A New Years to Remember

So yeah. You ever been inside a presidential protest? Well I can now say that I have. Me and a couple guys I work with (Jameson and Brian) went out New Years Eve to the city centre (Jonggak) to see what the locals did this time of year. It turns out that they all gather around a famous temple, filling the streets as far as you can see, have a concert/performances, and do the countdown. However, there seemed to be an overwhelming number of Koreans out in protest of the current president Lee Myeong Bak. So how do you combat protester.........riot police, and lots of them. They were lining the streets upwards of 6 deep some with shields, some just standing, and doing war/formation chants. At one point we were walking down the sidewalk and the protesters were coming our way so the police rushed in and got between us and them but it resulted in us getting pushed up against the store windows. All in all nothing really big happened, the main crowd was still full of protesters with signs and flags but it all came and went quickly and hilarious. We took pictures holding anti-LMB singed but never got too involved in case the police decided to make an example out of anyone. As the new year got closer many people started shooting fireworks off above the crowd, which was nice to see but dangerous too. I think we all got hit with shrapnel a time or two. After the celebration was over while we waited for the streets to clear we had a seat at a little bar and watched as the sea of people cleared the street. Once it was safe to go back outside, we found a cab and went to meet Blake and Brandon in Gangnam to have a couple more beers and say good-bye to Brandon because he was heading home in the morning. We didn't stay out late, but we had a really good/wild experience.
The rest of the week we took it easy and had high hopes of keeping it low key this weekend. That was until we met that which is called Nori-Bong (Singing Room). Nori-bongs are private karaoke places where you and some friends can go rent a room and sing karaoke alone instead of in front of a crowd. In fact they don't really have Western style karaoke bars here. So there we we were out Friday night having dinner when a few more friends called and asked if we wanted to grab a couple drinks. Jameson, Blake, Brian and I said sure. But once we had a few drinks somebody suggested the singing room and since Jameson, Brian and myself had never been we climbed on the party train. I never realized how much fun something like that could be. We liked it so much that we went back again on Saturday night, though Saturdays trip was even more unplanned but we did it to help out a friend who was feeling a little sad.
In the long run it was a great idea to try this form of entertainment out but right now, my throat is killing me and I haven't coughed this bad in a long time. So, maybe doing a double header wasn't the best choice, but that's what I do.
I hope you are all having a good start to your new year.
Bye for now