Weekend Update: Josh Comes to Korea

So this weekend I have spent visiting my friend Josh at his apartment in Bundang, a suburb of Seoul. It has been mildly successful and mildly disastrous.

1. On the way here, my bus was not full and so I had a whole seat to myself. Ooh luxurious :)

3. Josh and I went out to eat yesterday night at a restaurant chain that I had been to before. However, the menu was completely different (seriously?) and we ended up having to pay more than we thought, since the advertised price was per person.

2. I went to a Jimjilbang/sauna this morning with Josh. It was a pleasant experience, probably because I didn't have my glasses on haha. Still kind of weirds me out though...

3. I had spotted that there was a Daiso nearby and we went to find it in this huge Costco-esque farmer's market, but it turns out you need a membership card, so we couldn't purchase the armful of things we had selected.

4. We went looking for TWO Subway restaurants that were supposed to be here but did not exist in real life. I went after a third, but the bus route is much different than online and signage is terrrrrible in Seongnam. What a fiasco. I drowned my sorrows in chocolate bread from Tous Les Jours to make it better.

5. When we got to the terminal to go home, all the tickets for the next 2 hours were sold out...so here I am, waiting. I had to pay a lot more for the next quality of bus since all the cheap tickets were gone.

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So, after much trial and tribulation, I made it back to university. It seems every time I leave Gwangju I come away with a much stronger affinity for this place. I just love my town here :) Seoul is a black-hole of time-sucking transportation and expense.

The only other interesting thing I have to report today is about what happened to me at the bus stop this afternoon. I arrived at the bus stop, expecting to take the 184 to go downtown. Now, in Gwangju, they have these incredibly handy TV screens installed at the bus benches which tell you how many minutes until the bus you want will appear. However, my bus was on "standby" whatever that means.... anyway, I pulled out my phone to use the bus map application I have, so I could find an alternative route to where I wanted to go. I was in a bit of a hurry, since the bank I wanted to go to would close in an hour. I found out that the 7 express would get me close enough to where I wanted to go.

At that moment, a few young ladies approached me. "Excuse me" they said, first in Korean, then English. They wanted me to watch a short video on their cellphone and then answer a survey. They said it would take a few minutes (which I was hesitant about since I had to get going quickly). Anyway, I told them I had to go soon, but I would take part in their quest for public opinion.

They showed me a video about their cult, the "Church of God". Seriously, this isn't one of those, "is it a cult?" times, it was blatantly obvious. 
They were telling me all about how they believe in the heavenly mother as well as the heavenly father, who they claim is Jesus (they said she's from the "Jerusalem above" or something like that. They talked about the bible (not sure if I should capitalize, since they might be referring to their own book of lies)). They said when Jesus came, not many people recognized him, but now the heavenly mother is here, so everybody can recognize her. But they said she was some sort of secret (what?). It made me sad--their video was all of these non-Koreans coming to Korea to take part in their sinful indoctrination. In fact, there was a Korean woman in traditional Korean dress walking around and talking to people. I pointed and asked, "Is that the heavenly mother?" "Yes", they replied. Sigh.
At this point, my bus arrived and I was quite thankful. They quickly asked me how I felt after watching the video and talking with them. "Do you feel good or bad?" "Bad!" I replied with a big thumbs down, to which they gasped sadly.