Sometimes you want to go,
Where everyone knows your name"
The catchy lyrics to the popular 80's show Cheers, based at a Boston bar, warms your heart a little every time you hear it, just like that first swig of whisky you down at 9pm on a Friday night.
Bars are a lot like boyfriends I have realized.
There are endless bars to spend your evenings in. There are the glamourous ones, pretentious and expensive ones, the dingy hazy ones, the old ones, young ones, college ones, ones without chairs but with floormats and hookahs, sports obsessed ones, specialized ones, patriotic ones, the morally lacking ones, the after club ones, and the live music ones . Although there are many to test out, not every bar you order a pint from is going to be the right fit for you.
You can't help but be picky when searching for "your bar." Everything has to align.
The atmosphere has to be right for your taste. The music must coincide with what's in your Ipod, the volume of the music versus the volume of the bar noises must balance. The crowd that frequents the bar must be to your liking; you should be able to strike up a conversation at anytime with anyone who walks in and be in common company. Other things to consider are location for when you stumble home, the quality of the drinks and food on the menu, the awesomeness of the bartenders, the coolness of the owner, and the fact that whenever you need it most, it is always available to you. There is always a seat for you with good company nearby.
So after searching high and low for the better part of a year, I have found "my bar." Stuck in an impossible-to-find alley surrounded by a surplus of galbi restaurants that all look the same, and an always faint aroma of vomit in the air sits Beer O'Clock, a Canadian owned bar not too far from Sinchon Station. Ladies and gents, this is my bar. I am not going to say other bars didn't come close, there are a few in Itaewon that tickle my fancy; Wolfhound (a bit too eclectic these days), Scrooge (a bit on the sportsy side), and good old Zen in Hongdae (a bit too grungy pretentious) do a good job of occupying my time during the darker portion of the day, but Beer O'Clock has sealed my committment.
But just like boyfriends, good bars come and go in your life. You move away, you begin to frequent it less, and then when you do return on those nights when you're in the neighbourhood, you discover, unexpectedly, that it has changed. The place you once felt so good in now has a foreign atmosphere to it. The crowds are different, the noise and music, which was once eloquent is now just noise and murmer, and you realized just as the bar changed, so did you.
So you finish the last gulp of that beer and you move on.
In search for the next bar to call your own.
But you'll always have the good old memories made at the one you left behind. So cheers!
(*Photo Credit: Beer O'Clock website, NOT my photo*)
