Look at this picture and tell me what you see. Looks like a club right. Looks like your average Saturday at anywhere USA right.
WRONG
This shit is happening in Bucheon South Korea.
AND I DON'T LIKE IT.
Well that is not fair, I actually wasn't ready for it. This bar is called Rhythm and Booze and it is nothing that you would expect from a western bar in Korea…because these people got it right.
Most "western" bars in Korea have a cowboys and Indians type of theme going on and the décor is almost always wood and the beer selection is always shitty and but the thing is, these types of bars are their(Korean people's)interpretation of the American bar scene while at the same time keeping it as close to the Korean social dynamic as possible. This place on the other hand had everything that a person that just got to Korea or a person that has never been to the U.S. would need for a jolt of American culture straight in your face!
Over crowded
Hot
Overpriced drinks
And for what is certainly going to be the hardest thing for me to get over when I get back to the states, which is the first thing I was surprised about when I got here. This place had a line to get a fucking drink.
Really, that shit got on my nerves for real. Call me spoiled, but the places that I frequent here have buttons on the table. You press the button and the server comes over and takes your drink order and brings it to you. Real fast too! I have actually been in bars where it is crowded and when I press the button I still get my drink really fast.
Needless to say, there were no buttons on the tables, but you had everything else. A shitty cover band, people smoking all over the place, old creepy dudes looking at the hot Asian girls, young creepy dudes, looking at the hot Asian girls.
And it was fucking loud.
When I saw what this place was I realized that I wasn't ready for this. And when I get back home there are prolly going to be a lot of things that are going to hit me all of a sudden and I am not going to be ready for. I think I am going to need like a halfway house or something.
Now when I go to places like Itawon or Hongdae, I expect this kind of atmosphere, I expect to see a bunch of drunk foreigners acting rowdy. Honestly I think places like that are strictly designed for that kind of behavior. Seriously, Itawon was buit for Waygookins and that is why it has such a bad rap for fighting, crime, and prostitution(well crime in the Korean sense of the word) Now bringing that kind of party to other places in Korea require some work and some effort, and paying off the right cops.
No really, cops are sooooooooo fucking dirty over here, but that isn't the point.
Actually what makes hongdae and Itawon different and ok is the amount of Koreans present at the clubs. This one had non Koreans, only the Gyppo's(Koreans that have lost their citizenship due to immigration or adoption). Not that that means anything, but you can be assured that the western club scene is not what the normative Korean would consider fun. I think that as more Koreans meet other waygookins clubs like this will become more popular. Where else will the korean people learn to do things like the "Stanky Leg" and what not
I don't think I am going back there…well maybe….I dunno.
