Tuesday, August 4, 2009

This morning I had another traditional Korean breakfast in the cafeteria, which consisted of spicy kimche, cabbage salad (sweet), seaweed and carrot salad, white rice, miso soup with jalepenos (Koreans love their spicy food) and these unidentifiable brown balls. They looked like large, brown olives and were in some sort of brown sauce, yet they were soft, almost like a hard boiled egg. The inside seemed to be some sort of bean paste. They were slightly sweet and I liked them.

We had class again in the morning and spent a lot of time working on group projects and doing research for our first paper, which is due in two days. After class we tried the cafeteria in the Student Union. They had a few differerent choices of meals and you paid a cashier for whatever meal you wanted and then brought your ticket to the appropriate counter. I had noodles with a sweet black bean sauce and a side of rice and a sweet, yellow vegetable that I think is pickled beets. I then got a Korean version of a drumstick ice cream cone for dessert.

After lunch we toured the Yonsei University Library, which opened a new building a few months ago. It was similar to the National Digital Library in that they had a ton of fancy new computers, touch screen kiosks to make seat reservations and search the catalog, lots of open space, huge, glass walls, and lots of atriums and plants inside. They also had a recording studio and a movie viewing room. We'll be able to get temporary library IDs so I can go back and explore more soon.

After the tour a few of us walked around the neighborhood near the university. I eyed all the shoe stores again. I need to ask my korean classmates how the shoe sizes work here so I can buy some. We also walked around the food court and grocery store in the basement of the Hyundai Department Store (like a Nordstrom). It was huge and they had a ton of employees organizing everything and giving out free samples. We ate dinner at a Japanese restaurant, for a change, and I got some sushi and noodles. Kate got an unidentifiable meat in a tomato sauce that we concluded was some sort of sausage.

We took a cab back to our dorm so we didn't have to walk up the hill after dinner. I just finished working on my paper a little and soon it will be bedtime. Until tomorrow!