Relative Taste

I've got to send out a big thanks to my relatives for their gracious hospitality and generosity extened to my firends. Not having seen many of them for over 4 years, I was very happy to have the chance to visit Korea on my way to Germany.

Raw Tuna
My uncle took us all out for dinner to a swish japanese sashimi restaraunt, and we ate huge amounts of raw seafood. I'd never tried the different cuts of Tuna meat, from belly, to cheek meat, it was very different in texture and taste. We we very appreciative of the company and the dining experience.

Soups
My Aunt invited us out for lunch in down town Lotte Department store to a restaraunt called Han Woo Ri for a delicious 2 course dish that was prepared on the table for us by one of the pretty waitresses. The first course was a noodle soup dish served with stips of beef, seasoned with pepper, garlic and chili. The second course was a rice congee made from the remaining soup base. This was probably the best noodle soup dish I have ever had. I am thoroughly grateful for the dining experience.

Vegetarian
My cousin Hee Seup took me out to dinner at San Chon. Run by a buddist monk, the restaraunt is a vegetarian, set menu experience. They brought out little samplers of different vegetarian condements like different kim chi's, various root vegetables, mushrooms, some vegetable tempura, a tofu soup, some congee and even some rice cakes for desert. This was a real treat highlighting some of the typical monk dishes.

Traditional Tea
My cousin Clara showed me around Insa Dong, where we looked at some traditional crafts and then went to a traditional tea house. It was relaxing and calming to sit in a centuries old house. The place had real charm and I wish I'd taken a pen to add my grafiti to the walls. We sat and drank cold fruit Punch tea listening to some temple music reading notes left behind by travelers as far back as '97.

Jug Jug Fusion Beer

In preparations for the Korea Togo match, we headed out to KOEX convention centre to a bar called O'Kims Brauhaus. It was a german themed bar that brew their own boutique german style beer. Funny as the O'Kim suggested Irish tendencies. The place was decked out in World Cup paraphenalia, but unfortunately it had been fully booked out for the football event. We made our way to the underground to another place called Jug Jug, a "beer fusion restaraunt", not Jug Jug as in Hooters, but Jug Jug as in jugs of beer. We got there 4 hours before kick-off to get good seats. I was surprised to see on the big screen that the pre match entertainment had already started. At the Seuol World Cup stadium, a 4 hour marathon concert was taking place in the leadup to kick-off.

Jug Jug was packed and jumping with over zealous red devil supporters by game time. There was lots of cheering Dea-han-min-kuk and Han-kuk Han-kuk. Togo took the lead early on through a great goal and the silence was deafening, finally broken up by some moans and sighs of disappoinment once the realisation of being behind had sunk in. Korea appeared shellshocked and the crowd became subdued, although the girls pericing screams at the slighest sight of goal was distracting. Korea seemed to recover as the match wore on and as they eventually came away with the win, the party atmosphere lifted in intensity.

On the streets above ground it was even more chaotic, an advertising truck pulled up handing out free cans of coke and the truck was litereally mobbed. I dont think I'll soon forget this night. I can only imagine what would have happened had Korea lost that game.

Korea 2 : Togo 1

Watching the match live from Jug Jug, the mood was jovial and light hearted as Korea were expecting to brush aside their african opponents, but as the match started it was evident that the scouting reports about Togo's abilities and preparations were grossely underestimated.

The opening exchanges were guarded, with both sides feeling each other out. Exploiting some sluggins Korean defence Togo took the lead with a fantastic opening goal by Kadher. Korea seemed to go into their shell afterwards and seemed directionless, bar a few long rance efforts from Lee Eul Young and Choi Jin Cheul. After the interval, Dick Advocat made the telling substitution to introduce Ahn, and Kim changing his formation formation from 3-4-3 to a 4-2-4 system. Ahn's speed and movement seemed to inject some spark and impoteous back into their play and soon pressed forward.

The telling moment of the game came with the sending off of Togo captain, Jean Paul Abalo for a second yellow after brining down Park Ji Sung on the edge of the area as he burst through the defence. Lee Chun Soo curled in the resulting free kick to level the match and it was game on. Togo a man down kept 2 upfront and although outnumbered in always looked dangerous on the break, but an Ahn Jung Hwan strike from outside the box broke the deadlock as korea eventually came away with the win.

In a sign of tactical maturity, Korea elected to play the ball back and maintain posession late on in the game instead of piling forward. Some fans didn't approve and disappointingly booed the play, however this failed to dampen spirits and the party rolled on.

Buck Mulligan's

To catch Australia's first World Cup game we went to Buck Mulligans, an Irish pub in Down town, under the Seoul Finance Centre. The atmosphere was pretty cool, with most of the Folks supporting Australia because of the ties with Gus Hiddink and the constant Japanese rivalry. We ordered out pitcher of Hite and our dried snacks (dried fish and jerky served with mayonaise and chilli sauce) and settled in.

We were feeling pretty pleased with the way things were progressing in the game until that "goal". As the game drew on we felt gutted and totally cheated, almost to the point of telling the lone Japanese table to shut up. Thankfully with legend Gus' introduction of Timmy Cahil it all turned around and our sorrow turned to joy, I think we screamed our lungs out and scared half the people around us. As the goals went flying in, we continued to celebrate and to our disappointment, the Japanese table had left before the end...

Australia 3 : Japan 1

Australia made a lively start to the match and proceeded to probe the Japanese defence. They created a number of good chances, most notable a back heel (Hi Ben!) by Viduka to Bresciano who had his side footed shot turned around the post by Japanese keeper Kawaguchi.

Japan bearly troubled Schwarzer until mid way through the first half when a Nakamura free kick was lofted into the box. As the Aussie goalie came to field the ball, he was blatantly obstructed by both Takahara and Yanagisawa, but the Egyptian referee failed to see it and allowed the goal to stand. After such a devastating blow the Australians seemed to lose their way and for the rest were generally held to long range efforts. Just before half time, Bresciano again had Kawaguchi scrambling in goal as a free kick went inces wide.

Gus Hiddink introduced Tim Cahil, Josh Kennedy and John Aloisi to play 3 up front and finally the goal came after Kawaguchi failed to clear a cross and a subsequent goal mouth scramble, Cahil was on hand to slide in the equaliser. Cahil added a second just minutes later with a superb strike from the edge of the box with the ball rebounding off both posts before nestling in the back of the net. Finally Aloisi made a forceful run into the box from the left, turning his marker and slipping a low shot past Kawaguchi for the third in injury time.

A fantastic result and sense of justice after the farce of the first goal.

About Row One

So what's with Row One?

We put an enormously small amount of effort into the title of our blog, but we're pretty pleased with the result. The name came about because all of our World Cup tickets are seated in "Row 1" of a particular section. Not a bad stroke of luck, eh? But all of our tickets are also in an "obstructed view" section, so we'll see how it really turns out when we finally get there!

Other blog names we considered:

Obstructed View - a close second for our title, since all our tickets are obstructed view in addition to being in the first row.
Soccerwhos? - being an unknown quantity at the world cup ready to do some damage!
The Upper-Cut Celebration - In honour of Gus Hiddinks goal celebrations.
The Double Upper-Cut - When he's really excited about a goal!

As for the URL address:

R1G06 = Row 1, Germany, 2006