August 15' Through my phone

Hey yo ! 

It's Friday evening and honestly I haven't been having the greatest of evenings today so here's something to distract me from it. It's already the 28th of August and the last 2 days will be spent at the dance studio so I think it's a proper time to publish this post. Anyway let's cut to the chase because I'm pretty sure you all know what this post is going to be about. 

1. I am addicted to taking pictures of our campus. That's why I was planning to do the whole "Hanyang campus tour" post. I walk past these stairs everyday and when I start my university my classes will be held in a building right on top of those stairs... welcome hot summer days and climbing those up everyday. 

2. This month I have probably eaten at the school cafeteria more than at home. The food is so cheap and super delicious. Totally fell for this place, kinda reminds me of my year in Japan and eating at a cafeteria there, so something about being there feels so familiar and nice. Hence I found myself walking there almost every day after school. 

3. Met in Dongdaemun for a cup of coffee one of my old friends who I actually came to Korea with 3 years ago when I first came here. She was here for a year as an exchange student and left back home in the beginning of this month so we decided that after 3 years it was time to meet up and catch up. Finally. 

4. This picture is actually from the last days of July, so I'm kinda cheating here. I had a phase in my life when I visited like 3 different hospitals for like so stupid reasons. This is Hanyang's university hospital. The staff ladies there were so sweet and helpful. I was joking with my friends that during these last weeks I've learned so many hospital related words that I should change my major to medicine, hahah. 

1. After like 4 months of not clubbing almost at all I finally went to Club Cocoon. It was just as amazing as I remembered it to be. When the bouncer saw me he gave me a very long, judging stare, asked me where the heck have I been and threw a pile of stickers at me. Then he proceeded to judge me more when I told him I have been clubbing in Gangnam a lot lately.. The night was fun but very wet - as in they had a water party and they were shooting people with water guns. 

2. I also joined Def dance studio. Because of that my life here changed a lot during this month. Obviously 2 lessons in a week wasn't enough so next month I am gonna take 5 lessons per week. There's just something about the whole atmosphere at the studio that makes me want to spend more and more time there. Plus I get to do what I love. 

3. The studio is located in Gangnam around Solleung station, and it's the prettiest area ever. Big skyscrapers and business buildings but when you walk one block away it's all small streets and restaurants and cafes. It's just pure perfection.

4. What would a summer be without Oreo-Nutella bingsu? We found this gem from a small cafe around our neighborhood with Sara on a lazy day while wandering around. 

1. Found this adooorable small restaurant from the backstreets of Sinsa. It was called "Vegas" or something and their burgers were a piece of heaven. Definitely have to go there again when I start craving something super unhealthy.

2. I have fallen for iced green tea.. It's amazing and so refreshing. Until now, since I first tried green tea like 4 years ago I have absolutely loathed it, haha! Even the thought of it made me cringe.. a miracle has happened. 

3. Snapped this on my way to the studio. It's our student card. So cheesy hahaha

4. Pretty red roses against our pretty renewed school building. It was a foggy morning but somehow it looked so magical so I spend like 5 minutes photographing instead of making it to the class in time. 

 1. & 2. So besides dancing this is what my August really looked like.. We spent oh so many hours and afternoons and evenings at this school cafe practicing for our speech. It was 20 minutes long and we had to memorize every line and then on top of that our team was chosen to perform it at our school's speech contest. We got the third place out of 11 teams ! 

3. & 4. After getting that speech contest thing done the next week we had to improvise speeches in front of our class..we were allowed to choose 3 topics beforehand and then during the class we would randomly get one topic and had to talk about it in front of the class. It was not fun, let me tell you. But afterwards we got ice cream and donuts from our teacher, so that was pretty cute. 

1. One of my favorite past time activities is to look and photograph the pretty cakes and ice cream cakes Korea has. These are from Baskin Robbins. Before you judge me, let me tell you that in Finland we have absolutely nothing like this. Nor do we really have the cake / ice cream cake culture so you will never, ever see stuff like this in Finland. I've been here for 8 months now and I'm still amazed by the silliest things.. 

2. I don't even remember when, but I also went clubbing in Gangnam one weekend after such a long time. We have a friend working there so he let us in with VIP bracelets for free, and on top of that he bought us some drinks and we run into my friend's friends who were having a table there that night so we ended up clubbing pretty damn vip that night. It was a good night. 

3. When I'm bored I take pointless pictures. From the dance studio between practices.  

4. This cute stray cat lives in our neighborhood. I'm not sure but I think it might be the cat I saved from our roof that one time. It's adorable. But I've learned my lesson - no more touching stray cats. They bite and I pay over 300 dollars for hospital fees, hahhahah

1. Got a def dance studio shirt. I like it a lot. Just wanted to share this info with you all. 
2. We had a coffee business meeting with our real estate buddy Roy from ZIP housing. Their company has gotten so big and professional in only few months, I'm so happy for them. Roy, as the busy owner whose kakaotalk kept beeping new messages every 2 minutes, still found time to meet with us in person to talk about our plans for this fall. 
3. & 4. Today we had a girls' day trip to IKEA with these two lovely ladies. IKEA is a Swedish company but the food in Finland & Sweden is almost the same, so eating in IKEA is like eating dinner at home with mashed potatoes and meatballs and cinnamon buns. It was great. Also took silly pictures with huge horse statues outside and then explored the store for few hours. 

