Let's Do the Time Warp, Bowling Style

Rev up the flux capacitor and open the doors to the Delorian because we're headed back in time to a time when connecting to the internet meant that you couldn't use the phone.  A time when gas would regularly dip below $1 per gallon.  A time where I was a kid at a bowling alley, just striving to get that last pin down.


We found this time warp bowling alley just off the busy shopping area of Myeong-dong in Seoul and it had all the requisite awesomeness of a bowling ally in the early 90s.  First, it had the obligatory "bowling in space" scenes that come alive under a blacklight.  I'm not sure of the connection between space travel and bowling, but I do know that when space travel becomes possible, I would like to do it in a bowling pin shaped vessel.

Second, there is the push button score keeping machine.
No LCD touch screens here.  Only an array of buttons, each with a particular function.  This was the end of any sort of math in bowling and probably led to a rise in drinking at the lanes.  With no higher level thinking needed, the brain was now free to be awash in Pabst.  Unfortunately, the bowling ally people wouldn't let me use it and instead insisted that they do all of the functions with "the machine".

Of course, the scoring machine needs a display, and that's where these wonderful CRT monitors come in handy.
Just look at the pop in those colors!  All 4 of them.  Someday, they may upgrade to 16 colors, but I fear that may be too much for the eyes to handle at once.  I like how our display is also warped just like I remember it.  Someone needs to smack it with a broom stick and sort out the display.  That usually works.

This particular time machine is not without its quirks, though.  Most obvious, it's in Korea, so it's full of Koreans in matching bowling outfits.  Not any matching outfits.  Pink ones.
And in case you are wondering, the Koreans we saw bowling are pretty good.  I thought that America could still dominate the bowling scene, but it looks like the Koreans have caught up.  Well, we still have a leg up on meat loaf.  So, you know, that's something.

And of course, in my memories of bowling alleys, I did not have facial hair or a wife.  Such is the march of time.


Finally, if you are in Korea and you want to visit your own personal bowling time machine, they're pretty easy to find.  Just look for the giant bolwing pins outside.