A Cute Kitty and Never-Ending Musicals

2 weeks have past since the day I went to the Hello Kitty Cafe, and I am now finally making a post about it! It's been hard to stay on top of this! I hope I become more successful in the future. Anyways, without any further ado, here is the pretty Kitty!

We went to the Hello Kitty Cafe in Sinchon (there are others around Seoul). It is one of the cutest things I have ever seen! I thought that it was going to be extremely overpriced, but I was okay with that because it was more about the experience than the coffee. But to my surprise, it was extremely well-priced! Here are some pics!

Wallpaper. 

Hello Kitty-shaped hole in the wall!

Cute seats. 

Upstairs. 

Choco-banana waffles and yummy drinks. 

So freakin cute. 

Hello Kitty family. 

]

HK knows what's up. 

I WANTED TO TAKE IT HOME WITH ME. 

That night, we went to see the musical 궁 (Goong). It was based on a K-drama from a few years back. The lead actor the night that we went was Kim Kyu Jong, a member of the K-Pop boy group SS501. It was such a good show! The singers were amazing and it was super funny. I was so excited when I could actually understand some of what they were saying. Korean language class is paying off! Here are some pics!

Before the show. It was held at Yong Theater, inside the National Museum of Korea. 

Namsan in the background. 

Fans are intense. So many flowers for the cast! And all of that rice is donated to charity. 

Being a freak. 

Final bows. 

In other news, I have found a new favorite coffee drink. It can only be found at Beans and Berries, a chain over here. It is called a Blueberry latte. I am in love with it! It tastes like melted blueberry ice cream. Delicious!

Yesterday we went to see another musical, Winter Sonata. You may wonder why and how I go to so many musicals. My study abroad program has this thing called Cultural Reimbursement, where if an activity is related to Korea/Korean society/culture in some way, we can get fully reimbursed. So my friends and I have been going to a lot of things! This musical was based off of a K-drama with the same name that came out in 2002. It is one of the most popular K-dramas of all time. I have never watched it, but I plan to. The play was great! We were actually in the very front row! However, the front row was EXTREMELY CLOSE TO THE STAGE. As in, we could reach our hand out and touch it. Sometimes it felt as though the actors were standing on top of us. But the acting and singing was amazing!

The set. So pretty!

We are going to another musical tomorrow night, Temptation of Wolves. It is supposed to be really good! I'm excited!

I will leave you with a few pictures that I took of the Yonsei campus last week during a morning walk. Talk to you soon!

Walkin through the woods. 

So pretty!

Samsung Digital Library. 

TTFN!

Hails 

Sunday, with a Definite Chance of RAIN

It's Raining, It's Pouring..........

The day after YonKo Jeon was an epic day to say the least. Nearly a month after buying our tickets, it was time to go see Rain.

I had heard that they were really strict about not letting people take pictures at the concert, so I didn't bring my good camera with me. It turns out, however, that they didn't care AT ALL. So I attempted to capture epicness on my cell phone and iPod. I tried to get the best quality of photos and video, but neither device wanted to zoom for me. But here is the best that I was able to take.

Waiting for the concert to start.

The stage.

Epicness.

It is mandatory for all men in Korea to enlist in the army by the age of 30. As Rain is nearly 30, it's time for him to go! This was his very last stadium concert for the next 2 years. He is having a free concert in Gangnam tomorrow (on a bridge?) so I might also go to that. Then it's off to the army on Tuesday.

If any of you have seen Ninja Assassin, he plays the main guy Raizo. Rain is pretty much a world star! He is an extremely famous Hallyu star in Korea and has over the course of his nearly 10-year career done acting, singing and more. His voice was really good live! And he's an excellent dancer of course.

One of the funny things was the amount of older women there. They were everywhere! Rain is what I would call a nuna (누나, a woman who is older than a man) killer. The older ladies LOVE HIM. Check out this photo that he and his dancers took at the end of the concert. Look at the ladies in the front row. Hehe.

I thought that the concert was never going to end. As most/all performers, they say goodbye, leave the stage, everyone yells "encore" (although here they pronounce it "ancore!") and then they come back out and perform some more. Rain did this, but like 3 or 4 times! It was a big deal because it was his last concert for a really long time and he was saying goodbye to his fans. He even cried.

The third or fourth time he came back out. Haha. Some people had left because they thought it was already over.

Seeing as how this concert was a huge deal to Rain, we knew that there had to be other famous people in attendance. We saw some people being escorted by bodyguards to their seats, so we knew they were famous! Kim Tae Woo was one of them. There were also 3 or 4 younger guys sitting in the same section. Although they were pretty far away, I thought they looked like a few members from the band BEAST. Later, I found out that they were. I was proud of my K-Pop star recognition skills. :D

This was my attempt to get a picture of BEAST. iPod zoom FAIL.

My next post will be about a certain special cat and a musical. Stay tuned!

Hails