Itaewon

We went to Itaewon, hoping to find a nice leather backpack. I was looking around for something that was within reasonable budget but was unable to find one. Hence when we were planning for this trip, I decided to stop searching and to hunt for the bag when we were in Seoul. 

Itaewon is a pretty quaint area with shops along the main road and shops in the back alley. There were plenty of leather stuff but we found nothing that we like. We like the shops in the alley a lot better simply because of the relax atmosphere but browsing inside some of the boutiques was a totally different thing. We stepped into this boutique that carried simple tops that I really like. As I looked around, the sales assistant kept re arranging the tops that I looked at, as if I was making a mess of their display. In the end, I still bought a top from them...

We had to visit Gangnam given its popularity after the song. We did not really explore the area and stayed very close to the station as we did not really research on the area. Overall, the area seems pretty upscale and expensive, haha!

When our sore feet became too tired to walk any further, we decided to pop by Lotte shopping mall to catch a movie; "Taken 2". Stuff in the mall were far too expensive, hence we sticked to window shopping. We walked around a bit and finally settled down in the sitting area near the cinema to wait for the session to start after I got a set of popcorn combo to whittle the time away :)

The theatre's temperature was very comfortable and audience was very well behaved too; no talking and no handphone rung during the show. We had wanted to catch a Korean movie but a friend who had been to Seoul told me local movies did not come with English subtitles, only Korean. 

Shinsegae Department Store was located just about 8 minutes of walk from our hotel. We love the Skypark that was located at the very top of the department store! There was a food court, Starbucks and a couple of restaurant / cafes. It was a nice place to sit around, enjoyed some fresh air and the openness.

We always enjoy cafes and we hunted around for cafes in Seoul too. Cafes in Seoul were a lot quieter and people generally spoke softer. 

Hubby was forced to model for many of my pictures when I wanted some "human" factor in the photo *smile*. 

On our last morning in Seoul, we took a walk to the Skypark and spent about an hour there before heading off to airport. 

This is the final entry for our Seoul trip. Both of us like Seoul; for the food, the markets, and the people. We hope to be back soon!

Myeongdong & Cheonggyecheon Stream

We stayed at Hill House Hotel booked through Hotels.com. Besides the location, the bathtub was one of the main reasons for booking it. Guess my surprise when we were told the information on the website was wrong, and there would not be a bathtub in the room after all... It was not the best solution, but Hotels.com gave us a 10% discount as an apology. Well, at least, the hotel provides free green tea every day. 

The surrounding environment was pretty nice, though it was about eight minutes uphill task when we need to head back to the hotel.

The first night when we landed, we ate some really nice chicken at a seeming-family-restaurant. It was a little pricey in our opinion but it was nice enough for us to want to go back and had the something else from the same place. That was the time when we realised something... I checked the traveling dates to make sure it would not be too chilling but I never check if there was any national holidays. Yup, we went right smack into their Harvest Festival... We arrived on 28th Sep evening and the festival started on 29th Sep and last through to 1st Oct, and we were leaving on 2nd. 

Except for touristy spots like Myeongdong and Nandamum markets which were opened, many of the shops were closed during this period. I was totally devastated when we went over to Dongdaemum Shopping Mall and Gwangjang market the next day and realised that it would be closed the entire period. I wanted to get some fabric during this trip as well, and that was the reason for the huge luggage that we brought along for this trip. We usually travel pretty light, and this was the first trip that we really lugged something huge. 

Well, I still count myself lucky to find a couple of vendors at Gwangjang market who stayed open during this period. Instead of a totally nil buy, I bought two really nice fabric at reasonable price. Hubby did the haggling, haha! Amazing considering that we both do not speak their language!

We walked around Dongdaemum and came to Cheonggyecheon Stream. It was really nice to find a stream in the middle of the city. We saw a stage, Wall of Culture and many rest stops for people to stop and rest. 

We walked along the stream for about 30 to 45 min; there were people feeding the ducks in the stream; we saw fishes too. Lucky for us, the weather was cooling and it was good for walking and photographing. The people walking around were mostly south Koreans, and we guessed the national holiday was a chance for the people living in the outskirt to visit Seoul. 

Except for the first day when we had our dinner late and unpacked for the night, we were almost at Myeongdong and Nandamum markets every day. It was fun to walk around the markets, just wondering around, enjoying the weather, looking at pretty things and, oh, the constant snacking!

Myeongdong has more shops, and it felt more upmarket as some of the stuffs were really expensive! Nice to look but we did very little shopping. By the end of the second day, we had to ration our money when we realised we were spending so much of money on food! 

The night-Myeongdong was more vibrant with the lights around. It was cooler too, though the day-Myeongdong was not that hot. Quite a number of the cosmetics sales ladies and men were fluent in Chinese or they were Chinese. And man, were they brave! Many of these prettily dressed sales personnel had no qualms about shouting at the top of the lungs to get people to walk into their stores for the free gifts that came with purchase. Most of the sales personnels were well mannered, which made shopping and browsing a lot more comfortable. 

We finally called it a night and started to stroll back to the hotel. Hubby was really not used to the walking though he did no complaining. On our way back to the hotel, we saw Seoul Tower in shimmering beautiful neon light. 

It was a beautiful night albeit a tad cold for my liking. Well, with hubby by my side, a little colder might be just right *smile. 

Seoul ~ Here We Come!

We never went for a honeymoon after the weddings - yap, it's a wedding with "s". We talked about it, but we never really got around to planning for one. So when I saw an airfare sale, I decided Seoul was a nice place to go, and we booked the tickets, hotel and waited patiently for six months for the day for the trip!

We took our first AirAsia X flight at KLCCT. 

Communication was something that I worried about, having heard friends' scary comments about how unfriendly the Koreans are. Well, my worry was totally unfounded for! Our first night while searching for the hotel, a nice nerdy guy came up to offer help! Throughout our stay we encountered some really nice locals! After a night of hauling luggages through the subway to our hotel, we crashed at the hotel and slept all the way through to the late morning!

My first shoot in Seoul!

The second day, we woke to a clear sunny day! And was I glad I had my camera with me; I took lot of photographs. I read the manual during the flight and tried the various advice and tips listed. I think I might be lucky enough to find a lifelong hobby and it would serve my memory bank well :)