From the get go the city of Seoul exceeded our expectations (which for John were already pretty high). After getting lost in the airport, getting on the right train, and finding our way to our hostel, we walked around the neighborhood of Hongdae where we were staying. We both agreed it was nice to be back in a city, especially one that reminded us so much of Chicago.
With so many cute coffee shops and restaurants on every street we walked down, it was a bit of a stimulus overload and made our lunch decision very hard. The place we walked into turned out to be the perfect welcome to Korean dining. Once we sat down the waitress brought quite an array of objects to our table: Two cups, a water bottle, two small plates, two small bowls filled with mystery stuff (turned out to be Kimche, yum!), a big bowl filled with napkins, wet towels, 2 sets of chopsticks, 2 long spoons and a pair of scissors. We looked at each other with the expression of “what did we get ourselves into?!”. Then we looked at the menu that consisted of one item that came in small medium or large size and a choice of thin or thick noodles. We chose small size with thin noodles, seemed pretty safe. Then we started looking around to see what other people were doing with all of this stuff that had just been given to us. First, wipe hands with towels, next poor water into cups, eat Kimche with chopsticks, pretty simple. Then our food came out, it was like a big plate of chicken pieces and noodles in a stew like sauce, really delicious! We soon also saw people using the scissors to cut the noodles (that were otherwise impossible to bite into smaller pieces). Over all it was a fun first experience in Seoul!
The rest of the day we just walked around taking in all of the unique buildings and new things. There is a university very close to where we’re staying so we walked through there a bit. It is a beautiful campus in the city and John even saw his first two new birds here!
The next day we took the metro to the downtown area of Seoul. We visited Bukchon Hanok Village, a Korean traditional village and street, that was full of beautiful old buildings and art. It seemed like people still lived in this village which is pretty cool living in this little gem of history in a huge city. We found a neat coffee shop and got a sweet potato latte which was amazing and a Yuja tea. Then we walked to Gyeongbokgung palace. We got there just in time to see the changing of the guards ceremony which was very cool. The palace was beautiful painted all sorts of colors and filled with history.
After lunch we walked around the downtown some more and along the stream that runs through the city. Then we decided to see Namsangol Hanok Village which was in a beautiful park. Unlike the other village this one seemed maintained for tourist purposes and not for actual living anymore but the buildings were still beautiful and fun to walk around.
Saturday morning we went to a coffee shop so John could do some homework. We got the best hot chocolates ever (yes hot chocolate because we’re children). It was nice to take it easy in the morning after a long day before of walking and sight seeing.
It rained most of the day, so instead of walking through Namsan park to see the tower, we decided to try one of the cool ice cream places I had found on Pintrest. They make ice cream in the shape of roses which turned out to be just as tasty as they were pretty!
That night we met up with some former Thougtworkers who showed us a great time in the Itaewon neighborhood. We walked around a bit to explore and then found somewhere to have dinner. After that we headed to a karaoke bar where we got a taste of Korean karaoke and of course some Soju (the most popular alcohol in South Korea). We all had a blast belting out songs for the rest of the night.
Our time in Seoul was short but definitely sweet. We loved the city and the people in it and will be sure to visit again some time soon hopefully! Now we are off to Borneo for a week with a full day of travel ahead.
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