looks like korea

but it's not. reminders of what i'm missing:

at first, it just said 'kyochon: coming soon' and now they've put up a wall that explicitly states what was my worst fear: it won't be until january! you can be sure though that i'll be there opening night for my fill of fried chicken and draft beer.



paris baguette? nope. just a furniture store across from my gym.



jae hyun and i often frequent 'new york kom tang' because they are celebrating their thirtieth anniversary. so we eat delicious food for a mere $5.99, considering the panjan are like free appetizers and it's all healthy. i only hope come january they can be celebrating their thirty-first anniversary with another great deal.

introducing

my korean tutor, mr. jae hyun kim. since i meet him everyday and therefore struggle to find topics to talk about, our conversations sometimes are a bit mundane. however, with a million dollars at stake, i wouldn't hesitate to use him as your lifeline to find out any information about me because by now, he knows it all. well, almost.


happily smoking outside of starbucks.


giving me a natural smile. fun fact: he usually ruins his photos with his fake smiles. nice to know i caught him in the right moment.

cawfee

when it comes to roasting coffee at home, i want something good. in seoul, i had a favorite brand that was sold at homeplus and marketed as fair trade, hence why i bought it. but it actually turned out to be delicious too!

so, that being said, i was a little bit worried coming back to nyc. not for fear that i wouldn't be able to find another that was traded fairly, but because i didn't want to buy some beans that weren't delicious.

however, my first purchase has fortunately won me over. the bag describes these beans as leaving a buttery aftertaste and that couldn't be more true. they have a very warm taste to them which is what i love most. i highly recommend them.

introducing

i hit the jackpot when i managed to convince the managers of a&f to let me take their life-size cardboard in-store advertisement home with me. john says their policy is to not let them leave the store intact because i could sell it to a high bidder in japan, willing to throw down the money for it.

so without further ado, my new wallpaper, a gift from abercrombie...



now please tell me i made the right decision choosing BRITT and not headless man's naked torso.

ps. carrying this through the wind and rain at 3 AM to the surprise of many onlookers was interesting, to say the least.

employment opportunities

for all the fun i poke at a&f, it appears to be a pretty stand up company. or at least it provides good benefits.

imagine working in your local a&f store one day, living your normal life, and then moving to tokyo to run the a new flagship store for the brand. this is what's happening every few months at abercrombie. regular 'ole joes are being sent to london, (some city in) germany, and tokyo to work. and not only that, but they are being pur up in generously provided housing and intensively trained in the local language for six months prior to the doors opening.

can you imagine this? sounds like deal to me, coming from someone who loves living in other countries and who can't speak any other languages fluently. what a chance in a lifetime to lack that skill but still be given the opportunity anyway.

john says a&f has bought a whole row of houses in london for their management team to live in and the same goes for tokyo. when questioned about why they don't just hire locals, he also explained that they relocate americans to their international locations to uphold the all-american image of the company. only the sales floor is comprised of locals. makes sense.

in just a few weeks the newest addition to the chain opens: milan. and with certainly more to come, this may be the time to get in the business, flex your managerial muscles (for lack of the physical), earn your retail cred, and add your name to the pool of candidates wishing for an unbelievably amazing career break and life experience.

services offered

china the country or china the town, it doesn't matter, one thing is always true: the english is bad, much to the enjoyment of everyone else. perfect example:



i know america is going through a recession and all, but what has our service industry come to?

introducing

partly due to recent confusion of the tae hyuns and partly due to my desire, it would be my pleasure to introduce tae hyun #2 (a.k.a. the one who didn't ruin my trip to montreal) to you.

here is a random selection from our skype sessions:









you can probably tell from the various photos that we've had many a skype session. and i have a hunch also that you can imagine why i find him so adorable. i would like to write more recent revelations about him but i'll quit before i incriminate myself.

sweet million

thursday, john and i decided to rise and shine earlier than normal so that we could try our luck at getting into the wendy williams show without ticket reservations. we both put on our thursday best and shimmied over to her hell's kitchen located studio where we waited not even three minutes to get in! this could be due to two reasons: wendy williams is a new show and so its popularity isn't booming quite yet. or, more frankly, because it's wendy williams.

after going through security, gorging on dunkin's donuts, filling out a questionairre to be considered for 'ask wendy', getting seated, and being told the rules, dance party 2009 a la wendy style commenced. this lasted about twenty minutes leading up to the show and we got to dance on stage and participate in a contest.

so the show starts and whoa! it's wendy! scripted scripted talking to the the camera and not us was weird scripted. finally, as a few of our fellow audience members around us are going to participate in 'ask wendy', our moment to shine was up. wendy was standing in our aisle and when she got a glimpse of john and me in our outfits, she couldn't not put us on the tube. so after corresponding with her producers, she talked to us on the air, mister and mister RECESSIONISTAS. watch us in all of our glory.



after making eyes with miss wendy williams and getting paid compliments on my infamous pants, it was officially my lucky day.

not soon after did john and i get stopped by a non-speaking korean korean in starbucks who snapped our photo for a special section of The Times called 'one in eight million' that we may or may not appear in later if the editors like us. i have my fingers crossed that my irresistible glowing at the moment of encounter will sway the vote in my favor.

still riding high, i bought my first lottery ticket: sweet million. and i played 3, 17, 23, 27, 33, and 37. what do you think my odds are? pun intended. i just don't like even numbers. i tried to move my pencil tip over to pick one but deep down in my heart, i just couldn't do it.

that concluded my streak of luck. perhaps i shouldn't deem it 'my lucky thursday' so much as 'my lucky two things that happened before twelve PM on thursday'. i dunno. whaddya think?

useful korean words to know

in my recent extensive cross-section study of k-pop, i found that there are some words that appear quite frequently and thus should be addressed due to their integral importance to the music.

1. 속에 : this one appears in nearly every song and when it follows another noun, means "deep inside." for example, 꿈 속에 means "inside my dreams."

2. 걸 : this one is a simple play on the english word, "girl." because writing in hanguel is far cooler than writing it in english.

3. 세상 : something in the lyrics invariably pertains to "the world."

4. 반짝반짝 : "sparkling" also seems to be a good quality with the koreans. perhaps a '반짝반짝 세상'?

5. 손을 잡다 : used in various ways. for example, "we used to hold hands and now we don't. why?" or the similar "i see you holding hands with another man and i want to be him."

6. 말다 : what's singing without "talking"? talk to me, or talk only to me, or just plain tell me.

7. 사랑/하다 : and what would be k-pop without talk of "love"?

8. 눈물 : naturally, love will sometimes end in "tears."

9. 빛이 : but if those tears are 'shining', more power to you!

so there you have it. nine commonly used words in korean music. if you can include these in your lyrics, you're well on your way to having a k-pop hit and winning the mnet countdown.