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Continue reading →: Fort Santiago, Manila, PhilippinesWe visited Fort Santiago while we were staying in the Philippines. Fort Santiago, a citadel built in 1571 for the new city of Manila, was beautiful on the day that we visited. I don’t have much to say other than Fort Santiago is an important piece of history and you…
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Continue reading →: Kim Jonghyun’s Birthday Cafes in Hongdae생일카페, or birthday cafe is a common event in South Korea where people rent out cafes for Kpop idol’s birthdays and they give away free paper cups and sleeves, stickers, photocards, and other items branded with the idol’s photos. You can read about how one is managed by clicking here.…
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Continue reading →: Trash in KoreaLet’s talk 쓰레기–trash. One of the initial hurdles that an expat faces is what to do with their trash. In the US, you pay for a trash pick-up service that comes once a week on a specific day and collects your trash bags (purchased from any store) from either the…
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Continue reading →: Café Review: Mouse Rabbit (Super Junior Yesung)Mouse Rabbit Coffee popped up on a google search for “best coffee in Seoul” and sounded interesting, so my friends and I ventured out to the Konkuk University area to see what it was all about. At the time, I had no idea that this was the café run by…
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Continue reading →: Café Review: Little WaveI was in charge of finding cafes during our vacation trip to Boracay, a beautiful island located in the Philippines, and the first one on my list was Little Wave. Located in Station X on the main road, this quaint little café serves up delicious drinks as well as tasty…
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Continue reading →: Café Review: Groove Coffee Roasters (now Hoi Polloi)One of my favorite independent cafés in Korea is Groove Coffee Roasters. I’ve been here a couple of times, so these photos are going to be out of order and out of time. I hear there are more changes coming, so stay tuned! I first heard about Groove through facebook.…
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Continue reading →: 새해 복 많이 받으세요!!Happy New Year from the beautiful beaches of Boracay in the Philippines.
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Continue reading →: Café Review: Lilac HouseLilac House is a cute little café located in a residential section of Uijeongbu. It’s got great brunch food, croiffles (that’s a croissant turned into a waffle), espresso drinks, and hand drip coffee, paired with a cute, intimate atmosphere. I’ve been here twice with friends so that’s why some of…
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Continue reading →: Itaewon, Post-TragedyMinutes to death: Itaewon Halloween selfies help families piece together tragedy that killed 158 Two of my friends and I celebrated Christmas and New Year’s Eve in Itaewon. “Celebrate” is a loose term, as we merely went out to an Irish pub for an afternoon Christmas buffet dinner. On the…
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Continue reading →: Day Trip to Busan, 10/30/22At the end of October, I won two tickets to the BOF K-Pop Concert, part of Busan One Asia Festival. When I submitted my application for the contest on The Venti’s Instagram page, I had failed to read that it was in Busan, and when I won it, I was…
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Continue reading →: Korean Self-Service Convenience StoreEvery now and again, you’ll come across a self-service convenience store in Korea. It’s unmanned and boasts a variety of drinks, snacks, and other sundries. This particular one had a shaming poster on its door. I’ve seen these kinds of stores but had never wandered into one, so I thought…
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Continue reading →: Giving Blood in KoreaI’ve wanted to give blood for a while now, but I finally managed to do it. The basic requirements for a foreigner are: There are other requirements you must meet, such as age, weight, medications you can’t give blood while taking, and countries where you’re ineligible if you’ve spent time…
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Continue reading →: 수능 Suneung, the College Scholastic Ability Test
At 1 o’clock this afternoon, the skies of South Korea were silent. All planes were prohibited from either taking off or landing for an hour while (senior) high school students were taking the English listening test of the suneung, or College Scholastic Ability Test. Imagine the SAT or ACT, but…
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Continue reading →: Cafe Review: Cafe Onion, Gwangjang Market“Guys. GUYS. I found the fourth Onion.” I had seen the Instagram posts about a fourth Cafe Onion but assumed, due to the location of the place and the photos they posted, that it would be a pop-up location or that it would be some time until it opened. You…
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Continue reading →: In the Aftermath of the Itaewon TragedyThese are links to news and op-ed pieces about the tragedy in Itaewon. These are by no means the only news and op-ed pieces out there, but just the ones that popped up on my radar, as an English-speaking expat living in the greater Seoul region. I have no ties…
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Continue reading →: Cafe Review: Blue Bottle, Samcheong HanokBy reservation only, it’s Blue Bottle’s Samcheong Hanok cafe. “A setting where traditional and modernism coexist Around the corner of Blue Bottle Samcheong Cafe, one will find a serene, winding backstreet which leads to a wooden gate. Upon entering lies a cozy, ‘ㄷ’ shaped hanok (traditional Korean house), a place…
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Continue reading →: Prayers for ItaewonPlease keep everyone affected by the tragedy in Itaewon in your thoughts and prayers.
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Continue reading →: Rubber Ducky, You’re the One…Get yourself some friends willing to travel with you into downtown Seoul to visit an 18-meter-tall inflatable rubber duck. This was the second time for ol’ Rubber Ducky to float in the Seokchon Lake–back in 2014, it did so to celebrate the opening of Lotte World Tower and its attached…
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Continue reading →: Korean LaundromatRecently, two laundromats popped up in my neighborhood. No need to lug around your detergent, as these washing machines will automatically add it. If you want a dryer sheet, however, you’ll have to pay 500 won (approximately 50 US cents) and you can also purchase a large, clean plastic bag…
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Continue reading →: Review: Warm Glow Candle CompanyThere are a few things I try to do when I visit my parents, and going to Warm Glow Candle Company in Centerville, Indiana is one of those things. (And if I don’t have time to go, I just take the candles my mom has bought from the store “for…
Welcome to Koffee & Kpop, adventures of an errant American barista living in South Korea.
Koffee & Kpop 