Amanda Takes Off...

A Saturday tour of Seoul kicks off September.

I met this guy Daniel about a month ago and our schedules finally meshed (he was out of town, then I was in Thailand) enough that we went out together on a little tour of Seoul.

We met at 11 and took the subway to Jonggak station where we started off with some Korean lunch. The main dish was a spicy bean paste tofu soup (I really need to learn the Korean names for these things) and it was a very good meal until I believed Daniel when he claimed that these green peppers the Koreans eat raw aren't spicy. Yes, actually, they are. And it takes a long time for the heat to cool.

We went to 창덕궁 (Changdeok-gung, "Palace of Illustrious Virtue") which was lovely. It's a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site smack in the middle of Seoul; once you're on the grounds you can't see Seoul and it's very quiet and peaceful. We had to take a tour, there was no other way to get in. We took the English language tour (the ticket taker was a little confused, kept asking "katchi?") but it was a very big group and it was hard to hear the woman so we hung behind and read the signs on our own.

We then headed to Insa-dong and had some tea. I love tea houses. They're bustling in this peaceful way and you linger and enjoy your tea and read these menus with quotes about "the way of the tea."

We wandered over to 청겨천 (Cheonggyecheon, "Clear Water Stream"), a greespace area created out of a stream that used to be covered in concrete. It was cooling down a bit at that point and the greenspace area was lovely.

We started to head home and ran into some men playing 농악 (famers' music) calling for a good harvest.

On the walk back home I asked him what these hula hoops with bumps are. He explained that they're used to aid in digestion. He said, "Ajummas love them." 아줌마 , or "aunty" is used to describe older married women, not always in a good way.

I really enjoyed myself, and Daniel's English is multitudes better than he thinks it is. He was very good company and he taught me some Korean. Hey, now I know ALL my days and months! I think he was a bit nervous about any language barrier, but I knew we'd make do, and it was a great day.