Korea Trip (Part III); Seoul- {Day 5: Hongdae Apartment x Namsam Tower x Tarot} & {Day 6: Noryangjin Fish Market x Myeondong x Cheonggyecheon Stream} & {Day 7: Gangnam x Everland x Dongdaemun}

Lol since i'm a little free today since I caught flu x fever x cough a few days back, I shall try my best to complete parts of my korea post! I definitely do not want to fly to japan this year still with overdue seoul posts. heh 

FYI part 1 & 2 is already up so to refresh your memories:

Korea Trip (Part II); Guide to Jeju (2014)

Korea Trip (Part I); Guide to Jeju (2014)

Day 5 (Jeju > Seoul)

Congratulatory selfie cause we are finally departing jeju for seoul! heh, woke up hungry so tried some cool teokbokki korean instant cup noodles from the nearest convenient mart.

SO COOL, cos I love korean spicy rice cakes hehe, I have yet to try the extremely spicy korean noodles challenge viral on the net right now :P

Last meal in jeju, which was also one of the worst meals there before our domestic flight back to seoul. Thus lazy to find the address for you guyssss~

Some Biwon Restaurant which serves disappointing Samgyetang (korean ginseng chicken soup), or issit I just didn't know how to appreciate it cause it was slightly bland. Actually its okay la, maybe just rather recommend you guys something better prolly in the next seoul post or smth :D

some oxtail soup or beef slice soup I forgot.

just eating cause we are hungry all dayz

selfie biting on green chili cause I can tank spicy food very well ;)

(Hongdae Apartment > Kongbul (Dinner) > N Seoul Tower > Tarot Card Reading)

Without further ado, let my seoul adventures begin! Took the jumbo limousine taxi from Gimpo airport upon reaching to our humble nest for the nest ten days! Taxis in Korea is still affordable in comparison to Singapore! Priced around the same? With lesser surcharges maybe hahaha

tessa in da front

Accommodation 

Technically I had recommendations from a friend to try out Airbnb and I definitely did not regret. Paying for a nice cosy apartment while staying in Seoul is so affordable and its really easy to book! Just type in the dates you are traveling at, and choose the room type, obviously checking the entire place, can't share with others, and the price range.. then you are good to go browsing among the cities best spots for apartments and great reviews.

If you never airbnb-ed before, head to my page now to get a $34 SGD off your first airbnb stay! You won't regret it ;)

Ended up staying at this Prugio apartment in Hongdae! Aka Hongik University Station on the Seoul Subway Map.

Hongdae 

an university area of seoul - is a great place to stay at for youngsters in my opinion because of the nightlife and vibe of the area, not only that there are loads of cafes and yummy chill-able food restaurants in that area, there are also pubs, some famous clubs some frequent and opened by your very own YG entertainment. (Hyperventilates*) 

Rows of shops, huge flagship stalls of brands like New balance, nike, not forgetting my favourite 3CE in that area. Young talented musicians actually sing and play instruments surrounded by supportive teen crowds even in the cold along the streets or parks so I can't emphasise on how great this area is for hanging out.

At the meeting site with the apartment owner. And plus point of Seoul is that there are wifi almost EVERYWHERE. Even at this meeting spot so yup.

our apartment was like a condo so super loads of tapping of cards front gate, front building then the lift ahahah

and its on the 8th floor!

cute slippers from the host

And our host jimmy, explaining to us some of the rules of the apartment HAHAHAHA ok mostly about cleanliness and noise levels lol. and no smoking, need go all the way down to the first floor. LOL that was prolly the downsides for my aunt and uncle who joined us later as well.

Wifi

and Jimmy kindly rented to us some Olleh Egg 4G device (first time i heard of it) I think it was like 38 bucks for dk how many gigs of unlimited 3G. Very worth it. Its like a chargeable, slim and portable wireless wifi device which you can connected multiple devices to it when you are outdoors, good for sharing in a group! Beats having to buy a SIM card in korea for 1 gig of 3G is probably around 50 bucks. But this is easier to rent from a korean cause I think they bought data plans from the carrier there. 

