Ringing in the New Year in South Korea

My Korean New Years Eve started bright and early at 7.45am.  Winter Intensive classes started this week so we had to be at school around 9.00am for 10-1 classes.  Had a few hours break, then it was back for my regularly scheduled classes at 4.  For whatever reason (complainy parents, Korean drinking culture, or maybe just their fascination with any Western tradition in general), we get New Years Day off from work.  So after work we all probably should have headed into Seoul and partied til our legs fell off, but instead we decided to stick around our area and celebrate a friend/coworker's 24th birthday at midnight all together in one place (except for 2 of our coworkers who are jerks).  We took the bus to a bar called Jukebox where you can request music all night, and they had a big screen set up showing the Korean bell ringing ceremony in Jonggak (I guess it's equivalent to the ball drop, and by equivalent I mean not even remotely like it at all).  We had some drinks and food there, and had a celebratory shot to ring in the new year and celebrate our friend Arnecia's birthday.  After midnight some people headed home, a few of us went to light off dangerous $2.00 fireworks near the river, and then the group split again.  Some stayed at the bar, and four of us went to our favorite dive-y Suji bar, Underground.  Spent a few hours there and headed home.  Pretty lackluster and not much of a story to update, but I spent NYE with good company, decent drinks, and good laughs.  I've been blessed with some pretty phenomenal friends in Korea, and if I couldn't spend NYE with my friends & family back home, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world than here.

2012 was pretty good to me.  I graduated from college, finally.  Made a few growing up decisions.  Had one of the best summers of my life living with two people who quickly became two of my best friends (er 3, sorry Justice).  Moved to Korea, loving my job and what I'm doing here and not thinking too far ahead into the future at this point.  They say the way you ring in the New Year dictates the way you will spend the remainder of those 365 days (or is this a leap year, I forget?).  If that's true, I'm going to be single, slightly tipsy, and wearing a dress that is too tight for me for the next year, so I guess that sets the bar low!