Ho Bar Birthdays

Birthday celebrations are never limited to the date of your birthday, or the one party you have on your birthday. It is truly best played out as a gathering of your friends and loved ones who are willing to buy you drinks and wish you a happy birthday more than once.

Birthday Girls: Kristen (24) & Me (23)

Hongdae has the best stores!

Baskin Robbins Birthday Cake + Shot

Having our cake & eating it too!

Trying to get Shaun (head instructor) in the action.

Drinks from a street stall. Only 3,000 won for a strong drink from the street!

Me, Paula, & Kristen: The October Birthdays

This year I had 2 birthday celebrations. Kristen, a fellow colleague at Junggye, was born on Oct 2nd and I was born on Oct 4th. Instead of having separate birthday celebrations, we decided to have one blowout celebration at Ho Bar in Hongdae. Hongdae is the a very popular "hipster" scene in Korea. Because Hongik University is in Hongdae, the area boasts a heavy young clubbing/bar hopping crowd who dress way more trendy than I ever did in college. Ho Bar is so famous in Hongdae that there are 5 of them! We went to Ho Bar 3, which is one of the larger bars with great lounge and booth seating. Everyone chipped in for 2 bottles of Absolut. The best part is that each come with humongous fruit platters. Also, Kristen's friends surprised us both with a cake from Baskin Robbins. The Thursday evening was a success. We had about 10 instructors plus 3 head instructors come celebrate us. Needless to say, it may not be the best idea to drink with your bosses because you can lose all inhibition. You end up revealing way more that you want to to the people who grade your CCTV and are in charge of promotion or demotion. The conversations were a little embarrassing, but were more funny to think about the next day especially when facing the head instructors at work.