Btw I am getting my very own Singaporean company sponsored device for my japan trip so more details about how convenient & these devices are later!

how the Olleh Egg looks like. Its like mine and tessa's baby for the next ten days. Everyday before sleeping "you charge the egg yet?" "on the egg already not" "got bring the egg anot" hahahahahaha #twofuckersinKR #eugeniacantsurviveWOwifisollinotsorry

back to our apartment, there's three rooms fit for a family! And ours was room B hehe

super cute right?! I think 5 school girls can bunk tgt in here lol w the double decker bed.

wearing my super oversized jeans that day. my mom's one HAHA LOL

balenciaga towels ah

room keys etc etc I took the Pink pair hehehe

all settled and happy us going for dinna~

Vibes~

Good food everywhere so we settled for something near our apartment which Tessa chose, seems like a franchised restaurant across korea~

Kongbul 콩불홍대점

Hongik University
345-2 Seogyo-dong
Mapo-gu, Seoul
South Korea 

hungry but happy us cause NO MORE SIGHT-SEEING WITH THE FAMZ HAHAHA

lol their peach juice served there is so nice?!

Ordered Set B, Ohsam Kongbul - Squid + Beansprouts + Bulgogi + cheese & tess's fav udon noodles for 2 pax

tessa happily showing me her udon hahaha

great service~

paid around 11-12 bucks per person only?! So cheap and yumz we love it!

Decided we didn't want our day to just end there so we decided to take the metro to some other place!

Transport

T-money card: 2500 won deposit (non refundable). Buy this transport metro card from any of the following convenience stores; GS 25, Family Mart, Mini Stop or subway stations (but I think buy from marts easier to find #justsaying)

first day so more enthu about taking metro signs. LOL

mandatory shot in korea's subwayyyy

N Seoul Tower

aka Namsam Tower

We decided to go up there by Cable car:

Subway Line 4, Myeongdong Station, Exit 3. Take road to right of Pacific Hotel and walk ten minutes.

(Directions found online but in the end we just took to myeongdong station - I think hoehyeon station also can - and cabbed to the cable car place HAHAHA #firstnightinseoulstillblur)

 but anyways, you can choose round trip cable car fares, up/down Namsam, or one way meaning you either climb up or climb down lol (the walk is crazy I swear LOL)

operating hours: 10 am ~ 11 pm

sorry for my tired looking face and blemishes cause I didn't apply any makeup on my face due to the flight and cold weather cause I am always lazy like that heh

pretty steep ride up with a super goodlooking operator! 

And we reached hehe! You need to pay extra admission fees to go even higher up on the observatory tower which we didn't cause it was getting rather late and everyone was already going down.

I think you'll get two totally different scenic views visiting namsam tower in the day or night.

sitting on the iconic 'cracked' chair there so that lovers apart can slide down closely to one another hahaha we felt so fucking lesbian going here together HAHAHAHA

freezing as shit I rmb hahaha up so high wearing on layer like I usually do and the temperature was like at 1 degree Celsius or something.

must try churros shop at N tower WHICH CLOSED ON ME BEFORE I COULD ORDER 

so I sadly just accompanied tess to write her love lock and well wishes for her relationship with stanley~

hahahaha so many couples but non is mine HAHAHAHA

super pretty the night scenery *.*

just being tessa's photographer in the 1 degree weather *fingers dropping* I swear, I will come here again with my bf in the future HAHAHA

so sweettt

can't feel my nose but still can take selfie #girls

1 degree and showing off my belly button #eugenia

tessa was wearing her coat but she also dying of the cold hahahaha

Tarot

Back at hongdae!~ Another thing you can do in korea is actually getting your future read by a saju (fortune teller) through tarot card readings, I don't really believe in these but tessa and her bf thinks its rly accurate so I just tried it out for fun! But its really hard to find one saju that can speak english. So maybe we got cheated or smth. I bet those leggit ones only can speak in Hanggul language 

At one of hongdae chill park super like this area! damn street style with alot of graffiti, arts and drunk koreans drinking beer and crying over guys - I like to see this kind of dramas like in Korean dramas liddat

#horriblecomplexion #pimplesugh

Then we went to like some tarot parlour with this dude who can finally speak in english and I think he did like tarot card reading for EXO (kpop) before but we got asked to pay more (translation fee maybe lol) but whatever. Tessa still thinks what he predicted is accurate and we both asked about our love life muahahahah HAHAHAA

lol I picked out one card and the guy immediately said "lonely girl" LOL fucking accurate wtf ok the rest is private!

playing around with the cute softtoys just before bed heh

hahahahhahaa what is very angry neighbours HAHAHAHAH

Day 6

(Noryangjin Fish Market > Myeong-dong > Dongdaemun > Cheong Gye Cheon Stream)

Woke up slightly earlier to go have lunch at Noryangjin Fisheries Wholesale Market! Its almost opened 24 hours and all year!

