After meeting up with my friends for dinner, they told me that since they saved alot of money the night before on accommodations, they decided to spend alot this evening to stay somewhere. I didn't want to do that. I chose that instead of paying for a room for the night, I put that money towards picking up some souvenirs for Devin, Ryan, Yuka and myself. Basic stuff but still something. And so I went to Dongdeamon market. it's a new version of Namdeamon Market of last night. Alot more modern and the shopping centers are HUUGE!!!!! woah... so crazy! I got lost again in all of them. hahaha... but seriously, so many shopping centers I've been to in Asia in general that dwarf the Eaton Center in Toronto. sure it's big but you don't get lost. Also saw a dance show at the bottom of one of these HUGE towers (doosan tower), mostly J-Pop type dancing you see every pop star do in videos but they also had a short breakdancing session with some really good guys doing liquid. So Lesta, I took that pic is for you! What also happened at this point is that my camera battery had gotten
low. I brought my charger but then when I go to plug it in, it's the wrong
prong, its like the ones in Indonesia! oops... should have brought my
adapter. baka. ah well. I didn't anticipate that Korea would be alot like
Indonesia. So anyhow I stopped taking alot of pictures because I was saving
my battery power for when I was planning to visit the world cup stadium
on my last day before heading off to the airport. |
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From Dongdeamun, I decided to rollerblade to Seoul Tower because I couldn't resist the nice weather of the evening. by this time though it was 3am because I had just spent 3hrs in an internet cafe to kill sometime. I decided against getting a place to stay all together and just continue to explore Seoul. After all, I'm leaving the next day and who really know when I'll have the chance again to do this. Especially being by myself and having the chance to bolt down the empty main streets on my rollerblades! So I decided to go to the mountain and perhaps sleep on a park bench for a couple hours or in the forest or something something. Anyhow, I took a few wrong turns here and there but I eventually made it (but I had to take some roads that were definitely not for pedestrians). Once I got to the mountain I made my way up as much as I could on skates
until I had to take stairs to continue the journey (wish I had more pictures).
So then I took off my skates and walked up the rest until I got to the
top of the mountain (woah.. so many stairs). but the view was INSANE!!!
I saw everything! 360degree view of the city and its surroundings, really
nice. so I decided to sleep. but that didn't work because I was kinda
cold (after doing all that work to get up there, I didn't want to catch
a cold either from all the sweat) and there was a bunch of old Koreans
exercising at the top (at 4:30am? yup!). I took the road back down. Got
on a bus that took me the opposite direction I wanted to go. oops again.
hahaha... oh well, I found myself somewhere way south. the fun part was
trying to figure out how to get back where nothing was in english. I made
it and found myself sleeping on the subway, went around the green loop
line a couple times. Then I decided it was time for me to go to the World Cup Stadium... |
Ok, first of all, I have to say one thing about the world cup stadium... "WOW!!!" CRAZEE! it's HUGE! and not to mention really really beautiful!! For those of you who don't know, the last world cup just the summer that had passed was here in Korea. This is the Seoul Stadium. they have a bunch more all over the country and I would have loved to have visited them. The building design was so amazing I couldn't believe it. Also surprisingly I got the chance to go inside! I didn't have that option at the Olympic stadium. and it only cost me 200Wons!!! (20yen or about 26cents). A very powerful feeling to be inside this colossal structure. Last summer when I was screaming in the streets of Vancouver celebrating one of Korea's victories with hoards of other asians, I would have never thought I'd actually be in the stadium less than a year later. woah. Then again, that specific event had alot of repercussions, one of them linked to meeting Yuka, woah again. It was there I met another friend called Masato who is from Yokohama Japan (not far from Tokyo). He too has been there for the same amount of time as me only he was going to stay for another 4 days. Nice guy and so we decided to go back downtown in Namdeamun for lunch. My last meal was Sambatang, chicken and Ginseing. very tasty but annoying to eat because it's a whole chicken and I was in a hurry to meet my first two friends so we can leave for the airport together. |
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Leaving Seoul kinda felt good because I was really really tired at this point (remember, I haven't slept yet really) so I was kinda looking forward to getting home and getting some rest as well. Seoul was a great place to visit. I'm not sure if I want to live there, maybe, don't know yet. But Japan is really good for me now.
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Thank you to my new friends for helping me further enjoy my time in Korea. and thank you very much to the citizens of Seoul, some of the kindess and most friendly people I've ever met in a society. Everytime I asked for help everyone was always more than willing to help. People mostly offered every time I pulled out my map (kinda like my first visit to vancouver but these guys were trying really really hard because they didn't know much english but really wanted to help out). I've even had people just walk a long way out of their way to guide me to the desired area. Thank you and it was apreciated. |
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