My first stout? in Korea

Yesterday evening the manager of Crimson House knocked on my door and asked me if I had plans in the evening... So I told her I had nothing special in mind. She asked me if I was interested to go out to have dinner with an Austrian and Korean guy who live on the fifth floor of Crimson, so I said yes. At first, I thought she was coming to, that would be nice, but she was not planning to. I checked the age for sure and the guys were mid twenties. That can work =).

The Austrian guy - let's call him H to begin with because I don't know if he wants his name published - is a 4 months exchange student at Kyunghee University and is in his final year. The Korean guy - let's call him P - studies at Korea University and is a native Korean with hometown in Busan, located at the south east end of South Korea.
P took us out to dinner near the campus, in a street of which I didn't knew the existence of... of course, I just got here. Actually, I already have been there on Monday when I was at the Hana Bank for my bank account, but I didn't leave the building at the main street's side but at the campus' side. So I didn't notice it. And I thought I lived in a quite neighborhood :). In comparison with Sinchon, these few streets were peanuts. But still the presence of shops, bars, eateries and the crowd of students really made this area into a bustling place to hang out in the evening. And it's not even far from my student house. We went to a 'chicken eatery' were we had some .... yeah CHICKEN. Comparable with KFC, but home style-like. Being a non meat eater, I just ate some vegetables.
Afterwards we went to a 'pub' or 'bar' where we had some snacks - Korean non fat 'chips' and dried squid with peanuts - and drinks. There was a neon sign of 'Hoegaarden' and a big poster of 'Stella Artois' hanging on the wall, so I told them that my home town was Leuven, the Stella Artois town. But they didn't have a clue what I was talking about ;p. "Mijn thuis is waar mijn Stella staat."
I had my first 'Korean stout' Hite Stout and actually it reminded me a of a Palm... So was it really a stout? Is it a 'non compliment' if I try to compare one of our nation's centuries pride called Palm to a foreign beer? Or have my taste buds become so wasted because of the spicy Korean food ;p. And here comes another question : is 'stout' synonym for 'dark ale' while as Palm is an 'amber ale'? Hmmm... I am not really a beer expert, although I come from the 'country of beers'.

H and P were very nice company to hang out with. We talked about a lot of things, especially about cultural differences between Austria, Belgium / Netherlands, USA and Korea, China / Hong Kong. Sometimes it's not so clear to me and to others what nationality I am and where exactly I came from, being Chinese with Dutch nationality, having lived in Belgium for the greatest part of my life and recently moved to the USA which literally IS the country where I came from before I entered Korea. I am sensing a status of 'placelessness' right now.

It's really nice to meet new people, to talk the whole time and find out about things you never knew before. At least, I go out more often than I did during the past half year in the USA ;p. I like meeting people of other cultures and different backgrounds : it broadens your mind, changes your way of thinking about the world and life in general.