Shopping.Museum.Shoppping

On Saturday, 토요일밤에! Geraldine and Shuyi went to Myeongdong for some retail therapy. They needed some exercise for all the late night suppers they have been having, which are so uncommon here in Korea.

They visited many, many shops not because they liked all of them, but because it was raining on and off and they darted from shop to shop to escape the rain!

And Geraldine spotted Hyunjoong in the crowd! ^^

For dinner, the rain forced them to quickly choose a place to settle down. They are happy with their choice amidst the situation though. You'd see why...

They had lots of fun cooking and eating it. It wasn't even very expensive. The side dishes and plain water are free flow. It cost 5000won each. In Singapore, it'd probably have been around SGD12++? Geraldine's guess.

On Sunday, they joined the rest of the Singaporeans who arrived the night before and 2 kind archi seniors brought all of them around. Seonho-oppa and Jina-oenni. 감사합니다! Seonho-oppa wanted to bring all of them to Changdeokgung Palace but it was too sunny so he brought everyone to The National Folk Museum of Korea. Aren't they such culture vultures?

Korean vases from different periods..

Traditional Korean kitchen..

Traditional Korean room..

Traditional Korean bed.. Looks cooling..

(One of the many) Traditional Korean dance..

Traditional Korean fabric weaving..

Traditional Korean basket weaving..

Traditional Korean straw mat weaving..

Tradtional Korean paper.. Hanji (한지).. Geraldine can't wait to go to Jeonju's Paper Museum..

Korean rice cake moulds.. which reminds Geraldine of mooncake moulds...

Traditional Korean Costume.. Hanboks (한복)!

Traditional Korean Sauce Pots.. Onggi..

Traditional Korean Masks.. (The two girls attempting the dance HAHA)

Traditional Korean Acupuncture..

Girl emo-ing..

Being such cultured people, the group went to Insadong (인사동) after that. Insadong is Seoul's Art District, something that Singapore's Waterloo Street tries to be.

Street performance in Insadong..

A walnut snack sold on the street that was delicious..

On route to Dongdaemun (동대문), the group saw something quite bizarre on the streets. Someone was selling little puppies for 90,000won (~SGD100).

Dongdaemun is one of the major shopping districts in Seoul. No tourist would not have heard about it. Although there are so so so many shops in Shoppers' Heaven Dongdaemun, Geraldine still prefers Myeongdong because people don't try to cheat her as much in Dongdaemun. Dongdaemun is probably Bugis Street in Singapore times 20 times?

At first afraid of being victims in a tourist spot, the group managed to find a nice little Korean BBQ restaurant and had dinner there. They had one of Geraldine's favourite Korean food, samgyeopsal (삼겹살), along with some beer (맥주) and soju (소주).

Remember Geraldine was talking about T-money (EZ-link) as handphone accessories? Her Singaporean friends bought them!

On Our Own

The two girls woke up at 7.30am to take a bus to Wangshimni Subway Station to take the subway to Nambu Bus Terminal to take an express bus to Boryeong Bus Terminal to take a local bus to Daecheon Beach to attend the Boryeong Mud Festival (보령머드축제) (www.mudfestival.or.kr/index.html). The whole journey took them 6.5 hours. Along the way, they had a lot of fun. For lunch, they ate at another Kimbap shop. Shuyi had Meat Dumplings (고기만두) while Geraldine had Kimchi Kimbap (김치김밥). Geraldine loves the way the dumplings look. They are like sexy doughnuts.

The girls are really proud to have purchased their express bus tickets to Daecheon. It was a little scary because they had to make do with the little Korean they know, but everything worked out just fine. Thanks to the really efficient Korean transport system.

When they reached the event venue, they were pleasantly greeted by a carnival atmosphere.

They had to take many many photos to prove to those who thought that they weren't able to get past the bus terminal. Girls aren't that weak! Hng!~

Of course they couldn't resist the fun and the supposed good health effects of the mud..

Geraldine loves everything about the festival, even the dustbins..

And the girls made their own way back to Seoul. They spent a total of 10 hours travelling but they know that it's worth it for all the time and money. Who would have thought mud was this fun?

For dinner, the two girls attempted to order chicken delivery. The ajeossi at the shop doesn't speak English so Geraldine tried her best to understand him and she put to good use half of what she learnt to say during a delivery order on the phone. Hopefully her Korean teacher is proud of her. 30 minutes later when the chicken hasn't arrived, the two girls went downstairs to ask the guard if the delivery guy came and was told that food is not allowed in the dormitory. He just kept telling them that but luckily, a kind couple overheard and told them the delivery guy came and left. The girls called the chicken shop again and he came back, telling them he was unable to call them because it's an overseas number. Well, no matter what, the girls are glad to have food in their stomachs after the last meal 12 hours ago.

