mrsjono

Great Wall of Korea

November 15, 2010

Day 3 was spent in Suwon, an hour away from Seoul. The city is part encircled by Hwaseong Fortress, built during 1794-96 to honour King Jeongjo's father and to protect the city against Japanese invasion.

It is an outstanding example of early modern military architecture, incorporating many defensive and offensive features including arrow launching platforms, observation towers, command posts, sentry towers and secret gates.

Most people will enter via the North Gate (Janganmun) if they rely on the directions given by the tourist info centre. We covered half the distance (see red dotted line) and descended after reaching a dead end at Hwayangnu. If you're planning to visit, start from the South (i.e. Paldalmun Gate) to save on entrance fees ;)

I tried to escape paying 2,000W but was unsuccessful :x

Locals take the paths along the walls of the fortress as a shortcut to get over to the other side of the city.

Hwaseomun

Suwon skyline

I was blown away by this massive field of lalang growing nearby.

I thought we were gonna walk the entire 5-6km and eventually go back to the lalang but there wasn't enough time to do so as it was getting dark and I never got to see the lalang again.

Paldalsan

How did he cycle up here?

I wonder if the arrows are pointing in the right direction...

Seojangdae-West Command Post was reconstructed twice in 1997 and 2007 after being destroyed by fires.

Seonodae-West crossbow platform

Bell of Filial Piety

Colours along the way

An extended section of the fortress leading to Hwayangnu. Looks like a scene in Red Cliff eh?

Time to head down for dinner

We wanted to eat the famous Suwon beef but apparently it's only available near Hwahongmun Gate. In fact, none of the restaurants in the city centre have beef!

We peered through the windows of Kongbul and saw the waiters tossing what looked like noodles on a large pan. Looks good.

Turned out they were bean sprouts. Big pan of bean sprouts with pork slices and cuttlefish.

Let it simmer....

Give it a toss!

Ready to eat!

It was freaking cold tonight. I was shivering badly and I was determined to get a new coat at Dongdaemun, which I did at Maxstyle.

Nice shop by a young designer

If only it was summer! I need to change my wardrobe man!

south korea

Hi Seoul!

November 15, 2010

I had a hard time choosing between Gyeongbokgung and Changdeokgung, which was just across the road from where we stayed. My greatest regret in this entire trip was not choosing Changdeokgung on this day! :(:(

Gyeongbokgung was destroyed during the Japanese invasion (1592-98) and the site remained vacant for the next 273 years. The buildings have been rebuilt and restored over the last three centuries. So majority of the gates and halls look new.

I don't watch Korea shows in pre-modern/traditional settings (like Dae Jang Geum or Goong I find them too slow and draggy) so I wasn't quite able to relate the history of the palace to whatever I was seeing. Most of the halls and buildings were empty and no different from one another. Worse still, we didn't get an audio guide so I only had a superficial understanding of the place and that doesn't feel good...at all.

Here come the guards

Give the kiddo a break, can't you see she's more interested in the palace than looking at your lens?

Notice the influence of traditional Chinese architecture here. Despite the resemblance, there are differences as well in terms of materials used (wood vs brick), colour scheme, colours of roof tiles, level of detail of the statuettes on the roofs and how they were lined along the ridges of the roof and how high the eaves of the roofs were raised.

Most of the buildings sit on a stone foundation like this.

Doors have low clearance and small roof on top.

The king used Gyeonghoe-ru to entertain foreign envoys or hold large-scale banquets for his ministers.

Nice red beret

and nice red tree

Hyangwon-jeong Pavilion

The teacher was taking a long time to take a group photo of these children, who had to stand for so long, facing the blinding sun. The moment she was finally done with the group photo all of them scurried off.

There are two museums within the palace and we only had time to do the folk museum. Tomb-like figures of generals can be seen near the folk museum.

King Sejong, fourth king of the Joseon Dynasty, led the invention of Hangul or Korean characters. Gwanghwamun Square was opened just last year and is an important historical and cultural place where Korea's Presidential Grounds, the US Embassy and other important government buildings are located.

Lunch was at Gwanghwamun, an unknown restaurant selling Japanese food. We were so hungry we didn't take any photos of our food. When it comes to choosing what to eat, we use 'Win, Lose or Draw in the air' (when there's no menu, or menu is in Korean and there are no pictures, or no one speaks English or Chinese), 'Point-to-the-picture' (picture can be misleading) or 'Look-at-the-food-others-are-having' (not applicable if you're the only patron but most reliable method).

Namsan Park was gorgeous

By the time we reached the bottom of Seoul Tower, it was dark.

Now Dad's appearing on the paper too! But different Mom this time lol.

好辛苦才照到这张手都冻坏了~

N stands for new. The tower was given a new look few years ago and renamed as N Seoul Tower.

All I could see was Michael Jackson dancing on a LED billboard

View pales in comparison to Taipei 101. I wonder is it due to the height of the tower or its location on top of a mountain cos it's all black when you look down. The windows of the viewing deck were poorly maintained too. If you've been to 101, can give this observatory deck a miss. Not worth the money (7,000W).

Dinner was at Myeongdong Gyoza. One serving is enough for two. This meal was his favourite.

The night ended with more shopping at Myeongdong again!

south korea

Jung-gu

November 14, 2010

First day in Seoul was spent sleeping...you read that right, sleeping. We were totally absolutely super worn out after slogging for the past two weeks. We reached Jongno 3-ga at 8.30am but couldn't check in because our room was still occupied. Arghhhhhh! Torture. It was cold, we were suffering from fatigue and didn't have much appetite. The two zombies wandered into this shop that sells porridge in the vicinity of the guesthouse.

Mushroom oyster porridge (8,000W) and side dishes were good. No idea what the brown liquid (left) was. Taste like cough syrup to me. If you're looking for breakfast, Bonjuk's not a bad choice to start the day.

People like us from the tropics were naturally delighted to see foliage in different colours. Sadly, it was the last few weeks of autumn before the arrival of winter and most of the leaves were starting to fall off. Time your trip around October if you can. November's neither here nor there.

Hyundai has a prominent presence here. The home-grown conglomerate has a construction arm that has completed many residential projects in Korea.

At last we could sleep. I chose this place bcos Seoul Backpackers at Myeongdong was full and Jongno 3-ga was the next best alternative. Trust me, subway transfers are killers. Even though the rooms were crammed and worn out, we decided to stay put cos it was cheap (twin bed 20,000W/person) and location is more convenient compared to Hongdae, where all the backpackers were concentrated at.

After sleeping for 5 hours, we made our way to Namdaemun. We reached here early in the morning but our day only started at 3.30pm. Leaving on a Friday night right after working to the very last minute is not such a good idea after all...

Namdaemun is one of the oldest night markets around. It was also one of the detours in Season 17 of The Amazing Race.

We were famished and simply walked into the first eatery we saw. Everything was alien to me and the dazzling light bulbs made me more dazed.

All the stalls were selling the same food and the stall owners were calling out to us. Just when we were scratching our heads on which stall to pick, we heard "面条面条" (noodles). You'll be amazed, the number of Chinese disguised as Koreans is alarming.