Debating Club - Update

So what have I been doing all the time? Well, one of the things I did, was to go to the debating club (nearly) every Wednesday.
Some of the topics we talked about were:

• Does competition in education contribute to the improvement of the society?
• Should adultery be punished by criminal law?
• Do you agree that a university student who isn't qualified as a teacher tutors a younger student with such high pay rates?
• How do lovers handle Push and Pull games?

It was always very interesting to get to know the Korean point of view and I enjoyed going there a lot. I met some really, really nice people there as well who became my friends. So, now the good news is that we will continue meeting during the semester break :)

Small group discussion in progress

and of course we also went drinking together :)

Hello Kitty Café

You won't believe where I went last week: the Hello Kitty Café...Don't get me wrong, I like cats, but I really dislike this pink feline..
Before going to this "wonderful" place though we had our morning coffee at a real coffee shop close to 안국 station. The atmosphere was really nice and my ice-coffee-latte was perfect :) I wish I could always start my day like this!

Ice Coffee Latte

The view ;)

Afterwards we had a little bit of time before our next appointment, so Elena and me had (despite rain) a very short sightseeing stint at the Westin Chosun Hotel, where we looked at an old pavillion.

We rushed back to the subway so we could be in time for our lunch appointment. We ate Bento at a very nice Japanese restaurant with Elena's mentor and a Korean friend.

The original plan was to go sightseeing after lunch, but we didn't think about the rainy season which had to start exactly when we were about to leave the restaurant...(it has been raining ever since...). We decided to go for coffee (again) and went outside where we just happened to pass a Hello Kitty Café. Well, it was an experience...

Entrance (to hell?) ;)

Still smiling

We forced Elena's mentor to come with us...poor guy! He was the only male being far and wide and couldn't really pretend to be enthusiastic about all the pink and girly interior...

Poor guy!

Even the cake was shaped like Hello Kitty but, still being full from lunch, we decided to just have some coffee which of course also had to bear a feline trace...

Hello Kitty Cakes

..and coffee

hmmmm

And just for you to get an impression from the rest of the place, here some more pictures from inside:

did you know that pink is my least favorite color?

Oh how my sister would love to be here :)

nearly taller than me...

In the Office

One of my friends has her own office, including a free desk, in one of the university buildings. I went there today to study a bit and she told me I could use the free desk for some time if I want :) Yeah! I guess I will spend quite some time there ... Today we only watched a movie though and a friend dropped by, so it wasn't really productive...but fun :) Oh how I wish I had a desk in an office at my home university too, it feels so cool!

The free desk...not so free anymore...ha :)

My cool desk neighbor :) Thank you so much!

Having fun in the office: "Sofia's hair is maaaaaaaaagic!!!"

German Bakery

I went to the German bakery close to Itaewon last week. I met a girl in the debating club who had lived in Germany for 6 months and was craving for some German bread, so we met at the subway station (Korean time of course 30 minutes late ;) and walked to "Ach so".

Ach so!

We enjoyed some Broetchen with real cheese and salami. Oh it was so yummy!
I decided to bring some Broetchen for my Asian friends at university and that's what they looked like eating it:

One Chinese, Three Koreans, Four Broetchen

To my surprise all of them liked it a lot :) When I was in Korea the last time, I also made my Korean friends try German bread and most of them didn't like it...
We went in the afternoon, so a lot of the good stuff, like Kuerbiskernbroetchen, Sonnenblumenkernbroetchen and Bretzel, was already sold out. It's best to go there in the morning, so you can choose from everything. They also speak German by the way and have lots of German books lying around in the store...Feels like a small part of home :)

Please hang on!

I swear I will start blogging again in June!

Sports with the Girls

As I already mentioned on this blog I meet with some Korean girls and some exchange students for sport every Thursday. It's actually a sports club called "Miss A~Z Sports Club" (don't say anything, I didn't make up the name). Only girls can go there (although we made an exception for Elena's boyfriend Philipp this week). Usually we are around 8-10 people and usually we play soccer or basketball or both. I never thought I would like basketball but here it is actually a lot of fun!
Some girls were late so they missed the group picture:

Some sports club girls

Afterwards we usually go out for dinner but this week we felt lazy so we just ordered some food to the sports department.

Lazy sports club dinner this week

Korean Breakfast

It can be very difficult for foreigners in Korea to decide what to eat for breakfast. The bread you can get here is very white and sweet and doesn't really make you feel full. Also, I don't have a toaster in the dorm and no good possibility to store anything I might want to put on the bread.
So I tried now for some time to find a good breakfast for me here. For maybe two weeks I had breakfast in liquid form...
I had different kinds of strawberry milk:

Different kinds of soy milk:

Cereal milk:

Didn't taste like cereal...

So-called "Morning Juice":

And even soy milk with almond which was supposed to give me mojo:

Of course none of these made me feel full until lunchtime...the solution: Korean style breakfast in the cafeteria. I admit, I had to get used to eating rice, soup and spicy side dishes at 8 o'clock in the morning but it does give me energy until lunchtime and I guess it must be quite healthy as well. It's affordable as well (only 2000 won (~ 1,20 euro)).

Korean breakfast

Highlight of the week: once a week you get a slice of pancake as a side dish...and sometimes even a spoonful of scrambled eggs!