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[bonaducci]

http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/SITE/data/html_dir/2007/07/18/200707180027.asp?b_kind=&board_idx=

The ties that bind at Rock & Roll

It's 10 p.m. on a steamy monsoonal Wednesday night and Leigh Hardy is perched at the end of the bar at Rock & Roll -- Busan's latest, and according to its growing number of devotees, greatest foreigner bar.
Eyeing off an enviable spread consisting of a bottle of chilled Chilean Undurraga sparkling wine and a plate piled high with peanut butter-smothered toast, a smile slowly spreads across Hardy's face as the melodic strains of Kiwi one-hit wonders OMC's "How Bizarre" floats through the air. For this 34-year-old English instructor at Dongeui University, bar life in Korea doesn't get any better.

"This place is brilliant," he said while carefully pouring a flute of bubbly. "Great atmos, fab food, good people, cheap booze and free peanut butter toast. I've been looking for a bar where I can feel at home and now I've found it."


For Yoon Jung-gil, owner of Rock & Roll, Hardy's affirmations are music to his ears. "This has always been my dream," he said, gesturing around the interior of his bar. "Busan, and especially Seomyeon, has long been in need of a place where foreigners can escape and feel comfortable. What you see around you is my attempt to create an oasis of comfort in the city."

Yoon, who took up bartending after losing his arm in a 2003 industrial accident, now combines his love of people and passion for music in a business that enables him to meet new people and help bridge the gap between the foreign and Korean communities.

"I wanted to change my life after the accident," he said. "I needed to do something special where I could be creative and enjoy myself. Working in a Korean office is very difficult and not my style."

According to Yoon, opening a bar was the answer to his conundrum.

"I have many foreign friends and enjoy foreign culture," he said. "Foreigners don't make trouble when they drink and are friendly and have good manners. That's what inspired me to make this a jeong-style bar for creating close feelings between foreigners and Koreans."

A drummer who loved to smack the skins to Robert Palmer's "Bad Case of Loving You" during his university days, Yoon explained that it was his love of music which helped in the naming of his bar.

It's funny really," he said. "I love grunge music and rock 'n' roll, so when one of my foreign friends and me were talking about a name for my bar, he said, 'Hey Jung-gil, everybody likes to rock 'n' roll' -- what a perfect name!"

Always on the lookout for something new, Yoon has brought the sparkling wine and champagne craze sweeping through Europe this past year to Korea. Rock & Roll boasts a well-stocked refrigerator with tasty tipples from France, Spain and Chile -- the perfect drink for Korea's summer nights.

Jane Shin, an English teacher from Seoul visiting Busan for the week, is on her third bottle of Spain's Freixenet Cordon Negro Brut -- oft touted as equal in quality to Moet & Chandon but at a fraction of the price. "This tastes awesome," she said. "I was quaffing bottles of the stuff in London earlier in the year at a tapas restaurant and can't believe it's here."

But for Todd Roberts, an English teacher from Canada always on the lookout for more bang from his drinking buck, the cheapest pints of San Miguel Draft in Korea are a real draw. "Forget the bubbly dude," he said. "Three thousand five hundred won for what other places charge 7,000 is music to my ears. I love this joint."

In fact, according to many of Rock & Roll's patrons, the bar has cornered the cheap drinks market on the peninsula. And with 15,000 won all-you-can-drink Korean draft beer and house cocktails between 6 p.m. and midnight Sunday to Friday, it's difficult to argue. The free July 21 summer vacation party with all of the above and snacks between 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. is also further evidence of the establishment's well-received liquid sunshine policy.

Back at the bar, Hardy has polished off his second plate of toast and is smoking a Marlboro Menthol cigarette in between sips of his sparkling wine. "You know," he said blowing a smoke ring, "bar life really doesn't get any better than this."

Rock & Roll is open from 6 p.m. to 4 a.m., Sunday to Thursday, and 6 a.m. on Friday and Saturday. To get there, cross from Lotte Hotel at Seomyeon Station and continue 50 meters off the main road. For more information, call (051) 818-3425.

By John Scott Marchant

([email protected])




2007.07.18

[jaganath69]

I still maintain it's actually the place on T Street with the smoking hot Korean-Russian girls working there.

[swetepete]

Toast? In a bar? With booze?

Holy snapping arseholes. Why didn't I think of that?

[wo buxihuan hanguoren]

[jaganath69]

[swetepete]

Yeah, the sparkling wine lovers can take a leaping f**k at a rolling donut, but I want peanut butter toast.
Then again; hmm, wait a second. What kind of booze goes good with toast? I like toast and milk, but I don't like booze and milk.

Maybe I should just buy a toaster...

[chevro1et]

Yea, Rock and Roll is a pretty decent little place, just depends on what mood or scene you are looking for. Prices are pretty reasonable, and the music is good, thats for sure.

[VirginIslander]

I prefer the 7-11.

[bonaducci]

[swetepete]

No way dude! Having a few pops in front of the shops is one of Korea's great summertime pleasures. Bars are well and good, but a few cans with friends at the ministop is great.

If that makes me a boozer and a loser, fine; I prefer it to being a poser and a hoser. You can have fun vogueing with your chianti, but I'll take a Becks at the Sleven, and look better doing it!

[bonaducci]

[bonaducci]

Had a huge night at the Rock & Roll bar on Friday (as opposed to the street outside a 7-11 with a couple of Korean sojuheads). I kid you not, that place has the cheapest booze in Korea.