brain, shopping, climbing

I'm not sure if it is the lack of humidity in my room, that I'm not drinking enough water, that the ramyeon I had for lunch yesterday was loaded with MSG, or if Korean alcohol breaks my brain. It well may be a combination of all of the above, because there was no way that the amount of booze I drank should make my head feel the way it did in the middle of the night last night.

Lots of things are still closed down here. Some friends went for a never-ending hike yesterday (which, when recounted, was actually described as "Jess's version of Hell on Earth") and are going ice climbing today. ICE CLIMBING. HIKING. In 12 degree weather. People are crazy.

And speaking of crazy, it looks like we will be climbing at O2 on Saturday, which is nice and indoors and awesome. A few days ago I climbed at one of the local bouldering gyms, and it was great to see some of the stuff I was working on in Vietnam has stuck - thinking more, staying calm, better footwork - and so I'm psyched to try some vertical things this weekend.

Tuesday I went to a HUGE market for all things craft-related. Like, six stories of yarn, fabric, beads, any sort of frippery you could imagine, purse handles, zippers - EVERYTHING. Tons and tons of vendors. Any bobble or bangle your heart could desire. And most of the stalls were closed because of the holiday. I'll be heading back next week, as I have heard stories of Addi turbos for $5.00, and I'm willing to use a lot of bad Korean, smiling, and charades in order to find them in the maze of shops. Walking through the stalls, it was SO AMAZING - people were nice, but they left me alone to look. After being in other Southeast Asian countries where a series of shops like that would have been staffed by people who were hawking and begging me to buy things, it was really, really nice.

I wish more things were open - I might be going to the National Museum this afternoon for a "new year/calligraphy" class, and I will probably camp in a coffee shop for a while to study, basically as a means to get out a little bit.