Seoul: The Grand Finale

 Here it is folks, the Grand Finale of our trip to the land of the Korean South!

 

 Kevin had the great idea to visit the Fish Market. And here is the amazing result:

They have tanks all over the place with water constantly running through to keep the fishes happy and healthy. Notice the hook tool on the left side of the picture. We witnessed someone picking out a fish they liked, followed by a quick stab from this hook into the fishes brain by the seller. We were also showered with fish scales as a seller was preparing a fish for consumption.

Notice the creature that has hooked itself to the glass wall.

Kevin really wanted to find some freshly chopped and still-wriggling baby octopus legs to eat, but we didn't find any. Apparently these are fairly common in Korea, despite the risk of them suctioning to your throat and suffocating you. Luckily on our way out we witnessed this guy wearing a "hipster" hoodie, and balance was restored. We ran around for 5 minutes trying to get a decent picture of this guy.

Lights from the rooftop in Suwon. 

Here is an example of a Korean paradox: it is often lighter at night than during the day. Note the woman who apparently is not wearing pants, a common fashion statement here. 

This guy yelled at us and made us do the Gangnam style dance! We witnessed him several times chasing little girls! I guess it is his job to just walk around being goofy and talking in a high voice. When he saw us he exclaimed "ah, foreigners!" in Korean.

Moving to a new apartment in Korea is way cooler than doing almost anything anywhere else in the world: they are lifting the couch on a giant external elevator!

Exercise machines are everywhere!

This was taken on top of a mountain fortress in Suwon. Behind us was a guard tower that went up another 20 feet. 

How did Muffin get here? And when did he dye his ears??

This is the train that gives a tour around the fortress!

On top of Namsan Tower, Korea's "space needle on a mountain." Many Koreans fall in love for the first time on top of this majestic peak!

There are thousands of locks stuck to the fences and fake trees up on the mountaintop to symbolize people's love. Lots of these cell phone cases as well, and various other little trinkets. 

A row of lock-christmas-trees!

We were amused by these "gothy" girls all looking on their separate phones, together.

 Kevin ate the tower.

That's all, folks!

M+R

Seoul, South Korea Trip, part 2: out and about with Kevin and Miran

Here is more of our trip after the airport; we didn't think it could get much better after that, but it did! :)
We had to meet Kevin by taking a bus from the airport to Beomgye (pronounced Bumgay) station, but ended up missing the stop because we couldn't tell what they were saying and we were looking for Kevin's puffy hair waiting for us at the stop but didn't see it. Everyone left the bus at the last stop, but we had no idea where we were. The bus driver ended telling us through hand motions that we had missed the stop and it was one stop back. So we had to get on another bus to take us to the previous stop. When we got there, we called Kevin using the phone at the ticket station desk and he was still in bed! I thought he had to take the subway to meet us, but I guess he lived only a few blocks away and we were soon reunited! 

The roof top of Kevin's apartment was an open park with free wooden exercise equipment! It seemed that a lot of buildings had an open hang out spot on the rooftop. Also, there was exercise equipment all over the place (along the river, on top of a hill walking path near the fortress we visited, and at parks).

 There are a lot of very tall and modern towers everywhere. There are many more apartment building towers than anything else.

 Kevin brought us to a FC Seoul soccer game at the Olympic stadium and we got a corn dog and a spicy, really thick noodle Korean dish. They didn't know I was taking a picture, so Matt wasn't prepared with his happy face. Here is a taste of what he normally looks like!

Wild fans at the game. There were nice sound effects and games with the crowd during the half time show. The coolest part of this game is that every time Seoul scored, they shot off fireworks! Cheerleaders led the crowd in cheers, rather than just being scantily clad. Kevin didn't like this stadium as much as other ones he has been too because it was too big for the crowd and they had cheers that he didn't know.

Our first authentic Korean feast. We grilled meat atop a skillet over these tubular coals. We used the leaf lettuce as a wrap and put rice, sauces and meat inside. This place specialized in pork face, and it was mighty tasty!

Kevin's mix of friends and foes! Who is who?

After 2 hours of constant eating and drinking. Apparently its popular to put Soju in beer, which improves the taste and alcohol content. 

 After this meal we went to several bars with Kevin's expat friends, one of them was rasta-themed, another was Irish Pub themed and we played pool and had some bangers and mash. We tried to go into Kevin's favorite club, which looks like a giant cave, but it was only about 10:30 and there were about 5 people in the whole place. At this point we were both really tired after a full day of walking around Seoul and zero sleep the night before.

The next morning (actually afternoon, after a full night's sleep!) we went to this very large and modern building. This was the Lotte department store and there is a food court in the basement. The small windows on the second picture light up at night and they often show a Tetris game playing. We ate some Mandu (delicious Korean dumplings filled with Kimchi or other tasty treats) and Taco Bell for breakfast.

After breakfast we took the train into Seoul to meet Kevin's co-teacher Miran. We all rented bicycles and biked for about 2 hours around the downtown area and Han River. Here are some of the modern buildings of Seoul.

 Here is a panorama of the main parliament building. Kevin really liked it because it looks like it came out of Star Wars. It is huge with giant pillars and angular lines, which can be seen better in the second picture.

Here is a closeup of a mythical lion statue.

 Here is a fountain in front of the government building, and some lumpy-looking trimmed hedges.

 Here is Miran in front of a newly renovated traditional Korean building, it used to be used to house visitors to the government.

 Train bridge across the Han River.

 Train bridge + Rochelle and Matt!

Here is a view from our bike ride along the Han River. The tall building in front is the tallest in Korea. Apparently there is an aquarium somewhere in it. There were TONS of people out biking and the traffic on the trail was pretty chaotic. Not as chaotic as the daily car traffic in UB, though.

 Swan or crane boats?

Trees growing in large metal blocks.

 Is the tree growing from the basement floor? We may never know.

 This is when we were attacked by a giant subterranean tentacled beast! We barely escaped with our lives! The tree wasn't so lucky.

 After that frightening encounter, we decided to gorge on some tasty morsels. We went to this coffeeshop and ordered some ice cream Belgian waffles. All forks in Korea are required to have smiley faces cut into the metal, as shown here:

 Eating that waffle like a boss. That thing was huge and delicious!

More to come! We have many photos of dead sea creatures itching to be shown.