I almost never play MTTs (online or otherwise)...they take too long for my taste. I hadn't really played any poker at all lately due to my recent marriage. However, my buddy convinced me to play in a live, end of the month tourney at the Walker Hill Casino in Seoul, Korea.

Details:
Buy in: $200+20
Entries: 54
Starting stacks: 10,000
Blinds: 25/50, increasing every half hour
Spots payed: 9 (10th place also gets free entry into an end of month tourney, so was actually worth as much as 9th)

In first few rounds, not much happened, I built up a slightly larger than average chip stack and than lost a huge chunk w/ double gut shot + flush draw missing. Was down to 3500 chips in 200/400 blinds. By stealing blinds and retarted limps, was able to double up w/out seeing a flop, and then doubled again on a coinflip. From there I took off, winning by stealing blinds and out playing people. Had a very tight table so used it to my advantage. I won a huge pot to double up by smooth calling a raise by SB from BB (w/ AA), win all in flop of 345 (I blanched when saw his 66).

Won some more big pots, when got down to final 5, knocked out 5, 4, and 3. 5 was A9 > 56 (all in preflop). 4th was pretty fun, I raised on button w/ Q7s to steal blinds, BB called and flop was 79J, he checked and I followed up and he called. Both of us checked the 8 turn, and then river comes T. He checks to me, and I shoved all in, he thinks for few seconds and calls me (almost half his chips were in the pot), he got pretty pissed when I flipped over the Q. Knocked out 3rd w/ AJ > KJ. I was up about 7:1 on 2nd at this point and felt pretty good (and tired, had lasted from 5PM to about 1 at this point). My opponent was a young girl who looked about 22 at most, she had played pretty solid all day. I offered her a deal where I'd give her $100 on top of 2nd place if she gave up now, she said lets just play. She doubled up quick w/ her 66 holding against A5s. She doubled up AGAIN bit later by catching her flush on river after all in on turn. We kept playing, and I had about a 6:5 chip lead on her. We agreed to split 1st and 2nd prize, and than she give me $100, so eventually I ended up w/ close to $3000 prize.

Had good time, was pretty happy w/ my play overall. Sorry for the brag of a post, but its my first :)