Getting there:

Noryangjin Station (Subway Line 1), Exit 1, walk 100m over the bridge.

super huge array of stalls to pick your seafood from, so you can ask a few stall down and choose what you want to have and usually the fish stall owner already has an affiliation to the shop which cooks your food for you. 

Tradition for tourists who visits this fish market, you pick the seafood, then pay a sum of fee for them to cook in whatever way you'd like your food to be cooked at any restaurant at the 2nd floor (or they might recommend) 

One of the must-try food at Noryangjin! Sannakji (Live Baby Octopus hehehe)

and sashimi~

super cruel to watch the fish get chopped live T.T

evil butcher face HAHAHA

the card of the restaurant we had our meal at over at Noryangjin

I think I prefer the normal salmon slices, cause this fish was a little too chewy for my liking in the end I placed all of my slices into the soup broth to cook it.

first time trying out live octopus! Not as bad as I thought but the suckers on the octopus really does stick to your mouth and ur cutlery so just chew as fast and hard as you can once you stuff it into your mouth. HAHA I did an insta vid of me consuming this, so you can check my ig out :D

some oyster omelette which was damn good

sea urchin sea cucumber

recommended at noryangjin, spicy fish stew!

and definitely not forgetting the best dish ever, Alaska king crab!!! Really much cheaper even plus all the cooking fee there compared to if you have it in some restaurants in SG. You can even opt to fry the crab's roes & meat to get crab meat fried rice! (but i just ate up all the egg part of the crab up cause I like it hahahaa)

super huge legs meat was so sweet and yummyyyy

prickly prickle

Another food market you guys can try to located in korea which sells traditional dishes like Gimbap & onion pancakes and more is - Gwangjang Market which I didn't have time to squeeze into my itinerary unfortunately :(

Shopping after our heavy meal right after at

Myeong-dong

Its really the No.1 destination for tourist esp if you are makeup and skincare junkies like me and tess. Its probably the shopping district we went back the most number of times there (maybe cause the clothes they sold then was not really suitable for singapore's climate, so I rather buy some branded shit and shitloads of cosmetics hehehe) & Cosmetic products are all so cheap and affordable in korea. With thousand of brands sold all in Myeong-dong. Is like at each stretch/alley there are bound to be repeated korea makeup brands so don't worry about not locating any specific brands you want to get! 

There are also large departmental stores famous in the area like Shinsegae, lotte and lotteYoung plaza which I will talk about later but yeah, I love myeongdong! Even when you are out from the subway you get greeted by their underground shopping centre.

And the street food there is really da besttt~

Got one of the most popular street food there despite feeling so full and its called the egg bread. actually overall I had this like 4 times in total all in different parts of seoul and they all tasted different to me! Some was saltier, some was crispier and some was sweeter. And I prefer the super sugary and sweet one which was the ones found at myeongdong!

I'm so happy ahahahaha

stumbled upon this roasted sweet potato balls which WAS SO UNDERRATED 

fucking nice please why I never see on any blog reviews before!!

Strawberry mochis - Dalchi found on carts at myeongdong, SUPER GOOD. Must try!

its like the strawberry is so super juicy accompanied by red bean and the mochi! Why don't they have it in sg yet! :(

so we just shopped till night past and decided to go to another area to shop again

Dongdaemun

Must go to district for wholesale clothes shopping! Most malls are opened 24 hours so its like a never dying shopping heaven. But to be honest, ddm kind of disappointed us cause there are many malls in the area but I felt that most stuff was overpriced and there was not as many things to buy as I thought there are! But still, go down to check it out! 

We went there two night consecutively since Myeongdong closes early and the first night was a little disappointing cause the wholesale mall we wanted to go to initially was under renovation?!! (but yeah do wait for the better malls I will recommend people to go to in the area below!)

