"Take me out to the ball game!"

(This past week has been crazy busy, so I finally took some time to sit down and blog again. Hopefully these next few entries will catch me up to today!)

On Saturday, I met Mi-yeon at Times Square, one of the biggest shopping malls in Korea! They are known for their shopping and diverse food. We weren’t there to shop. We were there for some “On the Border.” I’m not sure if you’re familiar with this restaurant, but it’s a Mexican restaurant from back home. Delicious.

Mi-yeon and I met up at noon to grab lunch. We both had crazy weeks, so we just wanted to relax and enjoy some good company and good food. Mi-yeon ordered enchiladas, and I order quesadillas. I can’t even remember the last time I had a quesadilla. For our pre-meal snack, we even got real nacho chips, like the ones from back home! (Those are pretty difficult to come by here.)

We talked about our crazy weeks, and just got caught up on life. It was really good to relax and just de-stress. After we finished eating, we decided to take a walk around Times Square. Mi-yeon lives only a few subway stops away so she goes there often, but this was my first time. It was quite the experience!! There were the typical popular Korean stores, but they also had quite a few stores from back home. We ducked in a few, just to look around. We also did a lot of window shopping. We weren’t there to buy anything, so it was fun to just bum around. One thing that Mi-yeon and I both share is a love for scrapbooking! Cheesy, I know. Every time we saw a crafty kind of store, we just HAD to stop in and check out the fun ribbon, decorative paper, and fun cut-outs they had.

After a few hours, we headed back to the subway station….to go to the baseball stadium! This was my first Korean baseball game ever! For those of you who know me well, baseball is definitely NOT one of my favorite sports. In fact, it probably wouldn’t even make the list for a sport I would ever spend any time watching, playing, or even hearing about. However, in Korea, baseball is THE sport! I had heard that the atmosphere at a Korean baseball game is completely different than one found back home. So, I thought I’d give Korean baseball a try. Luckily for me, the company Mi-yeon works for was giving out free tickets, and she asked me to go with her! Because it was free, I could enjoy the game, and not feel like I wasted money in case I ended up not having a good time. Win win!

The baseball game was SO FUN!! The atmosphere was similar to the atmosphere at a football game back home. Everyone was standing the entire time, and yelling all during the game. They had chants for different things that were happening, and even had the vuvuzuelas and those inflatable bat things that you hit together. So fun! After about an inning or so, I was already picking up some of the Korean chants and joining in. Mi-yeon and I had a blast! Our team ended up losing, but neither one of us particularly cared. For me, it was all about the experience. And my experience was awesome. I will most DEFINITELY go to another Korean baseball game. And now that I’ve been, I know it’s worth paying for!