christmas

Returned to beautiful Jangyu for my mother-in-law’s haircut, just a stone’s throw away from her old apartment, where I stayed during my first visit to Busan about four years ago.

Excellent candidate for a Silent Hill-like event

After that, it was time for more shopping at Lotte Premium Outlets (Gimhae).

If you really focus, you’ll be able to hear your bank account crying

Now, today being Christmas Day and all, with more and more Koreans observing it… I was hopeful it wouldn’t be too crowded.

This time at least, I captured photographic evidence of steep discounts!

Is… is my bank account crying even louder?

Oh yea and I captured this:

The fourteen year-old in me was giggling uncontrollably

Next on the list: Halal meat. My wife, her brother and mom had already eaten and I was starving. Plus I was saving space for Samsa, a delicious meat-filled Uzbek baked bun/pastry.

Not sure what the area is called, but here’s the street name:

I am NOT attempting to type that on this phone with Autocorrect waiting eagerly, and cracking its knuckles

The nearest LRT station would be either Royal Tomb of King Suro (no, seriously) or Buwon. We drove there and man, it reminded me a little of some really narrow streets in Bangkok where cars mingled with pedestrians.

Here’s the cool thing about the place. It’s a true melting pot. You’ve got everyone from Indonesians to Vietnamese to Thais to Uzbeks and more.

Much more festive, it’s just that my photography skills are still almost non-existent.

We parked near the mosque:

Something weird about this. Can’t quite put my finger on it…

Before heading to the restaurant to get our meat (they also sell frozen meat), we checked out the nearby wet market which reminded me a lot of the old markets in Singapore:

Bank account seemed glad to see this place for some reason.

According to my brother-in-law, the prices here were significantly cheaper than in Busan.

Finally we arrived at the restaurant:

Hand over the Samsas and nobody gets hurt.

I’d show you a picture of the Samsa, but I’ve pretty much eaten all of them. They’re that good. And a hot Samsa in winter? Oh yeah.

At this very moment, I’m typing this on a phone, on a big comfy couch in the hall, with my reflection and its full tummy in the glass window staring at me. I regret nothing.

Not only is it Christmas Eve, but it’s also my brother-in-law’s birthday! So naturally… we all headed out before he woke up to do some shopping 😂

A short cab ride later and we arrive at Lotte Premium Outlets Busan.

Christmas is getting ever bigger in Korea, but it’s still not as big of a deal here as the Lunar New Year.

The place wasn’t too packed and there were a few good discounts according to my wife and her mom, who happen to be experts in matters like this.

View from inside a cafe that blasted music like it was trying to become a club

Pro tip: There’s more discounts on the weekend. And especially on Christmas Eve.

While the ladies went shopping, I entered the very mouth of madness:

This would be a good place to bury daddy

I don’t know what is it about me and kids, but there’s always one or two kids that seem to go’OMG A FRIENDLY GROWN-UP!’ but since there were more kids than usual… I had to basically reject quite a few.

For the last time… I AM NOT YOUR DADDY.

Shopping done and baby exhausted, we headed back and while I was at the gym, they prepared the birthday feast:

Because my wife’s family is Korean-Russian, the entire spread was a kind of hybrid of two distinct cuisines.