May 2013

After getting out of the airport and driving across town, Haylee finally arrived to her new destination.

Her new home, which was a cozy apartment above a nice coffee house.

Entering the place, while still holding onto her luggage, Haylee couldn't hide her amazement from what she was seeing. The coffee house had this cozy-home feeling, giving it away by the decorations and the way it looked in general, from the brick walls to the lights, to the floor and the windows.

Sporting the name S[e]oul Central, it had two floors; a beautiful black grand piano by the side of the shop just under the semi second floor, which was outlined by rails making it look like a balcony; there were wall windows on the side of the shop as well as on the same wall as the door, which would be covered by beautiful brownish golden color curtains (not at the moment though). To this, a couple of tables, chairs and couches were placed here and there as well as a nice spot in the middle of the shop were we could find four couches and a table in the middle of them.

The place was filled with customers and had a tasteful sent of coffee and cake.

After looking around, she finally made her way to the empty counter waiting for someone to come out of the kitchen. At that moment, a young woman came out and greeted her new customer.

From the first look, Haylee knew who she was and smiled.

Myung Hee. A 25 years old half Korean half American, living with her boyfriend, Mike, upstairs as well and has been living in Seoul for almost 4-5 years. She was probably one of the nicest person someone could have ever met. Thanks to her, Haylee was able to rent the spare apartment upstairs for the summer without any problem.

Myung Hee saw her new customer and looked carefully as if she was familiar to her. After a couple of seconds, she quickly went around the counter and went for a hug, welcoming her new friend and neighbor. “I'm so glad to see you! How was you're flight?”

“Exhausting, I slept the whole way through~”

“How about I give you a quick tour of your new place so you can settle in?”

“Sounds good!”

She looked at the luggage Haylee had to carry, as in 2 big suitcases, one backpack and a handbag, and calls out for Mike from the kitchen to come and help.

A tall man came out sporting dark hair and dark eyes. He practically had the appearance of a dancer. He was standing next to Myung Hee and the image of the Glee couple came into Haylee's mind.

Mike looked so much like Harry Shum Jr. now that she thought about.

“Hi, I'm Mike, nice to meet you”

“I'm Haylee, it's nice to meet you too!”

“Can you help us with her luggage please?” Myung Hee turned to her boyfriend as she pointed out to her new friend’s luggage. “Sure.”

All three of them were now making their way upstairs.

At the same time, Myung Hee explained to Haylee that if there was anything she needed, or if there was anything wrong, she could call either her or Mike since they lived right across the hall.

All the way to the top, they were now in the apartment and Haylee was surprised at how beautiful it looked, better than the pictures her friend sent over just a couple of months ago while she was looking for a place to stay.

It had the resemblance of the apartment she liked in one of her favorite shows: Once upon a time. Minus the second floor and adding a fireplace, it was just what she always dreamed of having.

“I love it!”

“Good! Let me show you around~”

She did and explained the basic stuff she needed to know and where everything was.

“We'll let you settle in and if you need anything, we'll be downstairs.”

“Okay, thanks”

They left, closing the door behind and as they did, Haylee ran to her bed and jumped right on the mattress squealing from excitement.

‘Finally, my own place!’

She looked around one last time before she started to unpack her stuff.

Two hours later, she went and took a long bath for relaxation as she laid in the bathtub and made a mental plan to herself on how she was going to spend her first day as a tourist tomorrow.

'Ah, c'est la belle vie!'

♥

On the next day, Haylee was ready to go outside and start her sight seeing.

She had prepared a map where she pinpointed places she wanted to go, money for any use of transportation she would use and an umbrella in case of rain.

Putting on some comfortable shoes and comfortable clothes, she stepped out of the building and made her way to her first location.

It was 10 o'clock in the morning and Haylee was ready to start her day.

Everything was perfect.

Visiting places she'd only seen on TV or on the Internet; going in and out from a couple of stores; walking around while enjoying the sunny day in Seoul and through all of this, she got lost.

It was bound to happen, anyway, since she was wasn't familiar with the area and having the map in her hands wasn't really helping anymore at this point.

We could say that she got carried away by her excitement.

Feeling stressed, tired and a little bit scared, she looked around for someone to whom she could ask for directions and luckily, she found one. He seemed to be waiting for someone by a black van wearing a white t-shirt, a pair of jeans and a simple varsity jacket. He kind of looked young and seeing that he was somewhat friendly, she went up to the young man asking for help.

“Excuse me?”

“Yes?”

“Hi… I was wondering if you could help me? I kind of got lost…”

“Sure! Where do you want to go?”

“I want to go back to S[e]oul Central coffee house?”

“Oh, yes! Let me show you.”

Feeling relieved, she showed him her map and pointed her to where they where right now and from there, he gave her directions back to the shop.

“But if you want, I can drive you there, it's on my way to where I need to go. I just have to wait for a couple of people.”

“It's really nice of you, but I'd like to walk my way there. Since I'm new here, I wouldn't mind looking around a little bit on my way back. But thank you for your help!” She bows to him, thankful that he helped her, making the stranger lightly chuckle. “No problem, just make sure not to get lost again~”

Laughing to his words, she bids her goodbyes one last time and went back to her walk.

Well, dear readers, who knew that she possibly got lucky by this simple encounter?

Obviously you didn't know, but don't worry, you're aren’t the only one. She was completely oblivious as well.

By the time she left, a group of five young men came out of the building right in front of the older man seeing that their friend just finished talking to a young lady. Opening the back door to let them in as they entered the car one by one, the last boy caught a glimpse of her and asked the older one who she was.

“Hyung! Who were you just talking to?”

“She just asked me for directions since she got lost.”

“She looks pretty~”

“Well you'd be lucky if she gets lost again and happened to come across you. Now hurry up and get in before we're late for your next schedule.”

He got the chance to catch a last glimpse of her while she kept walking down the sidewalk looking around fascinated by what she was seeing.

The result?

A smile started to appear on his face hoping to have a chance meet her one day.