My trip to Korea (suite)
Sunday April 8thIt was a beautiful and sunny day. We decided to visit Seoul. We took the city tour bus (downtown tour) and nice surprise, we had on board announcements in French. Initially we thought to get off at some stop to visit the place then taking the next bus but it took 2 hours to finish the tour so we didn’t make it because we already booked a half day tour in the afternoon. As it’s Sunday morning, there’re less traffic jams than the working days and we enjoyed our tour very much.
After the tour, walking back to the hotel, we stopped by Deoksugung palace and luckily we saw a kind of ceremony (we guessed it’s the changing guard ceremony). The guards wore beautiful and colourful clothes.
After the ceremony, you can take some pictures with the guards.
It’s the first palace we visited, and it’s a little strange for me to see a beautiful and old palace surrounded by big and modern buildings.
Cherry bossoms are really beautiful, and strolling there reminded me Frank Shin and Jin Yeong the first time they went out together to visit a palace in Hotelier.
In the afternoon, the tour guide came to pick us at the hotel and we started our tour by Namsan Hanok village. We can see traditional style of residences of the Joseon Dynasty’s Yangban (upper-class society) there.
This is the kitchen, and they also heat their house under the floor by this system, so now I understand why Korean people keep sitting and sleeping on the floor, because it’s very cold in winter here.
The tour guide told us that it’s where they stock kim chi during winter to keep them with the right temperature.
Standing in front of this house, I remembered a scene in Untold Scandal when Cho Won, sitting behind the window, tried to say to lady Chung he doesn’t love her with tears in his eyes when he saw the pain of lady Chung.
The tour guide told us that nowadays, people can come here and wear these tradictional costumes for the wedding ceremony.
Really amazing for us, a very old and traditional house near a modern building !
After Namsan Hanok village, we went to Jogye Temple.
Cute, cute Boudha
Then we dropped by Amethyst factory, the shop my friend wanted to go. Korea has beautiful amthyst jewels, and the price is not as expensive as in France.
But if you have an occasion to visit this factory where all the prices are in dollars, I recommend you to bargain hard, and always starting from half price.
We finished our tour by Namdaemun market where we bought some kimchi and red hot chili powder to bring back in France. Ha ha the old man who sold chili powder was so kind, he kept refusing to sell the hottest chili powder to me even it’s more expensive, he fear it’s too hot for me and then I would throw away the kim chi if I make with it. And I hope the fridge of the hotel didn’t smell kim chi too much as we kept them there during our stay before coming back in France.
And please wait till the last day of your trip to buy it, because kim chi becomes sour very fast. Fortunately the kim chi I bought was made by radish and not cabbage, so it's still good now after I come back in France.
This second day, we went to bed early because tomorrow is the D-day, the Winter Sonata day tour, the tour I always dreamed to make.
And it’s also the day I will see HRH, but I didn’t know it yet.
(to be continued)
posted by Toujours_BYJ @ 4/21/2007 09:04:00 AM
16 Comments:
yippee!! you're posted the second part! hee, more quickly than i'd thought too! thanks much much for sharing :)
Hi bb, I would like to post more quickly but it's very hard because I'm too busy, thank you very much for your support.
Chère Camille, vous avez vu les cerisiers en fleur ! Quelle chance ! Ah, je me demandais comment les gens pouvaient sembler être à l'aise en hivers dans les maisons anciennes ! Des planchers chauffés ? Génial !
Comme vous, la résidence pour les hommes me rappelle US. Si tout va bien, j'aurai finalement le temps de regarder ce soir ce film pour une deuxième fois (après avoir fini de lire le roman il y a 3 mois!).
Je suis peinée d'apprendre que votre bras est encore assez douloureux pour qu'on vous conseille de ne pas le bouger:(
Il faut prendre votre temps pour continuer vos articles même si vous nous avez maintenant si bien alléchées avec votre dernière phrase !
I really like the pace you travel, camille. You didn't try to pack too many places in one day. You seemed to really enjoy what you saw and had fun with it, like talking to the store owner about kimchi.
I hope one day when I go to Korea, I can enjoy this leisurely style too. Love your trip report so much, thanks for sharing.
Dear Camille,
Have you recovered from the jet lag? I'm looking forward to reading your travel report. Thank you for sharing!
cloud nine
Chère Gosijo
C'est la saison des cerisiers en fleur à Seoul, vous les voyez partout où vous allez.
Nous étions allées au célèbre boulevard des cerisiers en fleurs de Yunjungno qui fait 7 km, c'est magnifique.
Merci pour votre gentillesse, pendant mon séjour à Seoul mon bras ne me faisait pratiquement pas mal mais depuis mon retour en France, ça a empiré de nouveau car j'ai trop de choses à faire.
My dear Jaime
Thank you for your nice words. I always fear that you may think I'm strange because I made a long trip to Korea and then instead of going to see all YJ's spots right away, I took time to visit others places.
But I think he loves his country so much that I want to learn all about Korea too.
Dear Cloud nine
Thank you for your concern, I've recovered from jet lag although I still wake up very early.
I just talk to P, we both miss Korea very much.
camille,
how come frequent traveler bb and semi-frequent traveler like me keep missing the cherry blossoms no matter how effort we put into "timing" things right..........and you can hit the jackpot so easily, and on first try?
Hmpht! :)
mishio dear, this is called luck ha ha...
Seriously, I think because you and bb often go to Korea when there is an event related to YJ while I chose the right period when cherry blossoms. But seeing HRH was "my cerise sur le gâteau".
hi camille..
im enjoying ur writeup very much..
u know..i always look forward to trip reports by non-asian bae sisters who visit baeland. its interesting to know how u see korea as part of asian culture. of cos its all bcos of ONE MAN but somehow i sometimes feel the western will see something that we asians may sometimes not see or missed seeing. oh dear...i hope u get what i mean? sorry..
anyway...keep ur report coming ^^
ahh..btw..if its not too troublesome..can u pls recommend some good websites that i can go to for travel packages in paris? my frens are thinking to backpack from england to paris. thank u ^^
hee... actually i ain't that keen to see cherry blossoms in korea la... have kindda always associated cherry blossoms with japan. and i did purposely plan to go last march to see the cherry blossoms in japan, and i did :)
a pity i was abit early to see the beautiful flowers when i went last month though :)
camille, hehe... looks like i ain't the only one who's mistaken, yokee seems to be too... :)
Dear yokee
Welcome to my blog ! It seems that you, as bb before, has mistaken me as French people.
I'm Asian origin too, but I live in France since I was young, so I think I'm very influenced by western culture and sometimes my way of thinking is more alike them than Asian people.
Thank you for your nice words about my writings.
About the travel packages, please give me some times to check, because I don't know anything about this kind of packages as I always visit others countries and not Paris. Or if you do have some, please e-mail to me and I can tell you which ones is better.
My e-mail is camille_paris6@hotmail.com
bb, so you didn't see cherry blossoms in Japan ? I hope next time you go to Korea or Japan, you can enjoy seeing them because they are really beautiful.
huh? camille u r not french? my my...im so sorry...
well, i saw the cherry blossoms when i went to japan last march, but i didn't see them when i went again this year :)
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