Lunar New Year 2014: My first time… in Seoul - Part II

Five glorious stories of retail therapy.

After a low-key Thursday night we woke up to a chilly but bright morning. Our first stop was Sinsa-Dong for some shopping. To our disappointment the usually bustling streets were eerily empty. We probably shouldn't have been surprised since it was new year's day, but luckily my two top spots to visit, Forever 21 and H&M were open.
After spending three months in Korea with not one clothing purchase, and pardon the cliche,  I felt like a kid in a candy store.

Before we dug in to the tomato creme brûlée.

Once we decided our bank accounts had taken enough of a beating we went on a quick perusal for something to eat. One of the few restaurants open was Celeb de TOMATO, a quirky restaurant where 90 percent of the menu involved some sort of tomato ingredient. We ended up splitting a tomato salad, which was an assortment of red, orange and yellow tomatoes of varying sizes, a mushroom and gorgonzola pizza and tomato creme brûlée. The hints of tomato were subtle enough to be noticeable but didn't overpower the rest of the creme brûlée. With full stomachs and significantly lighter wallets we took the subway back to our hotel for some downtime while waiting for our friend Katelyn to arrive.

About 10:30 p.m. Friday we arrived again in Itaewon. There weren't many places still open for dinner, so we tried our luck at Hollywood Bar and Grill, a Western-style sports bar with lots of the usual pub fare, soccer games playing on a big-screen television, a foosball table, a menagerie of United Kingdom accents and a lengthy apple-themed cocktail menu. I ordered an apple pie, which consisted of two shots of vodka, apple corn and cinnamon in a rocks glass. It was strong and although it didn't quite resemble the taste of an apple pie, was surprisingly tasty. 

After leaving Hollywood Bar and Grill we went on a search for Latin club Caliente. After frustratingly walking up and down the same street while hearing the distant beats of Latin music somewhere in one of the nearby buildings, we took our chances and discovered that the club we were looking for turned out to be a BBQ-style bar that also happened to play Latin music on Friday nights. The vibe was pretty casual so after about an hour we decided to try our luck at one more bar. 

Which brings me to International Club. In retrospect I have no idea why we decided to come here. The place was huge, with blaring techno, garish, old-fashioned couches bordering an extensive dance floor, and what one of my friends described as a place where black market organ transactions might go down.  Within minutes two middle-aged Korean men approached our table and began speaking to my friends. They seemed innocent enough. One of the particularly sloshed men kept clinking glasses with everyone at the tableshouting "happy new year!"

 A towering Nigerian man sauntered up from the dance floor and started chatting me up. Long story short, apparently I insulted his honor by letting him know I wasn't interested and all of a sudden the lights in the club switched on as some sort of fight appeared to be breaking out. Before I knew it, my friends and I were flying down the steps out of the club to find a club and  make our way back to Hongdae. The lesson of this evening: Itaewon is great fun during the day, but once the sun sets certain parts can become a little sketchy by Korean standards.