"I can't wait to have fish come and eat my feet!"

I decided that it was about time to visit my good friend Dinah in Busan last week. I bought a bus ticket for Friday night, and got there a little late. Traffic on the roads were especially bad because this was the weekend of the 14th annual PIFF festival (Pusan International Film Festival). I happend to be riding the bus with two other EPIK teachers from Gwangju, Brian and Carleigh. A lot of other people from Gwangju were going to Busan too (Brian and Emily, Alex and Allie, Gabe, me, Carlo, Ann, Amanda, Shabana, Amandeep, and Mechele) but everyone traveled separately for the most part.

When I got in Friday, we went basically straight out to one of the downtown areas in Busan. We went to two places, Keno-eye and Ghetto Bar. It wasn't really that Ghetto! I got to see a lot of people I hadn't seen for a while, Dinah, Ben, Neil, and Natalie, and got introducted to a lot of other Busan EPIK teachers. It made for a good but late night (we got back to Dinah's apartment at 6 am!).

Saturday we slept most of the day. We finally got out of bed around 1, and left around three. We met one of Dinah's friends from church, John, and he showed Gabe, Dinah, and I around town. We saw the Jung-gu area of town. Highlights there included Yongdusan Park, Jagalchi Fish Market area, and Busan tower. We also went to a huge market area, but I can't remember the name off the top of my head. We went up to the top of Busan tower (118 m), and got a good view of the port. Busan has the 5th largest container port in the world, and the biggest in Korea. It was a lot of fun to see the boats coming in. I took a lot of pictures and will post them soon.

We met some friends for dinner in a different part of town. It was really good- fried rice, chicken, and spicy sauce. It is called DakGalbi, or 달갈비. We got to see Brian, Emily, Neil, Allie, and Alex. Dinah and I ducked out of dinner a little early to get our feet eaten by fish.

We went to Dr. Fish, a place that is similar to a Borders or Barnes and Nobles. However, they have an area where for 2,000 won you can get your feet eaten by fish. What happens is you wash your feet, and put them in a tank where there are at least a hundred small fish. They come and eat the dead skin off your feet. At first, Dinah and I were shrieking with laughter and causing a comotion. It tickled so much! It was the strangest feeling. It almost felt like you were getting poked with a needle all over but it didn't hurt at all. I took a few video clips of that too. It was quite the experience. Once we got used to the sensation, it was a lot of fun. It would make for a great first date! I'd really like to find one of those places here in Gwangju. We stayed for about 30 minutes, but we could have stayed 2 hours if we wanted. My feet did feel a lot smoother after just the 30 minutes though!

Saturday night we took it easy and checked out the Gwangalli Beach area. That part of town is known for the Diamond Bridge which lights up and is quite beautiful. There were plenty of bars and cafe's to choose from, but the Busan's crowd's favorite is Thursday Party. It was pretty fun, and it was good to have the Gwangju group back with the Busan group.

There was a person selling fireworks on the beach, and Alex really like lighting those off. It made for some great pictures. It was a really good time, but we headed home early (2am) because we wanted to do church in the morning.

Dinah goes to a place called ICC, so we made it there by 10:30 am on Sunday morning. It is a church for foreigners and is non-demoninational to accompany everyone. It was pretty nice and the people were really welcoming.

We wanted to go to a place in Haeundae Beach (often the beach is compared to Wikiki) for lunch, but kinda ran out of time. Instead we got Burger King there. The beach is the headquarters for PIFF, and Dinah and I had our picture taken on the red carpet where the stars come and stand to promote their films. That was pretty cool. We didn't have time to see any movies, but that was okay with me. I've heard that between 75-80 countries are represented at the fest, and Josh Hartnet was even in town promoting a film. It is a really big deal for Busan, and it is the largest film fest in Asia.

Gabe and I got the bus back at 3:30 on Sunday, and we were both pretty tired. I'll be sure to put up pictures soon so you can see the city!