Amy – Leon and Amy’s Big Adventures

Before I get started with my list of the top things we did in Seoul, I’ll begin by telling you about the 24 hours we had before Seoul. The most stressful 24 hours in our whole trip to date; it was a constant string of unlucky events. For the more impatient – scroll down to the list further down the page!

First of which included accidentally leaving my beloved Scarpa hiking boots on a bus (RIP boots).
Palawan (Philippines) didn’t have any PCR testing facilities on the island, meaning we had to buy an immediate flight to Manila. We spent all of 10 minutes in our hotel before we realised!
After our PCR swab at midnight in Manila we then had issues checking in to our hotel (saying they were full, but they weren’t, but we’d already paid online – all very confusing, but we got there in the end).

Armed with our negative PCR results and the knowledge we didn’t need a visa, or a some special app with QR codes, we were ready for South Korea. Or so we thought… because the drama didn’t stop there.

Tom (our friend from home joining us) was on a slightly earlier flight to Korea than myself and Leon. We said goodbye to him and continued packing our bags at the hotel. Half an hour later we got a message from Tom explaining he’d been asked to show the K-ETA confirmation at check-in. What the heck is the K-ETA?! Well, apparently this is a newly introduced electronic travel authorisation for visa-free foreign visitors. But you’re supposed to apply for this at least 72 hours before flying. Oh dear!

The guy in the queue at Check In next to Tom said he had waited three hours for his confirmation. Tom had one hour, maximum. We rushed through the long, arduous application for the K-ETA as quick as we could, of course with plenty of issues arising on the way (e.g. like annoyingly having to download another app to resize of our passport photos). It was really stressful. We’d need to delay our trip and buy a new flight if the K-ETA didn’t come through in time.

It was a nail biting 50 minutes. But with just 10 minutes to go, Tom’s visa came through. Thank God! Phew, me and Leon knew that meant ours would probably be fine. Sure enough, our K-ETA approval came through in time. Ok so maybe this wasn’t unlucky, but more of an issue with us not being thorough enough with our organisation. Lesson learnt – don’t be so chill with travel prep. Check, check, and check again.

Although despite advanced planning, there are some things you can’t fully prepare for. Like when we arrived at Manila airport and found out the free airport shuttle bus to the other terminal wasn’t running for another 2 hours, so we would miss our flight. So we had to quickly flag down a taxi (of course we’d just changed all of our Philippine Pesos to South Korean Won 15 minutes before).

Then finally at Check In, the lady behind the desk wasn’t happy with accepting our insurance policy. “This is the 7th country we’re going to, it’s been accepted for 6 other countries!” I pleaded through gritted teeth. Without a doubt, South Korea was now in first place for the most stressful country to get into. After 10 minutes and discussions with her manager, we were through check in and on our way to South Korea. Hooray! Well… it wouldn’t be backpacking without some stress.

Things drastically improved once we were on the flight, where we seemingly had a VIP service with the Korean flight attendant continuously offering us wine. Was the stress that obvious? After 4 glasses, his next excuse was that he needed to finish the bottle to throw it away. “Bottoms up, girl!” he said as he poured my 5th glass. But then 15 minutes later a new bottle was opened and he was actually tapping me to wake me up (I was blissfully daydreaming with closed eyes, and totally wrapped up to the neck in the blankets he’d given me an hour earlier). “Of course I’ll have more wine”. The warm, wine induced relaxation was washing over me and things were looking up.

Tom had been in South Korea for an extra day compared to us (his flight was considerably quicker). He’d only been there for a few hours and he’d already eaten chicken intestines by mistake. “Google translate told me it was chicken nuggets!”

Me and Leon finally arrived and we needed another PCR straight away upon arrival. Wow, it was expensive here. We were no longer in a cheap country. After being poked and violated by the swab, we made our way to the subway and down the escalator to the track. We were so tired we didn’t realise we’d left our backpacks outside the PCR testing centre. Oops! We quickly ran back, luckily they were still there. Turns out South Korea is a pretty safe country.

