says
2023 Certified Organ Donor
says
2023 Certified Organ Donor
Well-Known Member
Recently, you all saw a thread about my new friend Firdaus making a visit to Korea for sightseeing, enjoying time with friends, and of course TABLE TENNIS !!!
Going to a new country, NOT knowing anyone there, AND trying to do stuff is usually a recipe for EPIC failure. Well, in most cases, YES. However, Firdaus is not your average dude. He found my TT association on Facebook and made a thread on TT Daily asking where to play, where to go, how to do stuff, etc. That was one smart move as he nearly instantly found and made friends, who showed him a few things here, which helped him go places, meet people, see the REAL Korea, see and interact with REAL sincere people, and of course enjoy a LOT of TT action!
I met up with Firdaus twice, but times with TT daily Member BricePhan, once at Brice's Korean TT club (where these pics came from) and once yesterday.
The pics below show only a FRACTION of the good times we had. Really, we enjoyed more fun than humans should be allowed.
Meeting #1, we all met up at a subway station, got on the metro, and arrived at Brice's Korean club. We did a couple hours of TT and played each other in singles, and joined up as doubles playing against the club members. Brice's GF and I teamed up in doubles and took out the coach and a top player in the club ^_^. Brice and Firdaus had a blast playing both singles and doubles. Firdaus took pics of us, and I took the pics of team Firdaus/BricePhan... we also went out for veggie pizza and Brice and I continued with some beers at his flat. it was too late to take subway and I showered and crashed there and got in trouble at home coming back. Good mission worth the wrath.
Meeting #2, we met up at the most hopping party spot in the entire nation, walked around the neighborhood looking for an appropriate place to eat, talked and enjoyed ourselves. I suggested we go to Gongdeok stn area, eat in an old-fashioned marketplace style restaurant, then go to a former national player's club for some TT. That plan simply could not fail. We got to the old-school market restaurant complex of 25 restaurants in a maze of old-school market, immediately 3 different owners popped out of the woodwork and tried to kidnap us all make us eat at their restaurant HAHA. The last one helped us out as I told that older lady we were all looking for a cooked fish place. She led us through the maze to another old-school joint. There were two workers there, both sisters in saem family. I think the whole complex restaurant owners are from the same 3 families! There were a couple of older gents finishing their meal and killing some Soju. (powerful clear drink that will get you drunk off your arse in no time for $2 a bottle) We asked for pan-cooked fish. The owner brought us a table full of veggie side dishes. Of course Kimchi was one of them, but there were also cabbage, BEAN SPROUTS (Yeah!), Garlic (Double Yeah!) spicy HOT peppers (Triple Yeah!) and you get the idea. I asked for extra veggies for my needing nourishment and she delivered promptly.
Koreans in these places RARELY se a foreigner in this place as it is off the beaten path, which makes it a PERFECT place to see and experience REAL Korea without anything fake. We ended up killing fish after fish. owner kept giving us fish as service and tons of moar veggie side dishes. We talked with owners and the two old gents. They were grateful to see Foreigners there, especially ones who eat more veggies than them, plus speak great Korean. they never see that, so they were happy and bought us another bottle of beer. Crap, I was trying to go light. It's the late night beers keeping me slightly fat. Oh well, it was just one, split between me and Brice, so it didn't kill us by itself. We finally finished the mountain of healthy food (only the over-refined cooking oil unhealthy) (a small amount of that is bad, but won't kill me) and paid our meal. WOW! it was like under $25 for the entire meal. ALL 3 of us gorged on fish and veggies in an authentic atmosphere for less than $8 USD each! doesn't get any better than that folks!
That can be a typical experience if one does a little networking to make friends before arriving. I have been hooking up new friends like that regularly. I will unfortunately be leaving Korea this fall, but Brice and other friends will likely be on ground in Korea to help everyone.
Here are the pics from meeting #1...
The crew, all of us at the TT club with the owner. Firdaus on left, Team Brice in middle, owner on right. Some foreign joker wearing an orange KFTTC lettered jersey hanging out on middle left.
The venue... Sang-Am TTC
Firdaus posing with the Der_Echte taught cheer...
Brice and William playing a doubles match vs some Achuma ladies
The opponents... One had sponged LP on BH, which I like playing against.
More club action...
My medium high toss clear serve
My opponent's rear no-toss hidden serve. Amatures do not give a crap about ITTF manufactured BS rules. They just like to play.
So.. I better be ready to deal with it, because these players will not change their ways just because ITTF wants to change.
William (Der_Echte) vs Brice in singles
Brice and Firdaus in action vs the Achuma team...
