SEOUL VACATION DIARY DAY #2

Hello! 

For the second day I had planned out a handful of culture and Korean traditions to show to my family. We started the day early and were out of our hotel room already around 9am. We took a taxi to Gwanghwamun square and went to visit the Gyeongbokgung palace first. I also planned to show them the Bukcheon Hanok village and Insa-dong, but we ended up skipping Insa-dong and spent the evening in Myengdong shopping. The weather was reaaally cold in the morning but eventually got a bit warmer in the afternoon. 

We didn't buy tickets inside because there was still a lot to see that day, so we just visited the free areas and then watched the royal guard changing ceremony that takes place right outside the gate. I'd only visited the palace once before, so the whole guard changing thing was new to me too. It was like a really strict routine of walking around in perfect formations, checking that all of them were properly dressed, et cetera. 

After the ceremony we headed to the Gwanghwamun square and under the ground where they have this small museum about King Sejong's life and achievements, cafe and a small gift shop. Even though I might not look like it, I'm a huge sucker for history (favorite subject at school, studied and read books like a crazy person) so it was really interesting. 

My favorite part was this wall where they had small pictures drawn by kids. The theme was "my dream". It was really cute to read them. They had drawn about dreams like "a professional football player", "singer", "president", "announcer", "Wife" et cetera. We then sat down at this small cafe / gift shop, had coffee, talked and bought some souvenirs for people back here in Finland. 

After the museum we headed to Bukcheon Hanok village to see old traditional Korean houses. It was something also I myself had wanted to do for almost a year but never had the time to. We never actually found the actual most popular road with a view of Namsan tower that all the pictures are taken from, but instead wandered around the tiny streets around the neighborhood. It was actually pretty nice to just walk, with no other tourists, in the middle of I don't even know where, with small traditional cafes here and there. It was absolutely beautiful. 

Afterwards, before heading back to Myeongdong we had lunch in this small Korean traditional restaurant, where you had to take off your shoes before entering. We ordered Bibimbap (the safest option when travelling with parents) and a seafood Pajeon.

In Myeongdong the rest of the evening was spent shopping (bought the most amazing new winter coat), walking around, sipping coffee and taking pictures. Especially Korean street food received lots of love from my family, hahah. Before returning back to the hotel we stopped at Paris Baquette to get something to eat and drink. Another food that was popular during this trip was "Kopan", a bread filled with sweet red bean paste and whipped cream kind of thing. 

The second day was crazy busy and long, but we also saw and did a lot. I had planned the next day destination to be Gangnam, so I could first show them the older Korea and then the next day take them to skyscraper jungle and show them the 2000's Korea. 

xx,

Julia

SEOUL VACATION DIARY DAY #1

Hey hey hey !

I'm here to share and tell about our 5-day mini vacation in Seoul with my family. Well, more like my family's vacation. I was there as a tour guide and a translator, haha! Them deciding to come to Seoul was a really random, sudden decision. I was planning to go home for Christmas and the Finland-Korea-Finland flights were on sale so my mom kind of just went and booked flights for our whole family and instead of me just flying home they came and brought me home. Which was super sweet and I was really excited to show my family where and how I live and what kind of city Seoul is.

Our hotel was called "Hotel Staz Myeongdong". It was right in Myeongdong between Myeongdong, Chungmuro & Uljiro 3-ga stations so it was easy to go and get around. I will write about it later on a separate post. 

They arrived to Seoul 9am local time, which means it was 2am in Finland. Everyone was pretty exhausted after the flight (and I was tired cause I had stayed up half of the night) so we just went straight to our hotel and after relaxing a bit we went to get food in Myeongdong. Pizza and pasta. Yes, very Korean. 

Yup, Jame's Chicago pizza. I wrote a post about it earlier here on my blog and my mother, who is a very active follower, said she wants to go there. So we did! My little sister is 8 years old and does not eat Korean food whatsoever (excluding banana milk apparently) so we also had to think about her when choosing restaurants and such. She fell asleep in the pizza place (lol) so we went back to the hotel right after to rest and after few hours went back to Myeongdong to just look around and grab something to eat. We ended up in Paris Baquette and tasted all kinds of breads and pastries that looked delicious. It was very exciting, apparently, and an amusing sight to see, too. We don't really have bakeries in Finland so they were like little kids in a candy store.  

We wandered a bit around Myeongdong and also visited my old neighborhood, Idae. I showed them where I used to live and we tasted some street foods before returning back to our hotel around 11pm ! The first day was really chill. I knew they were going to be tired so I didn't plan much for us to do. Just casual things and some walking around and getting used to the fact they're in a huge city now instead of a small town in Finland. 

xx,
Julia

I'm home

Happy December!! I'm home ! Arrived yesterday around 4pm and fell asleep right after, around 1am Korean time. Which lead to me being wide awake since 3am this morning (10am Korean time) drinking coffee, hanging out with our dog & cat and watching Netflix while editing pictures for upcoming blog posts. The plane was super empty so I was able to take up to 4 seats all by myself while watching movies and eating ice cream they served in the plane. So the flight was pretty amazing. 

It's been nice to just chill and relax. And that's exactly what I will do for the next 2 months. No stress, no school, no places to be at or stuff to do. I will just enjoy my time, blog, walk our dog, eat delicious food, meet up with my Finland friends, celebrate Christmas and study Korean. This is gonna be a good vacation. 

xx,
Julia