We went out for a delicious Korean BBQ with our hostel for our first meal and were introduced to the eating and drinking customs. You cook the pork yourself, then make some tasty lettuce wraps with the side dishes. I asked for another side plate of the sweet and spicy slimy side dish that I had been piling onto the pork. “I’m not sure I wanna tell you what that is” the hostel owner said. I didn’t recognise the taste or texture so I knew it wasn’t something I’d ever eaten before. “It’s raw squid”. I wasn’t bothered by the rawness, but it took me by surprise. Welcome to Korea I thought to myself!

I’ll now kick off with my list of the top 20 amazing things we did in Seoul…. in no particular order.

1. Renting Hanbok

Hanbok is traditional Korean clothing. In the past, the hanbok was worn daily but now it is worn for special occasions such as weddings and festival. Despite this, tourists are encouraged to dress in the celebratory outfit. You can rent the clothing for a few hours (or a day) and walk around feeling your best self. There are many, many rental shops – the clothing is so beautiful, well-made, and there is so much choice. Some places even do your hair, make up, and do a photoshoot for you. You can actually get in to the royal palaces for free if you’re dressed in hanbok, which is a definite bonus. After trying on a few items, and getting my hair plaited, we wore ours round Gyeongbokgung Palace. Built in 1395, this is the largest of the palaces and considered to be the most beautiful.

2. Go Café Hopping

Coffee drinking and café culture is huge in Korea. Yes, I was surprised as well. I remember thinking on the flight – yikes, I hope they have good coffee. Well, well, well.. little did I know that I was about to stumble upon the most incomparably unique and appealing coffee shop scene I’d ever experienced.

Korea does not cultivate coffee but the consumption here is high. Seoul is the ultimate mecca for coffee addicts, like myself. It has more Starbucks than any other city in the World. Though we aren’t just talking about huge chains, Korea offers an amazing array of independent, cool, quirky haunts.

You will see some unique flavours here; tiramisu latte, grain coffee, popcorn latte. There’s also plenty of non-coffee choices too; strawberry latte, sweet potato latte, bubble teas. This confused me at first, but I now know that latte means steamed milk. So when you see sweet potato latte for example – that’s hot frothy milk with blended sweet potato. This delicious, comforting drink reminded me of autumn. In summary, lesson learnt – not all lattes have espresso.

In Korean cafés the focus is not just on the drinks, there is emphasis on the experience too. For example, themed cafés are really popular (e.g. Alice in Wonderland), as well as animal cafés and board game cafés. We tried them all!

You can read about my favourite café in the Busan blog; Café Art Space. Personally, I would call it a fancy dress café. If you’re heading to South Korea and want to find it, don’t bother with Google Maps. It actually doesn’t work in there – yes, this made travelling around pretty tricky. Due to the overt threat from North Korea, South Korea declined to share mapping data with Google. They have their own South Korean app; NaverMap, which, of course, is in Korean.

3. Renting School Uniform

In Korea, you don’t need to be a student to wear a school uniform. School uniforms are iconic, and are basically a fashion statement here. Even k-pop stars wear them on stage during performances. Rental shops are common (especially near and inside theme parks). The uniforms come in a variety of colours and styles; you can mix and match the tops and bottoms to create a unique school uniform look. We couldn’t resist… Though for some reason we ended up looking like posh boarding school students, not like the cool Koreans rocking theirs.

We spent the day in our uniforms going on all the fun rollercoasters, rides and attractions Lotte World has to offer. First of which was a 4D shooting game. In a theatre full of Koreans, the highest scorer was none only than our very own Leon. When the results (along with an embarrassing photo taken unknowingly during the game) pops up on the screen, Leon’s face was in first place. The whole theatre went “ooahhh” in unison. Needless to say, Leon was very smug.

4. Indulged in Korean Food

One of my favourite things about Korea? The food! Generally speaking in Korea, you can never quite prepare your nostrils for what you are about to experience. Get ready for a whole array of smells… mostly good, some not so good (sometimes a waft of sewage hits you in the face). But largely, the smells will have you following your nose on a hunt for that delicious treat.

If you’ve watched the Netflix Street Food episode in South Korea, Gwangjang Market is the famous market. Here we ate dumplings (mandu), knife cut noodles (kalguksu), mungbean pancakes (bindaetteok), sweet pancakes (hotteok), and a wriggling popular dish of raw octopus (sannakji) with a side of sesame oil. Sannakji is an octopus cut into small pieces and served immediately – with its tentacles still moving, and grasping on the plate. Definitely not something i’d ever eat again, but when in Rome…

People have actually died eating sannakji in the past, because the suckers can stick to your throat and cause a choking hazard. So we all chewed, chewed, and chewed some more.

