so I whipped out my cel phone and opened up the english/korean dictionary. I looked up BLADDER and then Dale used his phone to look up INFECTION. We showed both phones to the pharmacist but they just looked from one to the other, back to the first one. We ended up mimming the action of what was hurting and finally they got what we were trying to tell him. I got some meds and we were on our way.

We got some noodles for lunch and then went to a sauna, the naked kind. As it was raining that hard, there was nothing else for us to do. Our clothes were soaked, we were tired and hella cranky. Dale and Romi had never been to one before. So Dale went off on his own to the male one and we went to the female one. It was perfect. We warmed up, showered, dried our clothes, had some snacks, got a foot massage, had a nap, went into a steam room. All for $9.

That night, we went to meet a friend that Dale went to high school with. Her name is Stephanie and we all hit it off. She's only been in Korea for one month, but she sure is smart to pick Jeju to live.

Our activity for the evening was Jeju Love Land. This is an outdoor adult themed art park. Its just what I said. There are statues and pictures and sculptures of people doing it. Doing it alone, with someone else, with a few other people. You name it, this park had it. It wasn't gross though, it was very well done. I guess some art students from Seoul came up with this idea and the only place that it was ok to build it was on Jeju. Koreans are not the most sexually liberated people. So to the island it goes!

That night we drank at Stephanie's house and then went to a foreigner bar called the Blue Aguava. It was seedy. We got drunk and then we to McDonalds.