Now that I look at this I did have a really good month. Busy, but a good month. Hope you all enjoyed your August as well ! I'm personally really excited for the upcoming fall months, fall is my favorite time of the year and I have yet to experience it here in Seoul. 

xx,

Julia

Rainy afternoon at COEX Mall

Hey sweeties ! 

No, I haven't forgotten about my blog! It's been a crazy last 3 weeks, with speech contests, more speeches (that you had to improvise in front of the class) and then my final exams. On top of this I have been using all of my free time at the dance studio even though I have lessons only during the weekends. I've missed blogging, but just haven't had time for it. Yesterday was my last school day and I was planning to walk around the campus and take some pictures and then show you guys what it's like but apparently there's a typhoon coming so it's been raining for the last 2 days and it will probably continue raining for the rest of the week... So my plans changed and before going to the studio to practice (once again) me and my friend decided to visit the COEX Mall and do some aimless walking around. 

COEX also has a SM TOWN .. place, that has a theater, cafe, shop, dance studio where you can take dance lessons, photoshoot studio, et cetera. Basically a tourist attraction for all the sm entertainment idols' fans out there. I'm not really into the whole fan thing anymore, but the 15 year old me totally was, so I think I owed this little trip inside to my teenager-self, hahah! It was really interesting though, especially because music / entertainment industry is what I'm interested in plus it's a field I'm probably gonna end up working in. We were just mostly chilling at the cafe reading magazines and chatting and watching the cute little fan girls taking pictures. (I'm gonna leave out the part where we kinda got into taking selfies with EXO's Kai's life-sized cardboard cut and then finding out which idols' personality fits the best with your own (hi there Baekhyun) according to your hand shape or something. Just for the sake of my online reputation... hahhahah)

Here's some pictures from that day. Also I was using my friend's camera and can we just take a moment to appreciate how good pictures it takes? 

Today I have to take care of some boring adult stuff as in pay the rent and some bills so a great day ahead.. I can't wrap my head around he fact that this month is already ending? It just started like a week ago? I'm kinda scared yet so excited about next month because I will have hip hop lessons 5 times a week, from Monday to Friday, and then on the 14th day my final language school level, level 5, will start and according to our teacher our topics will include discussing about news, human rights, politics,,, Plus we will start learning Chinese characters which they use in Korean too, and have debates and fun stuff like that.. So we'll see how I manage school, hip hop, blogging & my personal life next month, hahhah! I'm gonna try my best. 

Anyway I will be back with the campus post in hopefully few days unless it seriously continues raining for the whole week, and then I have the "August through my phone" post coming up later this week as well. Until then you'll find me from here, here and here. 

xx,
Julia

One step closer

Hello beautiful people! 

Today has been such a good, exciting day. I just came home from Gangnam and am now officially a (broke) member of DEF Company & their dance school ! I've already reached my biggest, rational dream, which was moving to Korea, and now that my life here has pretty much calmed down I decided it's time to go for my other, a bit more irrational dreams. 

Now before some of you go all sassy on me and send me messages asking if being a kpop star is my dream, let me save you the time of typing a stupid comment like that. No, that's the last thing I have in my mind. Dancing has been, since I learned how to stand and walk, one of the most important things to me, and being able to do it here in Korea, and have a real hobby, is something I am really, incredibly happy for. I've been dancing in a bunch of groups & schools throughout my whole life, last time I took hip hop classes in Japan, but besides getting a proper education I've always had this little thought in the back of my mind that  what if this was something I could end up doing for living, or even semi-professionally on the side. 

And all you people who know me, even a bit personally, also know that when I decide something I also go for it 110%. For couple of years until now I've been putting all my focus on being able to move here one day, and now that that's true, it's time to go for new challenges! So dancing it is.

I heard about this place from my school friend about a month ago and since then I've given this a lot of thought and, well, today I went and signed up for hip hop classes. Def company is, what I've heard, one of Korea's best and most appreciated dance & music academies, so I am definitely looking forward to attending the classes there. Today I got a sneak peek of what to expect on Saturday when my first class starts, and I gotta say I was everything but disappointed. The choreography we are going to be learning this month in my class is Kyle Hanagami's version of "YONCE". 

On another, completely unrelated news, we have a speech contest tomorrow at school and after that I am probably going to spend a wild Friday evening catching up on all the homework and school stuff I have yet to do. Have a great weekend everyone and go for your silly, irrational dreams! 

xx,
Julia