Incase you’re wondering what that tray of suspicious looking shiny food is in the below photo, it’s chicken feet. And no, we didn’t eat any… but maybe next time.

I don’t know how they do it but Korean fried chicken is the ultimate fried chicken. Tender, juicy double fried chicken that stays extra crispy, even when smothered with a sweet, sticky glaze. If you haven’t tried it yet, I really recommend it. We ate a lot of Korean fried chicken. In fact, their whole food culture is very centred around meat and fish/seafood. Fruit and vegetables are pretty expensive here; barely any of the population are vegetarians or vegans.

*My favourite Korean food – hotteok (pancakes)*

5. Enjoy the Nightlife

Seoul is a city that does not sleep. Want a plate of delicious fried chicken with your friends at 5am? No problem. The place will be so full that it’ll feel like 8pm. Want to dance the night away? Want to drink coffee at midnight? Seoul has got you covered. For the best nightlife – we recommend Hongdae and Itaewon (although Hongdae will live in our hearts forever!)

Seoul has some awesome bars, dance clubs, night cafes, and a night market that stays open until the next morning. We even saw some ”vampire nightclubs” which opened in the morning.

6. Visiting The DMZ

The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is a strip of land running across Korea that serves as a buffer zone between the North and South. Dividing Korea like a scar, the 160 mile long zone is one of the world’s most heavily militarized borders. It has become a big tourist magnet, with many tourists visiting annually.

You can only visit the DMZ with a tour guide. The itinerary includes going down unfinished infiltration tunnels built by the North, viewing Freedom Bridge (used to return prisoners at the end of the war), and the observatory. The Mount Odu Observatory provides binoculars for checking out North Korea, and also 360 degree views around.

Weirdly enough, you can purchase food items here which were made in North Korea. Leon bought some alcoholic spirit made from mushrooms.

7. Visit a PC Bang (PC방)

Literally translating as PC Room, a PC bang is a gaming centre for playing multiplayer computer games for an hourly fee. They are pretty common and usually found in basements of buildings. Basically an internet cafe, but for gamers. They are open 24/7, feeding the intense gaming culture which exsists here.

We were surprised how cheap the hourly fee was (no more than £1.50), especially considering the incredible tech you were provided with. Lightning fast internet, high spec fancy PCs full of flashing LED lights, and immersive noise cancelling headphones. The food is great and the chairs are mega comfortable; we’ve even seen people taking a quick nap.

Being gamers ourselves, we couldn’t wait to check one of these out. We struggled with the language barrier, but the kind staff helped us through and soon we were battling it out on PUBG Battlegrounds.

The internet is so fast here, we heard that sometimes people come to a PC Bang if they need to get tickets for a very popular event.

8. Watch Baseball

Baseball is huge in Korea, it’s the most popular sport, with football following in second place. Baseball has been popular here since the 1980s. Having never seen a game we wanted to experience it, so we met up with Kyongsik (a friend of a friend) and headed to watch a game together at the Seoul baseball stadium. It was LG Twins vs Kia Tigers – sadly not many points were scored. But the most entertaining thing about the match for me was actually audience and the cheering culture. Korea’s cheering culture is absolutely fantastic; fans have a different song and dance for each batter. There are breakdancing mascots, cheerleaders, a hype man – it was really fun to watch and attempt to follow along with the different dances.

9. Take Photos in a Photobooth

Photo booths are really common, Korean’s seem to absolute love to take photos. Full of fancy dress options, hair brushes, hair straighteners, countless props – you are spoilt for choice. You can hop in anytime and strike a pose with your friends. In Hongdae where we stayed, there was so many photo booths, some even had queues out the door on occasion.

I think the fact these places are totally unmanned, and also open 24 hours, speaks volumes about how respectful this culture is. I thought about what kind of carnage that would ensue in England if we had these.

10. Ride the Bullet Train

You cannot visit Korea without a ride on one of the insanely fast bullet trains. We hopped on the KTX (korea express) to take us to Busan. Super speedy, smooth, with very comfortable seats. You can read all about our trip to Busan in our Busan blog.