Korea's got Seoul

This weekend I decided to go up to Seoul to see the sights. It had been a while since I'd last been, and there is so much to see there! Originally I wanted to go to the DMZ, but then I started researching Seoul and decided there wouldn't be enough time to make it.

I got the bus Friday at 6 with Brian, Emily, Ricky (their friend from back home), Alli, and Alex. The bus was pretty nice, so I didn't mind riding it for 4 hours. We took the subway to our hostel, which was in Hongdae. By the time we unloaded our things there, it was around 12 pm. Luckily, Hongdae is where the college students and young adults hang out on the weekends, and we were close. Our friends from Incheon (Evan, Patrick, and Sophia) were in the area. Patrick had friends visiting, and Sophia was on a date, so we only got to see Evan Friday night. We met in the downtown area and hit up Ho Bar VII. We grabbed 1 beer there, and realized how hungry we all were. Across the street was a 님밥 restaurant and decided that would be fine.



At the restaurant, we ordered some dumplings. We got 6 orders, and we were all stuffed. It was delicious. After that, we were exhausted and went back to the hostel and were asleep by 2 am.

Saturday morning, I woke up early, and got ready. Our first stop was Paris Baguette for breakfast, then we went to the Yongsan. This area is the biggest electronic markets. There are over 20 buildings containing 5000 stores. Emily and I wandered around while Alli shopped for a Canon SLR camera. Em and I found a booth that burned DVD's, and I walked away with about 18 DVD's for about $25. I got The Ugly Truth, The Hangover, and seasons 1-7 of Sex and the City. You can guess what I'll be doing the next few weeks!



Alli got her camera and she tried it out when the two of us went to Gyeongbuk-gung (경북궁) which is Seoul's largest and most beautiful palace from the Joseon Dynasty. We were there about 2 hours, and took a ton of pictures. Unfortunately, I did not charge my camera much before I left, and it died shortly thereafter.

Here is a picture with some Korean students who wanted a picture with us. I love how awkard looking it is!


A pretty view of the temple


We met up with Emily for a late lunch (4 pm) in an area of town called Dongdaemun (동대문) where you can shop to your hearts content. Wikitravel says "Dongdaemun market has large department store-like buildings such as Doota, Migliore, and APM that have trendy shops and stalls grouped togehter so customers can shop efficiently and save time." The three of us gave ourselves 2 hours to shop. We flew through it so fast and walked out with some really good finds. We each got shoes, dresses, pants, sweaters, and some jewerly. Alli and I each bought the same sweater and pants because it was so cute. By the time we were done, we couldn't remember what we had found!

We went back to the hostel to get ready to go out. The boys had gone ATVing outside of Seoul, and we beat them back. The three of us put on our clubbing gear and met Patrick for dinner at Omatu Tomato, a great fusion restaurant in Hongdae. The boys eventually made it, and we spent the rest of the night bar and club hopping with Joe, Evan, Patrick, Ryan, Alex, and a few of their friends. It was a great night, except I could have done without the large storm that rolled in around 2 am. We all got drenched!

Sunday, we went home shortly after we woke up because we were all dragging from Saturday night. It took us about 1 hour on the subway to get to the bus terminal, then another 4 hours home. I didn't really say goodbye to our Incheon friends, but Patrick called later on to say goodbye to me. They'll be down in 2 weeks to visit us, and I don't think that it will be nearly as crazy of a weekend as this one was!