Korean chicken delivery consists of three important/basic components - fried chicken (프라이드 치킨), spice chicken (양념치킨) and radish cubes (무). Geraldine likes the spice chicken better as they don't make her feel as guilty eating the fried chicken. It's like go-lo-yok, Singapore's sweet-and-sour pork. It's fried but it's pretending not to be fried. The two girls love the radish cubes as they are refreshing after every mouth of sinful meat. The two girls also found weird chicken parts like neck in their dinner, and some parts were unidentifiable. Maybe Biology Class should have taught them something more useful.

Around The Neighbourhood

Eunhae and Sowon, the 2 Korean girls who were exchange students at NUS last year, came to meet Geraldine and Shuyi today to orientate them around the area and helped them open a bank account. Anyone interested in depositing money into Geraldine's account please send her a private message. She was really surprised that it is possible to open an account without putting a single cent into it. They did that because they haven't seen an ATM with the cirrus logo so were unable to access their moolah. They also bought their T-money, otherwise known as EZ-link card in Singapore. What amazes her is that the Koreans are so innovative to make T-money available as handphone accessories too! (Sorry she didn't take any photos!) When you go out, you would definitely have two things with you - phone and transport card. Put the two together and taadaah!

They went to Wangshimni (왕십리), where the nearest subway station is, to buy some daily necessities like toilet paper. It is times like these (away from home without mommie) that you realize how important toilet paper is. And of course, mommie too! Haha. They bought toilet paper, shampoo, soap and detergent, and wanted to get tissue packets but Korean supermarkets don't sell them. That's because every restaurant in Korea have serviettes so they don't have the habit of bringing personal tissues around. So if you are wondering, no, obviously they don't have the I-chope-this-seat-with-MY-tissue-paper-you'd-better-go-somewhere-else culture. At the shampoo section, there are smell samples. How interesting! She doesn't know why Singapore doesn't have cool stuff like these.

The two girls attempted to make contact lenses at a spectacle shop and guess what?! Contact lenses can be tried on! They are so much cheaper than in Singapore and they will let you try before you buy! Geraldine tried on two pairs but they didn't fit so she didn't buy eventually. Shuyi got a pair and she's really happy with the bargain. Another weird thing about Korea, they don't have monthlies. They have dailies, bi-weeklies and 6-8 months. How strange. At least to Geraldine.

Today, they learnt how to take a bus too! It's the same as EZ-link, just tap-and-go, but the deduction system is slightly different. The moment you tap your card, the basic fare will be deducted. If the fare is higher, it will be deducted again when you tap your card upon alighting.

The girls really wanted to treat the Korean girls dinner for their really kind help the whole day, but both had to go home. =( So Shuyi and Geraldine went on their own adventure around the neighbourhood. They feel a great sense of accomplishment for being able to order their own dinner and have the ahjumma at the shop understand them. =] Food's good and not very expensive. Shuyi had kimchi ramyeon (김치라면) while Geraldine had dumpling ramyeon (만두라면).

After dinner, they continued to walk around, and they saw more zebras than they've ever seen on the road.

In all directions! Isn't it lovely? Bet Singaporeans would love it since we are always taking short-cuts in everything.

Last highlight of the day is that Shuyi and Geraldine managed to look for a shop with Go-stop cards and purchased them with not much difficulty. They went to a few shops and were told that they don't sell it, till in one of the shops, the kind ajeossi told them that a shop further down the road has it. In Korean.

Safely (Back) In Korea

Geraldine and Shuyi left the Sunny Island for Kimchi Land yesterday morning. Thank you to all who came to see Geraldine off. She really appreciates it. Especially those who live on the other side of the country! <3

The flight was rather uneventful and the girls reached their destination on time. Hyunjin-oppa and Dabin, two of Geraldine's best korean friends were there to fetch them.

Thank God they were there if not they'd really be lost! Geraldine left a piece of my luggage on the conveyor belt and fortunately Hyunjin-oppa was there to speak in too-too-train Korean and make several calls to the different departments to retrieve her luggage. PHEW~

The journey to dormitory was long as it was peak hour. Han River is now flooded due to the heavy downpours the past few days. While in the heavy traffic, she saw something!


Hyunjin-oppa asked if they wanted some and she promptly said yes. They've all seen it in the dramas but have never experienced it - making a purchase from a vendor standing in the middle of a congested road. By "they", of course Geraldine means the two of them really "swagu" Singaporeans. She has no idea how much it cost and forgot the name of it but it's some rice thing that makes one feel happy and healthy eating it even though it's carbo.

They all met Jinhee and Eunhae at the dormitory and they helped the two girls with their check-in.

This is how their room looks like now! Complete with an aircon for that Singaporean in them and a heater for winter.

All 6 of them went to downtown for dinner and the Koreans treated them to a sumptious Korean meal and desert, making Shuyi and Geraldine feel really bad. On top of letting them trouble them the whole day, the Koreans fought with them for the bill. Literally.