All Play, No Work - Part 2 -Seoul

Ahh Seoul, the city of 12 million people and the cultural centre of Korea. . .you’d think the things we did there would be endless and exciting. Alas, those kinds of doings take planning, and plan we did not until 11: 00 pm the night before we left. This was not intentional, as certain things were out of our hands and we weren’t even sure if we were going to Seoul until we started looking for hostels that night and realized the only available hostels in Korea were in Seoul (and there is a reason our hostel was so available, I think, but we’ll get to that later. . .)

Anna, Kristin, Robyn and I left for Seoul Thursday evening, using the gloriously inexpensive-by-Canadian-standards (and reflective of the cost of all Korean transportation) KTX high-speed train. We conquered the Seoul subway system with its madly-confusing intersecting nine lines and the masses of people (think New York City and then some and with pushier people) to arrive at our hostel which we later found out DID have air conditioning as advertised IF you had hostel companions show up on your second night with a Korean-speaking friend who was willing to argue with the host until he told him where he hid the remote. We also found out that our host liked to stare at people in the morning when they were sleeping and say things in Korean/broken English and then laugh oddly so as to make you wonder if he was all there in the head. Let’s just say we didn’t mind the company of the nine other people crammed into the tiny apartment, just so long as we didn’t have to be alone with him.

We arrived in Seoul late in the afternoon, so the first thing we did was embark on yet another attempt to eat at a Korean restaurant. This had not yet happened on vacation because we cannot read Korean and did not want to risk eating something we would rather not, and because it is more difficult than you may think to find a Korean restaurant menu with English subtitles. But we found one and had delicious chicken galbi with rice fried in an amount of butter that went against everything my mom ever taught me about low-fat eating.

Robyn and I dangerously close to being "matchy-matchy, same-same"

Then we decided to end the evening with a relaxing drink, which of course turned into an adventure. We were turned away from two places (we’re hoping it was only because they were full, except that the one definitely had empty booths) and we left two others- one because it was too expensive and the other because we had to order $14 appetizers to go with our $2 drinks. Walking out of a restaurant/bar is not so awkward when you know people are going to be staring at you anyways because you’re white, plus I’m pretty sure they expect us to be strange. We did finally find a place, at which we promptly caught the attention of some American businessmen whom we escaped- after they paid for our drinks of course!


On Friday we headed out for a hike in Bukhansan National Park. We found the general area easily enough, but wandered around for awhile (nothing new for us) trying to figure out how to get to the hiking trails until a young boy cheerfully told us to “Come here!” and skipped his way through the streets until we arrived at the entrance to the trails.

You will likely be seeing a lot of mountain view pictures over the next year as they run rampant in Korea and I enjoy hiking them.

Afterwards, we spent a while in Myeong-dong Shopping Area, Korea’s “trendiest shopping area” where we successfully searched for and found Forever 21, which I’m pretty sure has to be the largest Forever 21 in the world!! We ended the night walking along part of Cheonggyecheon Stream- something I had circled in my Korea tourism book before I left Canada. We didn’t see the whole stream, so when I'm in Seoul again, I’m going back.

A little haven of peace and quiet in the midst of a busy city.

On Saturday we took it easy and strolled around the streets, checking out little clothing shops and an amazing art free-market which made me wish I had money. In the evening we went to an FC Seoul soccer game- my first soccer game ever- at the Seoul World Cup Stadium during which there were fireworks and confetti for the kickoff and every time Seoul scored- try that at a hockey game!

This is the cheering section that was on its feet the entire game chanting, yelling, and jumping up and down like madmen. They must be very fit people. I got tired just waving my FC Seoul fan around.

Later that night while hanging out on the front step of a hostel we were chatted up by two Korean men who looked not much older than us, but then gave away their age by saying, “I went to school in America for 5 years, and worked there for 10, and I have been back in Korea for 7 years” – that makes them about 40. Yeah, buddy, you should’ve kept your mouth shut. This tip is for Koreans in general, who tend to look a LOT younger than they really are. Anyways, we dodged an invitation to go to some sort of spa and chat by agreeing to meet up with them in exactly three weeks at that same spot. . .yeah, okay.

Thus ended my first vacation in Korea.