Monday, June 22, 2015

Seoul Journ (DAY 2) Gyeongbokgung Palace // Total Museum of Contemporary Art // Samcheongdong // Insadong

So we've been back from vacation for a couple of days and things have been a little busy around here but I'm finally back to do some updating on our Seoul holiday. The second day was an eventful one indeed. We woke up bright and early to visit the Gyeongbokgung Palace!

The underground journey from train to train is actually pretty long, loads of stairs and valleys - we had to take some time to adjust to the lack of escalators :P

The palace guards! It was pretty warm there but not as humid as Singapore so it wasn't too bad, also, the breeze was pretty cooling so that helped! 

My new Korean squeeze. 



This was the best I could do, it was too hot to perfect the jump. 

Found my Korean twin sister. 

As we ventured further inwards, we found this rather tranquil spot with a view of the mountains. It was quite lovely indeed. 






We stayed for about an hour or so until the weather got progressively warmer, so we started making our way back out. 

A failed attempt lol. 

Byebye Gyeongbokgung and Korean men in suits!

We went out in search of the famous Tosokchon Ginseng Chicken! 

It was a bit of a long walk because we didn't know the exact location but I quite enjoyed it, I love the fresh flowers and cute little cafes. 

Ginseng Chicken isn't really my thing but my family loved it! Ginseng soup broth with free range chicken (all below 49 days old), stuffed with glutinous rice and served with Korean side dishes and soju. 

Mum loved it so much we actually went back for more on another day. 

Excuse the slanted picture, the place was really authentic and beautiful. Should've taken more pictures of the interior! 

After that we set off to look for the Total Museum of Contemporary Art. 

Took a bus that led us towards the residential area near the mountains. We were met by an immense looking hill and started to mount it. 

Hahaha poor mummy. The hill doesn't look super steep but it was... It winded up as well and it took us around 20 mins to find the museum! All along the hill were huge galleries and art houses so it got a little confusing, especially when Total Museum was a rather small one. 

This was taken at another gallery that we mistook for Total at first, it was actually right next door! After we arrived, the 3 of them went to a cafe near by whilst I checked it out. 

The arduous climb was well worth it I think. 




Lol self-timer shot. 

This was a rather cool exhibit. You step inside the car and there's a camera on the left trained at you, and another camera on the right trained at the tv screen which shows a moving blurry city background. The two are then combined on the huge screen so it looks as if you're driving through the city. I'm not sure if I described it clearly but I was pretty impressed by the idea - though I'm not sure it's actually functional. Then again, art is rarely functional in the physical sense. 

Just... checking myself out, hahaha. 



When I was done I went to look for the family and found them in a cute little Italian style cafe called Monet Cafe. 

It was a pity that I was still full from lunch because the pasta looked so good. 


Made our way back down the giant hill. 

Loving the mountain at the back <3

We took a train back down to Samcheongdong to check out the streets. It was one of our favourite places I think, loads of cute little stores, cafes, and awesome looking desserts. 

Saw this little party as we were walking along :')

Amazing looking frozen yogurt place which we came by to try on another day. 

There was a flea market around one corner and one stall was selling these awesome little tubes of tea! I loved it so much I bought quite a number as gifts (and.. for myself :P). 

Such lovely streets, it was very cooling as well because of the trees. Do-yeun came here to meet us and I was so excited to see her after almost a year! She brought us for some Korean food nearby too :3 

This was only about 1/4 of the food we had, it was actually pretty damn immense. The 5 of us couldn't finish the whole lot. 


There were flowers everywhere, I love them :') After dinner, Do-yeun wanted to bring us to have some good Korean bing-su but she wasn't too sure where the exact location was so we relied on googlemaps which brought us to... 

Some famous stone steps that went on for FOREVER. 

We walked vertically up for about 20 mins before reaching flat ground, it was mad tiring. 

Caught the sunset though! 

Lol, my sister documenting my mum's climb, which basically killed us all. 




We finally found the bus stop and hopped on to go get....

Amazing bingsu. Do-yeun and I shared the berry one and I loved it so much. We were terribly stuffed after that though! 

My darling unnie <3 After this we shopped around the Insadong area for a little. My dad and I were pretty tired so we headed home first while mum and sis went to some amazing supermarket. 

They came home with live abalones and we cooked them with Korean instant noodles, it was amazing. 

Had to move to a hotel again because the AC was still down, this time they didn't have any regular rooms available so we had a suite each. That was pretty damn amazing. 

Went to bed a happy kid :3

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