So I was in Manila with my travel buddy Elizabeth and we stayed at a place advertised as a ‘Home Stay’. It was actually an apartment which was turned into a hostel. We were placed in 4-person room, with two bed bunks.
So quite naturally, I took up the top bed while Elizabeth took the lower bed. While most of the nights we had the room all to ourselves, there was one night when a traveller from Korea came in to take up the other unoccupied bunk bed.
He didn’t talk much, but then most Korean travellers don’t really talk much. Perhaps it is the language.
He would have been another forgettable traveller if he did not do one thing in particular. Before he went to sleep, he’d put layers of newspapers on his bed and I can tell you, the bed was so spotless and immaculate, I seriously did not see any need to do what he did.
And yet he put the newspapers all over his bed. As weird as it might have looked to me and my travel buddy Elizabeth, we would have just shrugged our shoulders off and allowed ourselves to get some good sleep so we could wake up fresh the next morning and continued exploring the beautiful city of Manila.
Unfortunately, it didn’t really happen that way. The newspapers would crumble and rustle under his rolling weight so we had to endure through all the noises all night long. The night turned out to be so long, at least to me.
Unfortunately, he left before we even had the chance to ask what kind of disease he was suffering through that he had to do what he did, or whether it really was his physical needs or it was more like in his head (and yes, I mean mental). While all the questions were left unanswered, even until now, we were actually glad that he only stayed there only for one night – so the suffering of having to endure through the stupid noises he made with the spread-out newspapers turned out to be a one-night stand business. Phew.
But then somehow, it was not the only encounter with weird travellers from Korea during that particular trip. There was one time when we were enjoying a bucket (or two, or perhaps three, I don’t remember now LOL) of San Miguel Light at a local bar near to our Home Stay when a commotion suddenly erupted. It turned out that the bouncers were trying to stop a small group of Korean travellers from leaving without paying for the beers that they had already ordered and drank.
Doing a little bit of digging-in (or digging-out, whichever you think will suit you and your thoughts), we found out that the Koreans had joined a group of locals at a table, ordered beers and decided to leave (without paying), expecting the locals to pay the beers for them. I think the locals already knew the trick, and wouldn’t buy it so they had probably told the bouncers or the waiters that they were not going to pay for the beers that they Korean travellers had ordered and drank. Or perhaps even the bouncers and the waiters already knew. Perhaps, this kind of stupid behaviour which I could only pin down to some superiority complex was not really unexpected from a group of Korean travellers.
And yes indeed, who would have thought that we’d become a victim of this very stupidity the very next day. We were having another round of San Miguel Light at an open stall by the side of a road when a couple from Korea came to join us. So introducing themselves and we to them, they ordered beers for themselves and continued chatting up with us. I gotta say it was a cheerful conversation and me and Elizabeth were quite enjoying it, except for what they did in the end.
They left without paying.
Fucking wierd Koreans.
P/S : To be fair this was back in 2012, so I am sure the Koreans have changed over the years. And I have met good (and bad) Korean tourists since then. This was only based on the thoughts that I remember coming to me during that time.