Group dinner

Finally the day arrived that we got to do something with all the Koreans in our group, 'our' referring to Mark and me, who are both working in the same office. Initially there was a vote on what we would like to eat and the options were plentiful ranging from pig stomach to Thai food to duck and more. Luckily, duck - my personal preference - turned out to be the winner. We went to a traditional Korean restaurant, which means sitting on the floor and eating from very low tables. Dinner was brilliant. We got four complete, stuffed ducks for all of us along with the usual assortment of side dishes, most of which were really tasty. Afterwards, we hit the bars for a few drinks. Again, sitting on the floor and low tables. Todays drink: rice wine and varieties thereof accompanied by an exciting assortment of side dishes, of course. I personally had rather bad memories from my last visit, but the wine there was quite decent. Not a minute after the drinks arrived, the drinking games started. The clear objective: get the two German students drunk. Luckily, we can hold ourselves reasonably well and did quite alright in some of the games, too. Nonetheless, we certainly had a few drinks more than most Koreans. Nonetheless it was over too quickly and most decided to go home, about to leave me a tad disappointed that it was only 9 pm and I had been really enjoying the evening. But then luckily, four of them decided to ask us to join them for Karaoke. So off we went. The Karaoke bar featured multiple little rooms with comfortable sofas, multiple tv screens - one of them showing a music video and the lyrics, one the olympic games - and comfortable sofas. It came as it had to and we were absolutely amazed by the skill with which all the Koreans were singing. No matter whether lyrics were Korean or English. Luckily, we were drunk enough to dare to sing anyways, but I'm still afraid that after 'self esteem', 'paint it black', 'my way' and more we caused quite a bit of pain to our host. Although, not nearly as much as some of the people singing in the other rooms caused me on the way to the bathroom ;-)
All in all, the first evening with the group turned out to be lots of fun and I hope there will be more to come...