Itaewon nights

As you can see from our most recent blog posts, something is different. McDonalds? This is no way for us artfolks to live our lives. But since Bjørn and I moved into our hotel in Itaewon yesterday, we have all of a sudden experienced how a place can produce a new kind of mental topography. For a few short moments, which were really good fun, we were sucked into the Itaewon lifestyle. Then we woke up to a bad conscience for being bad foreigners. But as Bjørn commented: "If the only thing I have to have hangover anxiety about is eating three (3) burgers at McDonalds, maybe I don't have it so bad."

So what is this all about, then? What's so bad about Itaewon? Mainly just that it is a kind of "American ghetto" of Seoul, with a big army presence and, for some reason, also a big pull on the American tourist market. Perhaps most of the American tourists here are visiting family and friends in the army. All along the main street there are little shops that cater to tourists and Westerners, and the side streets are filled with restaurants and bars. Coming there yesterday was actually kind of a culture shock after spending the first half of the stay in the more exclusively Korean neighbourhoods of Jeeonheedong and Hongdae, staying in jimjilbangs etc. Then again maybe saying that this is a "culture shock", or also sort of feeling that it is, is just coquetteish crap that comes from a strong desire to perceive ourselves as different from these people (= rest of Itaewon crowd). As serious "travellers" as opposed to "tourists" or some such backpacker neo-hippie shit. But it is kind of interesting since we've spent most of our time so far attempting this flat structure where everyone is the same and where no one is in charge. And the we post long attempts at half-assed theory on the internet, so that people back home can think we're cool because we're, like, in Korea and meeting cool people (which of course we are) and what not. Then again, isn't this exactly the kind of self-effacing pseudo-selfcritical crap which mainly functions as a new way of blowing one's own horn. Sigh. I don't know. Basically, I don't think there's any way of writing about these questions without sounding like an idiot.

Anyway, yesterday then. I met up with Bjørn at our friend Jonny Dollars' apartment, where he was in the middle of recording a mammoth radio show for www.cheekymonkeyradio.com. From here we went on to meet up with Power, Jooyoung, Tae Eun and a friend of Jooyoung whose name I didn't catch (not a first here, I'm ashamed to admit...). After fish and chips, cosmos, beers and greyhounds at a bistro-like place we decided it was time to go to a gay bar which, as it turned out, was more like a gay night club. You can always trust teh gays to know a good time, and the club was fantastic! Absolutely packed, everyone dancing to great homo-friendly diva house etc. Neither Bjørn nor I got any attention from the locals, so I guess we're not what they're looking for.

After the club we went looking for a quiet bar in which to enjoy one final drink. First we accidentally walked into a brothel and were courteously thrown out with the words "We are not normal bar, men come here." Okay then. Anyway. Reading about Itaewon on wikipedia I found an interesting article on prostitution to Americans in Korea here: here