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Quite possibly the most overrused title for visitors to Seoul, yet I feel this title perfectly describes my experience in Korea. My 'soul' was rejuvenated a) because I got a break from the monotony of my job (all July and August I sit at my desk and do NOTHING- good way to spend my time...thank god for sudoku!) and b) I met up with some old friends from Berkeley, which was a nice slice of home. Given the short time I was alloted for summer vacation, it was a quick trip into Seoul and the DMZ, then back to Japan.

I've Got Seoul....

Casey Lary
2007-03-08 20:52:10

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in something Seoul is famous for: the 24-hour 10 story department stores in Dongdeamun Market. Korean- hard to read and hard to pronounce. I just called it the Ding Dong Market. We stopped along the way to test out some of the street food. We heard it was cheap, edible, and thought we would give it a go. After our meal, I would say to bypass the street food, as we ended up with some weird congealed/fat/skin/I don't know what it was, and some chicken concoction. The dumplings were good, and the kimchee pancake was decent, yet I don't really like kimchee so that constituted a minor problem. We wandered the streets meandering between streets selling fake EVERYTHING. It was cheap, but not as cheap as everyone said it would be. Next we ventured into one of the shopping towers- completely overwhelmed by everything. We thought we would spend an hour or two in one building and then move to the next. We were there for 4 hours! All 4 of us were having way too much fun shopping for clothes and accessories. It might not have been real, but it was pretty darn nice and relatively cheap. That
was one thing that did surprise me about Korea. It was not as cheap as I thought it was going to be. Around 1 am we called it a night, leaving the hundreds of others to shop till dawn. We made out like bandits: Taz scored some new shirts, Jen got a new pair of shoes, Naomi got a cute new shirt, yet I was the big spender with a dress, hat, 3 shirts, and a skirt. We dared not attempt shopping tower 2!

Day 3
Unfortunately our last day in Korea was terrible weather. As hardcore travelers, we ventured out sightseeing regardless. We went to the Seodamun Prison and learned more about how Korea has been tortured/in control of another country for most of its existence! Then we went to the Korean Folk Village. That afternoon we wandered to the area where Taz and I went shopping the first night. All the stalls were gone because of the rain. We went to the area with ...