WINTER IN SOUTH KOREA

SOUTH KOREAN WINTER
19-24th Nov 2015

The journey started on the night of 18th Nov 2015 via flight MH 0066

depart 23h50 arrival 6h25.We adjusted to local time which is 1 hour

 earlier. local weather at Incheon was 7 Celcius.

waiting for satellite trains in the airport

The Airport was modern and looking quite new, in around 30 minutes 

we are already safe outside the arrival halls.

Buy limousine bus tickets no. 6004 to bring us to Guro-gu district stops

 at Lotte city Hotel, tickets costs 48 Won, a 1h ride.

The bus stopped at this spot,

 and we made our way to the apartment guided by Amy Hansol's direction.
Oh yes Amy Hansol is our host (pic below)

 Its really quite easy, only about 300 m walks.

Afiq was the leader of the pack

 "Yes we are on-track, there should be a beautiful island just ahead..."

We are there! 7th floor Hyundai Appt no. 704. the code is Abah's mobile last 4 nos.

Want to see the apartment's interior? read on,

 The entrance,

 The living room,

Kitchen and dining,

Bedroom 1,

 Bedroom 2 

Bathroom, washing machine, Olleh (Egg wifi) and 

temperature controller for room and Water. Abah paid 

about RM 2,200 for 5 nights for this apartment 

through AIRBNB.

View from balcony, there was a secondary school and a wide 

sports field.

 Then it was already 12 noon, we walked to nearest food-court centre,
as usual we have checked out at least 6-7 outlets and we argued about
what type of food and the halal aspect, finally we found
a splendid restaurant serving tempura, ramen and Udon.

 It was really2 good meal and really a tastefully decorated
restaurant.

We paid like Won 35,000 for those meals.

 Few artistic features in front of KFC at Guro digital district.

 We proceeded to subway thru Guro Digital complex station.
Oh yes, to travel using subway, we used T-Money (access card) which costs
Won 3,000 each, and you can repeatedly refilled it with
the refill machine at every station. You can also use it
to buy goods from most shops.

DONGDAEMON

First destination is Dongdaemon Cultural and Heritage centre,
on the background is Dongdaemon Design Centre

Dongdaemon was a combination of Shopping malls, wholesale
 traders and roadside hawkers 

 Most products were for bulk sales

Then we're back in subway for next destination.

MYEONGDONG

 It was a mixed of high rise office and commercial buildings,
more like Bukit Bintang in KL.

We found this local bakery and bought few pastries.

There were pedestrian-only areas where all sorts or
products were on sales.

 There were also street hawkers for street food lovers.

street food meant to-be-eaten on the street.

Seoul folks + touristas flocked the shopping zone 

on Saturday evening

 Street hawkers slowly moves in for night market, they were so
orderly and clean.

 Zeti as usual found her favorite BTS poster here. Oops no photo please..

 Other than fashion the skincare products were the most on display here

Then the hunt for food begins, again arguments ensued and we hesitated few times
before finally found a suitable restaurant. This one is famous for its
nasi-goreng kimchi styled cooking.

This restaurant is called Yoogane

 2-3 men and women come and go and all we do is just wait
for them to say "its ready, now you can eat"

 But I assure you we finish them all both of the frying pans.

This is what we bought from the street, quite alright

BUKCHON VILLAGE

Silent please!...no noise allowed here

Ibu bought a refreshing fragrance from this beautiful shop.
The shop keeper was a US-slanged english-speaking
korean girl.

My Canon cam didn't do justice to the beautiful background
and blue sky.

Zeti is already begging to eat lunch.

The restaurant where we ate delicious mussel soup
and oyster fried cakes, its near the Anguk station exit

Truly delicious when served hot (38,000 won)
The mussel were really soft and sweet.

This is another great delicacies.

GYEONGBOKGUNG IMPERIAL PALACE

We paid around Won 25,000 for entrance fee, 4 adults 1 kiddo.

The "Changing-of-Guard" ceremony.

Boy..the Guards looks tall at least 6'

Such a perfect post-card like photo.

Another ceremony.


WAR MEMORIAL OF KOREA

We exited Samgakji station and walk to the Museum.

