The Amusement Park

Does this look familiar? No silly, it's not Disney World; it's Lotte World!







Lotte World is the largest indoor theme park in the world. In addition, there's also a newer outdoor section with some exciting rides.

The indoor portion of Lotte World is huge. There are crowds everywhere! The park was built in 1989 and all the rides indoor date back to the park's founding. So, there weren't a lot of thrills. Koreans have a problem with originality. The music, the movies, the clothes, and the companies are spitting images of American pop culture. For instance, the first Korean movie I saw was, "The Good, the Bad, and the Weird" which was a spitting image of the old Clint Eastwood flick only modified to Korean history. There is a clothing company called Crocodile, which suspiciously resembles Lacoste clothing. Naturally, the rides at Lotte World are clones of Disney World rides. There is a ride in Lotte World named "Sindbad's Revenge" aka "Pirates of the Caribbean" at Disney World.

Outside is where all the fun is, and I sure loved it. There is this one ride called "The Gyro Drop." I'll let this video clue you in on the rest...




As you can see, it's equipped with a sizable drop. When the ride started to accelerate to the top, I looked over at Meg and saw little tears start to stream down her cheek. I made her go on this ride. She was starting to panic. At the top of the ride, when the ride stopped spinning, Meg began to lose it. She screamed, "We're going to die!" And in less than 3 seconds, it was over. Although Meg was shaking like a leaf during November, we lived.

We also got to ride the Gyro Swing, which might be the world's biggest, fastest spinning swing. (click the link for a video) This ride was the closest thing to flying I'll ever experience. There was one worthwhile roller coaster as well. It was a great day.

On to a random note...
Since Micheal Jackson's death, I've heard random Korean storefronts blaring his tunes constantly for the last two days. The guy was an international superstar. He is the one guy whose hit songs can ALWAYS get me to dance or at least drum my foot. I'll never forget the response Billy Jean got at Jimmy's wedding. Those guys who grew up with MJ (too lazy to type it out) made me wish that I grew up in that era. To see 40 year old Jimmy trying to do the splits to Billy Jean was hilarious. The music (and alcohol) motivated him to dance his ass off. His childhood friend, Tom, was singing and moonwalking around the dance floor like he was MJ. It was an awesome sight. The guy was a legend, and I'm a huge fan. So was I sad to here that he died... not really, not at all. He died to me a couple of years after the Free Willy song came out. After he started transforming into a creep, a clown. After he started dangling babies off balconies. After he was accused of multiple child molestations. In the later part of his life, he was overshadowed by the controversies that surrounded him. This is the MJ I know, the caricature version. I'm more bummed out about Billy Mays.