I Got Lost!

There is no metaphor behind that title - I literally got lost. More lost than I have ever been in Korea. Before we go any further, I feel the need to reassure all concerned parties (e.g., my parents) of something insanely important: I live in one of the top five safest places on the PLANET. Little children in Suji-gu walk home alone after their 10pm academies let out.

Back story: My friend Tim threw me a "surprise" birthday party. Surprise in quotation marks because I knew about it (however, it did involve one fantastic surprise - I got to see my favorite Korean friend who had said earlier that he was completely busy...he did have to leave right away, but it was nice seeing him :)). We had a very American dinner followed by norebang (Lady Marmalade!) and it was exactly what I wanted.

Okay. So. Tonight was definitely the night of Bad Decisions. Not the type of bad decisions that involve hospitals and babies and brain poisoning, but definitely not ones that involved thinking. Bad Decision one was not to get on the M-4101 - a bus that goes directly from Myeong-dong (the neighborhood in Seoul where we had dinner/norebang) to Suji. I have a love-hate relationship with that bus because it's such a battle to get on. The M busses don't allow people to stand, so once all the seats are full, that's it. And everyone wants on that bus because it's the fastest way to get back to Suji from north of the river. Instead, I got on the 5500-2. Mostly because it was there. And convenient. It's a G-bus...and while they are less crowded, they also don't have that nice convenient light-up map that shows where you are on the route. Leading us to mistake number two (the Big One).

I got off at the wrong stop. I wasn't quite sure where we were. I heard the bus announcement say "Suji" - I looked around outside, thought I recognized the area, and just jumped off. I was afraid that I'd stay on it too long. Bad Decision number three is directly correlated: I looked around and realized I was a bit further away from Pungdeokcheong-dong (my neighborhood) than I realized, so I looked around again, thought I saw one of the downtown buildings, and started walking straight. I was wrong. Then I saw the M-4101 take a turn, so I followed it thinking that it would lead me to stuff I recognized. Wrong again. Had no clue how to get back to the bus stop. Had no clue where I was in relation to anything.

So I hailed a cab. Told him that I wanted to go to Pungdeokcheong. He had no clue where that was. So I told him to take me to the Suji Lotte Mart. He insisted there was no Lotte Mart in Suji (if any coworkers are reading this, here is a good place to laugh - to those who don't live here, I go to the Suji Lotte Mart like once a week). So I did the only thing I could think to do. I called Tim so he could help translate (Tim, if you're reading this, I love you and thank you forever for talking to that cab driver; I'm going to speak for my mother and tell you that she loves you too as you were involved in me getting un-lost, even though the idiot cab driver was...well...still an idiot). I overhear him telling Tim that there is no Lotte in Suji, but there is a Shinsegae in Jukjeon. Ok, fine, it's a million years away from my apt, but I know where it is in reference to where I live and, obviously, how to get home. So I tell the man that the Shinsegae in Jukjeon is fine. He looks at me as if I have 8 heads and starts driving. I look around to see if there's anything I recognize so I don't have to make that long-ass walk home. Nothing. Oh well. We get to an intersection that I kinda recognize, and he points out Lotte Mart and asks if that's where I want to go. YES!!! Well, he turns toward Shinsegae anyway. At one point, I swear he said something insanely derogative about having a foreigner in his cab..

Drops me off at Shinsegae. I walk home, laughing the whole 15 minutes. The whole time, I was just a few blocks away from where I wanted to be.