10 –
First thing we did after checking into our hotel was go shopping, because our hotel is conveniently located right smack bang in the middle of
The Lotte department store, located just across the road from us (and, btw, is ginormous!) has many many things that attract the likes of me and Marisa.
We kind of went bananas looking at clothes, bags, shoes…. and bought a few items… but speaking of shoes, that first afternoon of shopping I got separated from Marisa in Lotte, by the time she found me, I was in the shoe department, seated and surrounded by shoes and a shop assistant bringing me more shoes and fitting shoes onto my feet. I felt like Carrie Bradshaw! Gotta love Korean service, such a stark contrast to what I have been receiving in
That night, we also found out that our hotel has a self-service coin laundry and not only that, but it only costs 2000 won to wash and dry, that’s less than $AU2! I’m so glad we decided against doing our laundry in
After shopping, we were a little concerned about not knowing where to have dinner. We really wanted to have something Korean, and something relatively cheap and close by as well as yummy of course.
We were at a complete loss as to where to go, I mean, don’t get me wrong, there were food places all around us, so we were not going to starve. It was just a matter of deciding which one seemed the best choice.
When we wandered around our little area before dinner, we were pleasantly surprised to find the streets had come even more alive in the evenings than during the day. Not only are the shops still open but the roads were closed off and little street stalls had propped up all around the entire area. It was wonderful.
What I have noticed in the first few hours in
talking at least every 3rd shop being a glasses shop. Are there really that many people with vision impairment living in
Day 2 –
Our last full day of holidays, I’m so sad.
This morning we’ve booked ourselves onto a half day tour of Seoul which took us to a local temple, drove past the current palace because we’re not allowed to stop in front as it’s viewed as a security risk, we stopped by the old palace and watched the changing of the guards, which is (for obvious reasons) such an amusing difference to the changing of the guards at Monaco palace. We also got to walk through the then Emperor’s sleeping chambers and all the chambers of his wives and concubines. We got to see the Korean history museum and then made an obligatory tourist trap shopping stop. This time, ours was an amethyst factory/ workshop/ retail outlet. Apparently
At the end of the tour, they dropped us off at Itaewon, yet another shopping strip… it turned out kind of disappointing really. There wasn’t much to see there, I have been told that this shopping strip once upon a time openly heralded knock-offs of all major brands and labels, and depending on how much you were willing to pay, you can get a pretty decent quality fake Louis Vuitton bag or a Chanel or a whatever takes your fancy thingyameebob. The sellers show you a catalogue of the full-range of bags they can make for you because they cannot openly display their goods, but what amused me no end was that there are different qualities & grades of knock-offs. The more you pay, the better the quality and apparently the top grade stuff is so much like the real thing, most people cannot tell the difference.
The lengths people go to get fakes….
A useful thing I did learn today was that Korean is the only written language in the world with a known creater and time of creation (~1432 I think). Before that, they – like the Japanese – used the Chinese writing. However, as we all should know now, Korean, Japanese & Chinese are very very very different languages, despite the very similar cultural and historical backgrounds. It was created on orders by one of the noblemen, the Emperor had wanted all his people to be able to read and write and so he commissioned a very smart intelligent man to create a written language that could easily be learnt by farmers and the like. Or something to that effect…. We were only allowed to spend 20mins in there, no where near enough time to learn everything or for me, to remember most things.
After we returned to Myeong Dong, we just went on a shopping frenzy because sometimes you just have to spoil yourself and today we did.
For dinner, OMG, we chose a very nice local BBQ restaurant and had delicious bulgolgi beef, authentic style (at least I think it was authentic?) cos we had to take off our shoes and sit on the floor, which was fun for the first 10 mins, after that it just got uncomfortable. Especially if you are wearing a skirt and trying to protect your modesty….
Last day in
Not really much planned today… I do remember making Marisa walk through, lordy knows how many floors of Lotte to find a dress that I vaguely remember I liked but wasn’t too sure what it looked like, or where I found it or which part of Lotte I saw it in, I just remember it was very cheap.
Speaking of Lotte, this brand is absolutely everywhere in
One thing I love about
We should expect great service here in Oz as well, not just good service, but exceptional service everywhere we go. It should be expected. That is my dream.
One of the funnest things I’ve done while in Seoul was try on about a billion pairs of sunglasses, who knew putting on sunnies could be so much fun!
Other memories of Seoul? Hmm... well, Ginseng Grandma - the gorgeous little grandmother who tried so hard to get me to buy some ginseng products... I will always remember her telling me about "ginseng crunchy, ginseng candy" and even "ginseng chocolate" Eeeeewwwwww, ginseng chocolate? she was so adorable I had to buy something from her :)
But ginseng chocolate wasn't the worse that I saw.... the Koreans have kimchi chocolate - yes, KIMCHI Chocolate! disgusting!! They really do have it with every meal. Kimchi is spread across your table for every bloody meal that you are served in Korea. Poor Marisa, I think she became a bit overwhelmed with all the spicy food that we ate.... whereas I rather enjoyed it :) I love Korean food, sweet, spicy and garlicky - yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Anyways, last 3 hours in
*sigh*
Goodbye
Now, onto plans for my next journey….. who’s gonna volunteer to travel with me next time?
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