서 seoul 울

it is friday evening and i am sitting in my living room sipping chocolate milk. i haven't updated this blog in two months, and i suddenly felt the urge to post something, yet my life these past few weeks haven't been very eventful (save for my birthday, but i have yet to develop the rolls of film from that day). so here i am, revisiting my trip to seoul from april of 2k15 in a series of photographs, despite the fact that i still have a shit ton of work to do for school.

buk 북 chon 촌

i loved bukchon; the little shops lining the alleys were just plain adorable, and the traditional buildings were seriously the bomb.com. the colour scheme was beautiful, too.

i came across a hotel in one of these little old-style buildings. it was a sort of inn / motel. those places where bathrooms are shared and rooms consisted of multiple beds for multiple people. it looked so cool; the next time i visit seoul, i'm definitely staying in one of these buildings for the ~full experience~

isn't this store the cutest thing ever??

hong 홍 dae 대

ah, the hip part of seoul (yes, i did say hip. yes, i am 18, not 48). we lived near hongdae during our trip, and this is by far my most favourite region in the city. the vibrancy of the night scene is unlike anything i've ever seen. walk down the street beside hongik station and it's like experiencing ten concerts in ten minutes: there's a rapping duo, but right beside them, an acoustic guitar player. and slightly behind them, five breakdancing guys + a guy shaking what his mama gave him to some girls generation songs. i love the darn place. it's magnificent. and the people in this area wear some really pretty clothes, so that's quite nice.

so pretty but also so expensive (i did cry internally when i found out the price of that skirt)

the architecture at ewha womans university (which is near the hongdae area) is simply unreal. imagine going to school every day in a campus that looked like it came out of a fairytale. i don't think i would dread school days as much as i do now.

this was dinner at 팔색삼겹살 (palsaek samgyupsal – it means 8 flavours of pork). as the name suggests, there truly were 8 flavours of pork. 8 heavenly flavours. heavenly. my favourite was the wine-flavoured, purely because of the fact that it was the weirdest thing i've ever tasted.

in 인 sa 사 dong 동

this 'neighbourhood' follows hongdae very closely on my list of favourite places in seoul. i'm basically a sucker for tiny restaurants and little alleyways, and insadong has a lot of these.

i was taking a picture of the stall beside her when i noticed her photographing me with her phone.

**

wow, this turned into a huge post that took up 3 hours of my evening. i've finished the chocolate milk now (because i know you're really curious about that).

over and out,

halloween '15

mes amis and i dressed up as bank robbers for halloween. or rather, we tried to. we ended up looking like a mere sextet wearing matching striped shirts. we were missing those scary ski-masks that bank robbers of the cinema wear in action, as well as actual bags of money. but hey, we tried.

it was my last halloween with these idiots – it feels like a routine now, checking off everything one by one off this list of last things i will do for a long, long time.

i keep thinking how this time next year, everything will be different: for the first time in 10 years, i will be in a different country when school starts, surrounded by people i have never met, living by myself (and having to feed myself, eek!), and going through an entirely new routine. no more waking up at 6:15 am every weekday to shower and eat and get on the bus at 7:30 to head to school. no more eating questionable cafeteria meals with my friends at 13:05 every monday-friday. no more returning home to my parents and relating to them everything that happened that day in school, significant or not. this is scary. so scary. i'm excited at the change that will happen, but also scared.

i hope this fear goes away soon.

over and out,

alexius.

hat-shit crazy

lately i have been nursing an unhealthy obsession with headgear.

i tend to have strange, fleeting obsessions, and sometimes they last for weeks, sometimes they last for days. this headwear fixation has been fully fledged for a month now and i am curious to see how much longer it can last.

here are some hats that i am really liking:

soft loafer cap

cherry + strawberry pink cap

niles cap

fishing cap

i've begun to realise how random this blog is becoming. i dedicated a post to japanese cars and now i've created an entire post about hats. this space is turning into such an accurate portrayal of the inner workings of my mind.

over and out,

alexius.