News from Mel

Actually so far today nothing has happened. I got up at 2 pm and since then I haven't done anything, except for lying around, listening to Juanes, checking mails and talking to my parents. They call me here a lot more often than in Spain. Calling is so cheap, 2 cents per min. It's weird, but here I feel a lot closer to home than in Spain, although this world here is so much more different.
Tonight I will go out to eat at seven with Robert. I'm glad I know somebody outside my apartment. I don't always want to wait for my roommates to have time to do something. They are mostly busy writing diploma or just prefer staying at home. Well today the girls went to see a movie, in korean. So that's nothing for me. I really would like to learn the language, but without a real course I think that's impossible. I am already glad when I can remember food names, numbers, letters or areas of Seoul. This is already difficult enough for me. It's pretty frustrating, when I remember not having had any problems learning Spanish and now I feel like I'm a language idiot. Well, it's just too different from all the languages I've learned bevore.
Today I want to see the area in the south of Seoul, close to Apujeong. I have been there once, but haven't really seen too much. Seoul is just too big. I want to see everything. I really don't have to go anywhere else in Korea, because I think Seoul is big enough for half a year. And anyway I have already seen Busan, so I don't necessaryly have to go there again. But Yujin told me I could visit her parents. Well, I'll see if I have enough time and money.

Cultural thing: (in order to not forget my Spanish and make it possible for non english speaking friends to also get some info, I will translate this into Spanish)

Dogs: A "stereotype" all around the world is, that Koreans eat dogs. Well, it is true, but not really a lot of people eat it. Usually it's only older men, but also not all of them. It's also pretty expensive. At the beginning I thought, since it is a cultural thing, I also want to try it, just to know how it is. But now, since really nobody eats it, I won't try it I think. Well, here in Seoul nobody has a dog really. If they do, they have one of those "rats". I have seen some Americans in my area with "real" dogs, but that's an exception.

Perros: Un stereotypo en todo el mundo es que los Coreanos comen perros. Es verdad, pero realmente no mucha gente lo come. Normalmente solo algunos viejos hombres lo comen a veces. Tambien es bastante caro. Al principio pensaba, que voy a probarlo, pero ahora he cambiado opinion. No creo que voy a probarlo. Aqui, en Seoul (12 milliones de habitantes) nadie tiene perros, solo esos "ratas" pequenos. Algunos Americanos de mi barrio tienen perros mas grandes, pero eso es una excepcion.

Hunde: Ein Vorurteil, das auf der ganzen Welt existiert ist, dass Koreaner Hunde essen. Das stimmt auch, aber eigentlich kaum jemand ausser einigen älteren Männern. Es ist ja auch nicht gerade billig. Am Anfang hab ich mir vorgenommen es auch zu probieren um mitreden zu können, aber da es ja eh keiner isst, warum sollt ich es dann probieren... In Seoul hat eigentlich fast keiner einen Hund, wenn dann nur diese kleinen Ratten. Ein paar Amis in meiner Gegend haben größere Hunde, aber das ist ne Ausnahme.

Well, translating it in two more languages takes a while. I am not sure if I will do this every time...
OK, I think I slowly will get ready to go out.