icouldeatakimchi

i don’t want to end this bloggg………

in transit from korea to houston (home) took me more than 26 hours!!! and i had already pulled an all-nighter before that. and along with being a little sick, you can imagine i was a little delirious.

on the plane ride from japan to houston there was quite a bit of turbulence. and i dont like takeoff very much. but i was so out of it, i started imagining myself in a giant flying pikachu who was battling the wind and stuff. that really took the fear away from the bumpy ride.

anyway i thought i should tell you all that i’m safe and back home. even though this has become a bit more personal than i expected for it to, i hope you all enjoyed my study abroad experience through my blog as much as i did.

if i look through some pictures later and decide i should post them i will. :)

2:15am right now. 2 hours until it’s time for me to leave the dorm- heading out to the onyang bus terminal to catch the bus to the airport. and honestly i’m leaving with kind of a bad taste in the mouth.

all of my suitemates are drunk except one who is tipsy (sean). and i know they’re not usually like this so it’s whatever. but one of them throwing empty bottles at my door to try to get me to drink is getting irritating. and then he just walked into my room to tell me that he’s gonna miss me and that he regrets not having spent more time hanging out with me.. and then i look at the broken glass bottle in the living area and know that it’s just the drunk in him talking. ah i have to pack..

this might be my last post. byebye for now icouldeatakimchi fans

thank you for following me

brian kwan

12.21

i got to see the genius fingerstyle guitarist this past sunday (12.19) perform along with some special guests. yeah.. he’s good. the guy in the red is his teacher, who is playing at the same time as him! isn’t that cool?? sungha did the main melody while the teacher played the walking bass.

brian kwan

12.20

went snowboarding on saturday 12.18 with keisuke, shuhei, ross, maho, mitsue, kazutoshi, and chris! mitsue twisted her ankle on the 3rd run so these pics were taken by her. we all look happy because this was before we all got injured or sick lol.

yeah, this was definitely before i felt like i was dying. haha. ow. laughing hurts.

i don’t know how, but one of my left ribs feels really really bruised from an early fall.

shuhei’s first time snowboarding!

i think it’s kaz’s first time? and keisuke’s 10+ time. i wanted to race but parts of the slope were just ice! and at the bottom of the slope, you can see concrete through the thin snow! it sucked for all the people who fell at the bottom..

it was still fun :) but i miss getting out of bed in less than 10 minutes..

brian kwan

12.20

today i skipped class for the first time, mostly cuz i’m sick and i need to pack. sorry teacher..

have a headache, can’t think, still feel cold after taking a hot shower, are abnormally tired at 8pm, and have a sore throat, does it mean i have a cold? i’m going to sleep… snowboarding was fun but i’m pretty sure i won’t be able to get out of bed tomorrow ahhhh…..

not too much happened today. our last class with the writing teacher, we played a game and went out to eat with the teacher. one of the best teachers that i’ve ever had, i’ll miss her but i’m glad she is here doing something she’s so good at.

i was gonna go to the last CCC thing today in a church in cheonan but michelle couldn’t go so i ended up deciding not to go since she usually does a lot of the translating for me.

so today’s post is just about yesterday

while looking for a restaurant to eat at, i bumped into the hello kitty cafe haha. i promised a friend that i’d go there, so there ya go. probably not a place for pink-haters.

also saw this charming little cafe/coffeeshop with a bunch of old-fashioned birdhouses on the wall. who knew sticking a bunch of those on a wall would be this pretty??

mr. david choi doing his thing

:D he’s smiling! he rarely smiles in his videos but he does quite a bit more in person. pretty sure i watched his entire concert about 7 times all the way through today.

snowboarding tomorrow!

brian kwan

12.17

wow what an absolutely amazing day. i am.. so jittery right now it’s crazy and kind of embarrassing lol.

went to hongdae today, about a 4 hour trip from my university, to see the one and only david choi. saw on his website that he had updated his schedule with a little added line that said “FREE CONCERT” in a place called Bebop house.

and that’s pretty much all it took, i called googled bebop house. called them and confirmed it. he didn’t announce it on twitter or youtube or anything so i suppose no one knew about it but i did!!

eventually arrived at bebop house today and it was actually in a place called the tango house (same owner- different location). not important.

what a great- and as my friend anna called him- down to earth guy. truly a fantastic musician. 

he actually indicated that he didn’t know there was a concert? lol. and i don’t know if i would call it a concert either- it was more of an intimate gathering of around 15 people and he just played for us. it was like.. someone hired him to play for a private party. AHHH it was amazing!! he is so good at what he does- please listen to his music and support him!

www.davidchoimusic.com 

when he first walked in, he greeted everyone and bowed with an “anyeunghaseyo”, even to me because i guess he thought i was korean. and we talked a good bit too, because i was the only native english speaker there. talked a little about where i’m from, he showed me that he knew some chinese (after i told him i’m taiwanese american) like “ni hen ke ai”, “zhege, nage nage nage”, “zai jian”, and he told me he might have a concert in houston in february, and that he almost got sued because of his biography online (read it!), and that he’s not completely recovered from jetlag yet, and that he’s nervous and never does intimate concerts like this (he said that several times), and asked if i knew what “mul” was when he asked for water. i sound like an obsessive fanboy.. but i don’t care!

he is really doing a lot in promoting music for what music really is, and as an asian american. he’s the only person i know who has worked this hard to get where he is as a musician today and i can’t help but give him the utmost respect and he’s doing it all with a humble heart that you can see pretty soon after meeting him.

after figuring out that he was scheduled to play 8 songs, he scribbled down his playlist and laid it in front of him as he went through each one. amazing, amazing singer and guitarist i can’t get over it. i asked him if i could keep the playlist- and being the kind guy that he is, he said yeah sure.

sorry if my thoughts are everywhere. it was just amazing. the host (tangohouse) even gave us drinks (like beer which i preferred not to drink and orange juice and grape juice and a wide assortment of cookies and pastries and bread) all for free! definitely more like a private party than a concert. and he sounds even better in better in person with an acoustic guitar than anything i’ve ever listened to from him.

if i’m allowed to, i’ll upload a video of one of his songs. ahhhh he was awesome!

brian kwan

12.16

pictures taken from my new toy camera :)

today i wrote my final paper for understanding korean literature and built a snowman. not much else, it was REALLY cold outside! 18 degrees fahrenheit!

brian kwan

12.15

this is probably the least stressful finals time that has ever happened in my life? or at least for a very long time- like middle school! i’m finished with my finals (minus one paper) and i don’t even feel like anything has happened or changed! i just felt like i took a couple of hard quizzes.

very few people to my knowledge actually studied, i certainly didn’t. sigh, i’m gonna miss korea.. i don’t want to go back to the difficult tests at A&M!! ahhhh

k i’m over it.

look at the camera that took the last picture in the entry “pictures, pictures and a miracle” on 12.12.

not what you expected right?

and now it’s all mine!!!!! muahahahaaaaaa!

brian kwan

12.14

a couple things i’m looking forward to: snow TOMORROW wednesday, david choi concert thursday, ccc event friday, snowboarding saturday, sungha concert sunday, noraebang monday, hopping on the plane tuesday!