Seoul and Busan!

After Hokkaido trip, me and mba Tri went to South Korea. Deasty missed the flight (see this) so our adventure began right after we arrived at Incheon international airport. Both of us planned to rely on Deasty who could read some hangul writing, because we didn't have time (or might be too lazy) to learn how to read. My friends said learning hangul was easier than Japanese. Well, of course, Korean don't use the chinese characters on everything, but the Korean students should learn it at school. Deasty was not there, so we had to survive with our english and japanese.

We could understand the sign, which train we should take, and there were even some people offered to help us to find a way because we seemed too confuse while checking on the map. Everything was going too smooth until we arrived at Seohyeon station. It was not right, too smooth and too fishy, hahaha. We were supposed to take a bus to Mbak Nyayu's place, some where near Hankuk University of Foreign Studies (HUFS) from a bus stop near Seohyeon station. That was where our first unfortunate event started.

The bus stop didn't have romaji writings, there were only hangul. We couldn't read anything, we didn't know where we should stop at. In the end, we took be bus, and kept our ears on for every announcement, and keep an eye for the surroundings. All the announcement were in Korean, and the TV display for the stop's name was turned off. We mistook the announcement, and got off at the wrong place. The place we should go was on the next one, apparently. Thank God, wi-fi was everywhere, and I used my phone to call our friends by skype. "We're in front of two churces," we said. "But I'm already at HUFS bus stop. Where are you?" asked our friend. Of course we wouldn't meet because we were at different bus stop. After waiting about 30 minutes (it was cold that night, the temperature suddenly dropped into 5ºC), we decided to walk to the direction of the next potential bus stop. The good news was we could meet Mba Nyayu, and spent the nights at somewhere not even at Seoul.

Then we went to Everland, a theme park near mbak Nyayu's place. It was fun, the roller coaster was great, more thrilling than Hollywood Dream Ride at USJ. Unfortunately, there weren't many people around, the atmosphere were a bit gloomy. Some attractions were under maintenance. It was so quiet at most part of the park, the music was not around.

There were so many places we had visited during our short trip. Gyeongbokgung Palace, Insa-dong, Dongdaemun, Gwanghwamun, Itaewon, Namsan, Namsangol hanok village (thanks a lot for Hee Kyeong, our guide!), Bukchon hanok village, Hwaseong Fortress at Suwon (we got lost a bit because there were many school zones there), and even we went to Busan, four and half hour away by bus from Seoul.

Busan was not as crowded as Seoul (of course, the capital city). But at most public toilets at Busan provided the toilet paper outside the toilet stall, which means you should take a lot before you enter the stall. The public transportation was also nice and comfortable, easy to understand, and cheap because we could buy one day pass only 4000 won (it was not even 400 yen) for unlimited subway! The beach was good, and Jagalchi market was really something. It reminded me of Muara Angke fish market at Jakarta, but in a really bigger scale, and more organized. We also went to Yongdusan Park where we met some elderly, mostly men, played some kind of chess everywhere. there was also a souvenir shop where we met a shopkeeper who could speak Indonesia language.

near Haeundae Beach, Busan

At Seoul, we also visited the modern history museum (for free), and it was so inspiring. Hell yeah, Indonesia could learn a lot from South Korea.

One more.

Happy holiday! Wish me luck for all my holiday projects.