Seoul

Me in Seoul.

Seoul was wonderful! The weather was amazing, we basically ate our way through the city, and all in all had a lovely time.

The picture above is from a temple near Insadong, which after the dirt and... volume... of the westerners in Itaewon, was wonderful. This was also the neighborhood where I saw some of the most incredible paper I have ever seen in my life. Seriously.

Other temple/Insadong pictures:



(I love the vividness of the colors used on the temples here)


This temple area is in the middle of Seoul. It is pretty wonderful to find this place after the buzz of the city. The main temple is behind me as I'm taking the photo, but I liked how this was framed against the office building.


A monk on the street in Insadong.



This lady is making one of the most amazing street foods ever. In Korean, it is called Hottok, and it is basically a sort of pancake that is filled with brown sugar and fried. I used to love a good funnel cake, but I will never be able to look at them the same after one of these.

There was lots of shopping, lots of food (including two of us clearing out 30+ Nature Valley granola bars from a corner store, Mexican, Indian, and burgers), but the highlight really was the tour to the DMZ. I don't really know what to say about that, really.

Itaewon was worth it for the bookstore and the restaurants, but there are a LOT of white folks with bad manners there (but I should also point out that it was only the Korean men who thought I was a prostitute...)

We only has a couple of days, so there was a lot that we missed. Also, because of the holiday, many of the places I really wanted to go were closed. We are already talking about a weekend trip in November.

Also, running into people I knew, being able to navigate the subway on my own, and having enough of a command of the language that I was able to barter in markets and get a taxi to take me where I needed to go reminded me how far I have come in terms of language. I have a LONG way to go, but I feel better about using what little I have.