Not only did I get to see an awesome friend again, I got to check out Korea's beautiful capital city. For various reasons, I have been putting off going to Seoul. One of those reasons was that I was afraid that (being as heavily and densely populated as it is) it would be a dirty, busy, ugly city.
Well, I couldn't have been more wrong. It's a beautiful, bright and spacious city. The roads and sidewalks are wide and clean, modern buildings and old buildings (anything from 50 to 500 years old) share the downtown core, trees line the streets, and architecture is all over the place from very traditional to post-modern.
Two of my favourite buildings...the one I call the "Zipper Building"...looks like it's getting undone with the North Seoul Tower in the background:
Okay...backtracking a little...getting to Seoul is pretty much the longest possible trip from here (I'm in the south-east corner, Seoul is in the north-west), and yet it was only 5.5 hours by train and cost a mere 26,800 won (or less than $25).
The train ride was peaceful and smooth as always, and I even slept a little (I was up just after 5 a.m. to make the 7 a.m. train in Masan). I got to Seoul at 12:30, just in time to meet up with Mark at 1 p.m...
Back to the architecture...it's all over the place from this (with Mark in front):
To cool guards at the palace:
Wow, this is going to be a VERY half-baked random blog...I have to teach my afterschool class, so this is it for today (then I'm going wandering with Mark)...so more Seoul tomorrow...I apologize for this blog haha I promise I'll try harder tomorrow...until then, enjoy the pics!
T
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