Night was saved when we stumbled upon the

 Cheonggyecheon Stream

(korean dramas sometimes get film here like in the one who came from the stars *.*)

 (its a stream down so most Subway exits in any area should link to the stream)

Subway

some areas are: City Hall, Jonggak, Jongno 3-ga, Jongno 5-ga, Dongdaemun, Sinseol-dong (Seoul Subway Line 1)

getting here specifically: City Hall Station (Seoul Subway Line 1, 2), Exit 4. Walk 250m north to Cheonggye Plaza

haha for us we exited at dongdaemun station obviously hehe

haha feeling so sereneeee

selfie cause the one who came from the stars also filmed here hahaha!

One of the large fashion malls located in Dongdaemun Market which has a tax refund system which I will recommend first will be Doota! (Opening hours at 10.30 am - 2 am) more of a departmental mall though, but worth having a look if you are more into brands and local designer labels. 

If you are looking out for places which is like a wholesale market and items can get discounted from bickering with the shop owners stay tuned to the malls I will recommend in Day 7 cause we came back!

Since korean soft serve ice-cream is kind of the hype now, (like honey-creme) my friend recommended me to try this Korean designer branded YNL unique ice cream flagship shop called REMICONE in seoul.

They have one outlet located in Garosu-gil (super chill area for cafe hoppers in Seoul)

REMICONE

547-12 Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea

but lucky me happened to stumble upon another one of their outlets (you know it can get quite tedious locating all the areas in a country with a language barrier) in Doota! 1st floor so yeah another reason for you to visit Doota! in DDM~

their soft serve is quite unique cause there are even flavors like salted caramel and chocolate which you can then hoard them with loads of cool topping like what they are famous for - their thunder cotton candy which tastes like mint. "Thunder Bomb" and "Hawaiian Beach" are prolly the two most popular pre-customised ordered even though their menu is constantly being switched.

I actually got quite greedy and didn't really care about the judgement I got when I customised mine from the flagship shop. Cause unlike me, tessa is not really an icecream lover so she didn't order anything & I wanted to try everything badly since it was the first time I am trying out a korean soft-served icecream thus...

how it looks above versus 

how it looks beneath HAHAHAHA okay I think I over-ordered. Macaroons + caramel sauce + organic powder + mint cotton candy hahahahaha

settled for dinner after that in the top floor of doota! At their departmental food court!

and we were craving for curry (and tessa her udon AGAIN) so we had Abiko curry

tessa can't eat spicy so her curry udon was at level 1

vs mine at level 4. I think everyone thought I was crazy hahahahaha look at the color difference! but I just really love torturing myself with spices, i think this is like one of the most spicy food I had in korea already. Korean chili is more towards sweet not the super numbing spicy kind which I expected.

Day 7

(Bonjuk (Brunch) > Gangnam > Everland > Dongdaemun)

Settled our breakfast for a long day ahead at BonJuk - also another franchised congee shop all over in Seoul, serving traditional korean porridge "juk" in both savoury and sweet ways recommended by Wenmin. 

She's loves it! I had mine at an outlet over in Hongdae, near my apartment. 

The one wenmin tried was Bonjuk at Hoehyeon Station (exit 1)

had the mushroom flavoured congee

and my parents ordered the abalone flavoured one for my uncle and aunt to try (cause we had super nice abalone porridge in jeju so my mom just wanted them to try it, of course the jeju one still wins this hands down) So I recommend just sticking to flavours like beef/seafood at Bonjuk! 

the sweet pumpkin one was not too bad either.

Gangnam

Everyone definitely heard of "Oppa gangnam style" before, and yeah here we are at the prime area for living south of the Han River where you get to see very well dressed up koreans. If you are lucky - even celebrities in this district. Plastic surgery clinics are located here, malls, cafes, and the alternate clubbing district in Seoul other than in Hongdae with famous clubs in Gangnam like Octagon, Answer, Ellui you can pop by at night with a higher cover charge/fee to open bottles of cause. This is like the upper east side of the city.

Reason we were in Gangnam so early in the morning was actually cause we were going to take a bus from the area - figured it was the most convenient way to get to Everland.

