I hope Carmen doesn’t steal Seoul, because frankly I still have much to see. I’ve been to Seoul quite a few times, but it’s almost too big of a city to see everything in a day, weekend, or even a week. My mission to continue seeing more and more in Korea that’s actually Korean is coming along quite nicely. I’ve been keeping myself quite busy with this mission, and I’ve seen and done some really cool things.
I’ve yet to post pictures on these happenings, but I’ll get around to it soon I hope. First off I went to Myeong-dong (which I had previously been to once), which is a huge shopping district in Seoul. It’s a favorite of foreigners living here, especially Americans, because it houses some of the main shops back home: Gap, H & M, Apple Store, Forever 21, and restaurants like Outback and TGI Friday’s. It’s quite an extensive area with blocks and blocks of shops, and I must say that the stores that sells comedic nicknacks and swag are my favorite. After going through these shops, which I really went to because my friends really wanted to go, we went to this restaurant called Bennigan’s. It’s reminiscent of Macaroni Grill back home, mixed with a lot of New York décor. I recommend their lunch specials, a ton of food at a reasonable restaurant price.
After that we headed somewhere I really wanted to go, which is the Korean War Memorial, a museum dedicated to Korea’s independence victory. There were lots of amazing things to see, it was almost too big of a museum (very Getty-like). There were walls and walls of plaques of soldiers from all over the world who lost their lives, and I must say it was pretty cool to see a Navarro (Ralph Navarro) under the California portion of these plaqued walls. Inside the museum there was just so much to see, including mannequin/caricature recreations of battles. My favorite was the human-sized recreation of the Hwaseong Fortress, which one could walk around in like it was King Friday’s kingdom from Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood. The kid in me that liked forts really appreciated this. The museum was great, and aside from the huge Chevorlet billboard outside it that took away some of the historical effect, I’m really glad I did it.
I still want to do more of the palaces in Seoul, but I’ll have to save that for another day. However, I did head to a great place in Yongin called the Jisan Resort this past Friday. Some friends and I headed to snowboard and ski, something I really wanted to do here since so many people here do it and it gave me an excuse to head out and see the Korean slopes. I must say that snowboarding was an epic failure, but skiing was definitely more of a success. Just need to work on stopping myself when I reach the bottom of the slope, in due time I’m sure. Really glad I got to do something wintery that helped me see more of what this country has to offer. Since I had winter on the brain I then went ice skating at the You & I Center in Byeongjeom. This center is great in that aside from ice skating they offer things like swimming and hold classical music symphony concerts at events they host. I will say I had a blast ice skating (I usually do), but the only thing that weirded me out is that in SK people wear helmets while doing it, so that was a first.
In exploring more of Korea I still aim to go to Busan, which is a hot-spot for tourist and beach/resort-type vacations. It’s really far south in SK, but I hear it’s worth the trip. I’ve also unlocked new sites in my neighborhood as I found this great scenic park that has a great hiking route near the future site of the Sports Complex here in Songtan. In seeing more of South Korea, I must say that I still aim to see more of Asia since it’s so convenient since I’m already here. With that said I’m happy to report that yesterday I bought my ticket to Japan!!!!! Yes, J-A-P-A-N! I’ll be there for a weekend in April in the very renowned city of Tokyo. Yesterday was also a win because my school moved a couch into my apartment (which was direly needed), so I was on cloud nine that day. But back to Japan, Whoop whoooop!
So these past days have been really good to me, including my food ordering accomplishment (see previous vlog).
On a totally unrelated note, I’m really happy all the Timbiriche albums are now on iTunes. To commemorate the albums of one of my favorite all-time groups since my childhood I thought I’d leave you with a song from when they were kids. It’s funny to see Paulina Rubio, Benny Ibarra, Sasha, Erik Rubin, Diego Schoening, Alix Bauer, and Mariana Garza when they were kids and note that they look and sound (not the guys) the same today.
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