I am a walking advertisement...
team Brice in action...
The after TT action at the Pizza joint...
Going to a new country, NOT knowing anyone there, AND trying to do stuff is usually a recipe for EPIC failure. Well, in most cases, YES. However, Firdaus is not your average dude. He found my TT association on Facebook and made a thread on TT Daily asking where to play, where to go, how to do stuff, etc. That was one smart move as he nearly instantly found and made friends, who showed him a few things here, which helped him go places, meet people, see the REAL Korea, see and interact with REAL sincere people, and of course enjoy a LOT of TT action!
I met up with Firdaus twice, but times with TT daily Member BricePhan, once at Brice's Korean TT club (where these pics came from) and once yesterday.
The pics below show only a FRACTION of the good times we had. Really, we enjoyed more fun than humans should be allowed.
Meeting #1, we all met up at a subway station, got on the metro, and arrived at Brice's Korean club. We did a couple hours of TT and played each other in singles, and joined up as doubles playing against the club members. Brice's GF and I teamed up in doubles and took out the coach and a top player in the club ^_^. Brice and Firdaus had a blast playing both singles and doubles. Firdaus took pics of us, and I took the pics of team Firdaus/BricePhan... we also went out for veggie pizza and Brice and I continued with some beers at his flat. it was too late to take subway and I showered and crashed there and got in trouble at home coming back. Good mission worth the wrath.
Meeting #2, we met up at the most hopping party spot in the entire nation, walked around the neighborhood looking for an appropriate place to eat, talked and enjoyed ourselves. I suggested we go to Gongdeok stn area, eat in an old-fashioned marketplace style restaurant, then go to a former national player's club for some TT. That plan simply could not fail. We got to the old-school market restaurant complex of 25 restaurants in a maze of old-school market, immediately 3 different owners popped out of the woodwork and tried to kidnap us all make us eat at their restaurant HAHA. The last one helped us out as I told that older lady we were all looking for a cooked fish place. She led us through the maze to another old-school joint. There were two workers there, both sisters in saem family. I think the whole complex restaurant owners are from the same 3 families! There were a couple of older gents finishing their meal and killing some Soju. (powerful clear drink that will get you drunk off your arse in no time for $2 a bottle) We asked for pan-cooked fish. The owner brought us a table full of veggie side dishes. Of course Kimchi was one of them, but there were also cabbage, BEAN SPROUTS (Yeah!), Garlic (Double Yeah!) spicy HOT peppers (Triple Yeah!) and you get the idea. I asked for extra veggies for my needing nourishment and she delivered promptly.
Koreans in these places RARELY se a foreigner in this place as it is off the beaten path, which makes it a PERFECT place to see and experience REAL Korea without anything fake. We ended up killing fish after fish. owner kept giving us fish as service and tons of moar veggie side dishes. We talked with owners and the two old gents. They were grateful to see Foreigners there, especially ones who eat more veggies than them, plus speak great Korean. they never see that, so they were happy and bought us another bottle of beer. Crap, I was trying to go light. It's the late night beers keeping me slightly fat. Oh well, it was just one, split between me and Brice, so it didn't kill us by itself. We finally finished the mountain of healthy food (only the over-refined cooking oil unhealthy) (a small amount of that is bad, but won't kill me) and paid our meal. WOW! it was like under $25 for the entire meal. ALL 3 of us gorged on fish and veggies in an authentic atmosphere for less than $8 USD each! doesn't get any better than that folks!
That can be a typical experience if one does a little networking to make friends before arriving. I have been hooking up new friends like that regularly. I will unfortunately be leaving Korea this fall, but Brice and other friends will likely be on ground in Korea to help everyone.
Here are the pics from meeting #1...
The crew, all of us at the TT club with the owner. Firdaus on left, Team Brice in middle, owner on right. Some foreign joker wearing an orange KFTTC lettered jersey hanging out on middle left.
The venue... Sang-Am TTC
Firdaus posing with the Der_Echte taught cheer...
Brice and William playing a doubles match vs some Achuma ladies
The opponents... One had sponged LP on BH, which I like playing against.
More club action...
My medium high toss clear serve
My opponent's rear no-toss hidden serve. Amatures do not give a crap about ITTF manufactured BS rules. They just like to play.
So.. I better be ready to deal with it, because these players will not change their ways just because ITTF wants to change.
William (Der_Echte) vs Brice in singles
Brice and Firdaus in action vs the Achuma team...
I am a walking advertisement...
team Brice in action...
The after TT action at the Pizza joint...