How to get to Everland by bus

1. Take Exit 10 upon reaching Gangnam Subway Station

2. Just keep walking straight down despite feeling doubtful of how far the distance may get, I am talking about couple of streets and blocks STRAIGHT down after few zebra crossings too its not very near

3. Until you see this shop WHO.A.U (which btw sells quite nice america branded stuff similar abercrombie) 

4. and yeah a bus stand is just right infront of it you should be able to see a queue forming as most people get to everland this way and if you are lucky there are even operators guarding this 5002 bus number to double confirm your bus ride there

5. Pay using your T-money card (so make sure there are sufficient amount of money in it) until you arrive at the Everland.Carribean Stop which is a public bus terminal 

6. and then board the free shuttle bus which comes every 20 mins or so to everland!

Between Everland and Lotte World (both popular tourists theme parks in Seoul) I would opt for the older age group to go to Everland (more thrilling rides) and maybe the younger kids can go to Lotte World since the rides there are more kidder and Lotte world is in fact more convenient to get to. But I have always went to lotte world since I was a kid so I opted for Everland this time round!

Remember to bring a printed copy of the Everland discount coupon for foreigners and present it at the ticketing counter to purchase the tickets at 32,000 won (approximately S$38) per adult instead of 40,000 won.

Everland Resort

199, Everland-ro, Pogok-eup, Cheoin-gu, Yongin-si, Gyeonggi-do

Caught some K-pop Hologram show at the start and we caught the bigbang one! *.*

I can't believe this was my first churros I had in Korea only at day 7 -_-

hungry tess with her hotdog

haha we weren't allowed to take pictures in the holographic theatre but I found this so interesting thats all. We each took a picture at a booth in the theatre so we could see how lucky we can get if we can get computerised so our hologram selfs can interact with the pre-recorded holographic Bigbang stars on stage!

they looked damn real. After this I swore I got tessa to be bigbang fans just like me as well HAHAHA

TOP!!!

choosing time

hahahhaha tessa with her unglam face got the special event!!!

AND THATS HER FACE CROPPED IN A DRESS WITH BB ON STAGE LOL I can't believe I felt jealous at that. Just holograms for goodness sake! HAHHAA

but oh well the event winner got a chance to take a free photograph (usually you have to pay for this!) with any star in the booth so kind tessa dragged me along in her photo and we are standing between G-Dragon and TOP *.* hehe

Line friends shop in everland?! haha damn cool! 

I was wearing black so I stood with the mr brown HAHAHA

Tryna mimic the actions of the character. Damn alike hahahaha okay we were just damn excited cause the line app characters we actually use are alive here!

unglam ootd with my handphone cable still stuck out from my bad hahahahaha #ootdfails

happy pre-christmas vibes~

ice-cream yet again, my fav mini ice balls~

Everland is super huge so you can't possibly cover all the rides in one day but one of the must ride is the T-express - Look at how steep this mega roller coaster parked on a slope of a mountain is!

DIDN'T REGRET QUEUEING FOR IT A SINGLE BIT

damn cool automated lockers every amusement park needs to have this!

some honey chicken with mustard sauce and fish chips for lunch

and got some gummies as well hahaha

one of the reason I like everland is because they have mini safaris in the resort too!

Rmb to get to Safari World ride where you can be in the bus and get to see lion, tigers and bears close up!

mixed lion x tiger breed

super well train-ed bear who can respond and do actions to "hello" in korean and all

the kid in me got these kiddy head gears hahaha

tired us leaving everland in the shuttlebus!

After the entire day I had no idea how Tessa and I managed to drag ourselves back at Dongdaemun market hahahah but as promised these are some of the wholesale retail malls I think you guys can consider going to! 

U:US

Hello aPM

10.20 am - 5 am

Migliore

10.30 am - 5 am

as well as these which i got some of my new clothes from, but these two malls above are one of the most popular ones in DDM where most silly tourists like you and me visit, so the shop owners will always try their luck to exploit your money, I rmb buying this shoes for like 60 bucks and tessa could actually find the exact same one at 30 -_- But nevertheless, I still got some good buys here!

and our last meal of the day settled at the top floor foodcourt of migliore (top level again), everything was already closing but luckily the stall we ordered from served not too shabby food ^^

FINALLY REUNITED WITH MY DDEOKBOKKI and this was so good with so many ingredients. Not forgetting yummy korean steamed egg and ramen!!

I liked their seafood pancake too! Haha I think koreans overall can cook well, any rdm shit from any rdm stall tastes good.

shall end off part three with a candid at everland! SO TIRED RN! But hopefully i'll be back soon. Happy CNY anw guys~