Seoulful insight: Korea trip diaries: day 3 and 4

Sorry I have been keeping quiet but I had some personal issues and then last weekend was a national holiday. But now I'm back :)

Day 3, on monday in the morning I had some time before meeting my friend so I went for a walk. I woke up soooo early for some reason and had nothing to do for two hours. But I had nice walk around sungkyunkwan university area which was basically next to my hostel.

Tong-in market and Insadong

So about 1pm, I met with my friend Hyojoo who was in same volunteer work place as me when I did volunteer work in Korea.

We met at Gyeongbokkung station and continued to tong-in market from there. It was so nice to see her after a year :)

Tong-in market is basically a food market where you can find traditional street food. You can access there from line 3 (orange line), gyeongbokkung station, exit 2. It's about 500 meters from exit 2 on the left side.

We first walked it through and just browsed what was in there. We were supposed to go to the restaurant where you buy kind of fake coins and then with those coins fill in your "lunchbox" with different kinds of food. But sadly it was closed.
So we ended up buying tteokbokki (떡볶이), tong-in market specialty small kimpab (김밥) and mandu (만두). And I got sikhye as a drink which is a korean traditional rice beverage (it has real rice in it).
Then we looked a small spot in one shed which was full of mainly older people spending the day and eating picnic food. We just stuffed ourselves in there and spend a little picnic ourselves :P
Just a warning, if you don't like spicy food, don't try tteokbokki. It's very spicy rice cakes but for me it tastes so good! Because I like spicy food :P

Our food :P

After eating all I asked if we could visit Insadong which is really famous tourist street for getting all the korean traditional things and souvenirs. I needed to buy my mom a picture which she asked (because my mom loves the korean mother-of-pearl art).

We decided to walk from the market to Insadong which takes about 20 minutes. It's not that far~

We walked next to Gyeongbokkung palace and partly through gwanghwamun. So If you're looking for nice day with sightseeing and lots of traditional korean culture, I recommend route tongin market-gyeongbokkung-gwanghwamun-insadong because they're so close to each other.

Above is Gyeongbokkung and on it's right side gwanghwamun square. Literally, if you're walking you'll be seeing this as your left and right view :D

We found the picture pretty fast to my mom although first we had little miscommunication problems about what I was looking for but eventually all good~

Then we found Sulbing cafe which I had read great reviews before and wanted to try! Hyojoo had visited Sulbing before so she recommended me Mango bingsu. Sulbing is mainly concentrated on bingsu's which is traditional dessert in korea. It's made of shaved ice and usually comes with icecream topping. You have milk in side of the bowl and you can pour it over as you like. But it tastes definetly better with that milk :P

We ordered injeolmi toast and mango bingsu.

After eating ourselves full from delicious bingsu, we said goodbyes and planned that we have to see next week also.
After parting with Hyojoo I thought that evening is still young and I had some more shopping to do so I quickly stopped at myeongdong to buy some cosmetics what my friends had ordered.

It was a bit crowded even though it was weekday. But this is pretty normal because Myeongdong is popular shopping street. I recommend if you do shopping, go at daytime. Not too early though because I noticed most of shops open at 10.30am or so at most days.

Ewha and Hongdae

On tuesday it was so sunny and I was glad that weather had been nice whole time I had been in korea. I met Anniina at the morning and we headed to Ewha which is famous and popular university area (Ewha womans university).

You can access there by line2 (green line), ewha womans university (idae) station. I don't remember which exit but there are clear signs to pointing which way :P

We just walked through streets, enjoying view. And visited outside the famous idae (korean name for ewha university) library.

Then we were feeling pretty hungry and we went to eat chicken in one restaurant Anniina liked so much. I have to say it's propably best chicken I've had in a while :D And dem chips omg so delicious! And in that restaurant, if you have your passport with you they give -10% discount for foreigners.
It's a little hard to explain where it is located but when you're at main street which is going down towards idae, when you notice corner ice cream shop Baskin&Robbins in your left side, turn left to that side street. It's right on the left corner so basically opposite on Baskin&Robbins. Chicken restaurant is on basement level so there's stairs going down. It can look a bit shady but trust me, it's an excellent place for either lunch or dinner.

We were pretty full but decided to first go around smaller streets and then get back to main street and go get ice creams from baskin&robbins. I have to say they make delicious ice cream, and it's quite cheap. My serving cost 4500won which is about 3€?

Then just before we left I bought a bag for myself :P I recommend idae if you want cheap but very good looking bags. In the main street there was one bag seller from where I bought my bag and it was only 10,000won (about 7€).

We said goodbyes at idae station and I headed to Hongdae next where I met with Laura.
To Hongdae, you can access also from line2 at Hongik university station. It's like couple stations away from idae.

We met in front of exit9 with Laura. We decided to visit Thanks nature cafe which is basically a sheep cafe :D They have sheeps inside fence outside cafe. Animal cafes are pretty common in korea but sheeps are rare actually. They were so adorable and fluffy! And I totally liked their ade drinks and waffel!

It's a little difficult to explain location but I'll try; when you come from exit9 and see etude house in one corner, walk towards there. Pass etude house and turn right from next intersection. Walk straight until big H&M is on your right. Turn left from there. It's on that street. Just walk straight and it's on your left side. It's also on basement level so you have to go downstairs.
It's definetly a cafe worth visiting for. And pay attention to this: you can visit the sheeps only after ordering!

After petting sheeps and saying goodbye to them, we walked around Hongdae. I finally got myself converse shoes which I had been wanting about two years lol. They cost about 45000won so about 43€.