This ship's Hull is reconstructed replica but everything
on the deck were the actual parts of the war-ravaged ship

F-5 Eagle

ITAEWON

Itaewon is famous to Malaysian tourist primarily due to its Halal
eating outlets, halal butcher shop and the Grand Mosque.

This is where we stopped to dine. The food was splendid
and the Teh tarik mesmerising, in the coldness of Seoul.

contented, filled-stomach faces

And a roast chicken for sandwiches tomorrow.

We had home-made breakfast, uhmm protein, carbs..

The two boys split up with Abah, Ibu and Zeti, this is where the
mobile wifi (olleh) comes handy, we can continually communicates
by Whatsapp, of course Abah use MAXIS roaming.

some street-food hawkers at Myeongdong, mmm so tempting.

Red Sun restaurant

This is a combination of Seafood, soya cakes, egg, vege and noodles
smeared with thick brownish sauce. It was delicious and we enjoyed the
taste and the experience.

NAMSAN TOWER

from the Chungmuro station exit we were lost again for quite a while
and later realized and took a shuttle bus no.2 to went up to the hill top.
The bus could be really stuffy and use T-money to pay the fee.

The scenery was breathtaking and there were huge crowd too.

This slope was really steep, Abah had to stop midway awhile
before conquering the top.

The Namsan tower

Glorious view of Seoul from top of the hill.

That night Ibu cooked chicken curry, fried vegetable and some eggs.

Then Abah and Ibu went walking at Guro town 

to find fever medicine for Zeti. It was raining lightly.

It was a clear morning, Zeti has catched fever last night, so Abah,
Ibu and Zeti were grounded, the boys went for Bukchon
and Itaewon to find something.

So Ibu just do some housekeeping and made porridge for Zeti.
NORYANGJIN

In the afternoon we dragged Zeti to Noryangjin.

glimpse of bullet train

We were kind of lost, nobody could help us due to "english barrier"
so we stopped by Baskin Robbin for Zeti to have some ice-cream
its good for her throat.

We left Zeti at BR and look around for direction
to Noryangjin Fish Market.

At last a good samaritan passed by and escorted us to this overhead bridge
and showed us the direction, by the way he had used sign-language only
how generous!

Noryangjin fish market..at last.

70% of the creatures on sale were alive, it was like going to
market-cum-aquarium.

This are baby prawns in various sizes and those fermented fishes....uhmm

Noticed the fish fillets on platter, you could buy those and bring it
to a restaurant at the market to cook and eat them fresh.

Tempura?.. nice...but at @ WON 10,000 per 5 pcs!!

All those dried sea creatures.

Back at the field near our apartment

local Kosa Mart near apartment

Later late night Abah and Ibu went to Guro town

Out in the cold...hot latte and sugar-peppered waffles!!

It was 8 am in the morning and we were at Sports Complex station.
It was coldest time for us in Seoul, temperature was 5 Celcius.

Was so cold Abah couldn't get the facial muscles to smile.

The bus came at around 9 am, altogether there were maybe
12 passengers only including us.

YONGPYONG

Arrived at the famous Yongpyong Ski Resort, guess what?! No snow
yet!! wow!! we were speechless, the temperature was well above 0.

But it was really cold, around 3 celcius to be exact.

Winter Sonata malaysian version

Look at those Udon...yummy

we had a nice lunch

I can see the snow coming...on the horizon that is...

The resort  was deserted

Goodbye Yongpyong better luck next time..insyallah

LOTTE WORLD MALL

Quick shopping

Nice foods here and good price too.

GURO-GU TOWN

Ibu queuing for hot fish cakes

It was so scrumptious, hot and tasty especially on cold winter night.

The bus no. 6004 had missed us, so plan B, using subway.
The journey took 1 hour

at 9.00 we reached Incheon International Airport. Our flight departs 11.30.

Check-in

Our conclusion of South Korea;
1. Very clean city
2. Communication is a major problem
3. Almost everything is expensive (compared to Malaysia)
4. Quality of products and services are good
5. People are hardworking
6. Reaction to tourist are rather cold and indifference
7. Coffee is national beverage of South Korea
8. Official treasure of Korea is actually KIMCHI.

Good Bye and Thank You Seoul you will always be in our mind.
We spent around RM 7,500 excluding flight tickets.