When we got back, Hisung and his dad had to go to the dentist. Hisung was having some major dental problems right before we left. He had to take antibiotics and vicodin for the pain. He's having a root canal, but something else is up with it too, I'm not really sure. His dad turns out needed implants, and they cost a pretty penny.....or....won. But yeah, so after the dental appointment we went out to a nice little Chinese restaurant and I had Jjambbong. It's a very spicy red soup with noodles and seafood in it. The noodles were VERY spicy, but good, and I think it goes without saying that I left the tenticals floating in my soup alone. hahaha! I was wearing a white shirt though, big mistake, and I splashed a little of the red soup on it, but I had my little shout pen, and wouldn'tcha know it? It came right out! Those things are like a laundry miracle. Here's a pic of the restaurant, and Hisung's dad in the corner. haha!
That afternoon we decided to go to Gyungbok Palace and see the National Museum. It was so hot and humid. Like I stepped into a sauna with my jeans and tennies on. It was a loooong ride, and there were so many people, I just stood for most of the time, when we weren't racing to a new subway line to transfer, or climbing up and down what seemed like hundreds of stairs. I swear, Seoul is just one gigantic Stairmaster. My muscles are already bigger than when I got here, and it's only been a few days.
Even in the rain, there were still so many people. I snapped a pic of this group of Chinese school kids as they shot a video. Their leader was hilarious! Look at him go!
So we start over to the National Museum, which is right next door, and guess what....closed on Mondays! Sad..... Well, we were meeting up with his friend Sungmin in the evening, and we'd already forgotten his present. I was so hot and sticky and wet and miserable I wanted to go back home anway. So off we went, and that's when I got into my little skirt dress and took out my braids. With my wavy hair and a nice airy dress I felt ten million times better.
So then off we went again and I'm still kicking myself that I didn't take pictures that whole night. We were supposed to see Sungmin again tonight, but he can't come. So hopefully sometime I'll have some pics of them together before we leave. We went way out to see him and they talked like they'd never been apart. He's definitely Hisung's best friend. He was a professional soccer player here for a while and now he's getting ready to go study sports marketing in the states. Even though I'm happy for him, I'm kind of sad, because he doesn't speak English quite as well as Hisung I think, but he has a good TOEFL score and got into the University he wants to attend. Here they have academies that specifically teach you skills for how to pass these tests, whereas Hisung's classes in the states don't teach too much honestly.
Anyway! So we walked and walked and walked to this restaurant, and we finally arrived around the time I thought my feet were going to fall right off and roll into the nearest gutter. It was totally worth the walk though. We had Samgyehtang. It's a chicken and ginseng soup served in a stone bowl. When you get it, it's broth with chopped scallions in it, and a tiny boiled chicken, whole, right in the bowl. When you pick up the pieces with your chopsticks, it falls right apart....soo good. You're supposed to put the chicken on a plate and eat it out of the bowl as you go, and put the bones in a little metal can. I just couldn't do that though....I totally deboned my chicken, then put all the pieces back into my soup and ate it that way. Also! The coolest part, is that the chicken is stuffed with rice, a date, and ginseng. It looks like a big nut cut in half kind of. So when you open it, all the goodies come out and voila! Chicken and rice soup! It was amazing. Wow....Even Sungmin was impressed with how much I ate.
He was a funny guy. He's my favorite of Hisung's friends so far, although I know I've only met too. But he's very entertaining and you know that a night out with him won't be boring for sure. And Hisung gets a lot more fun when he's around Sungmin. He brings out a really funny side to him that I haven't seen as much. It's really great to see him with good friends. So after dinner we took a cab back to the subway station, since I was about to die of exhaustion. This time it was after 9, but my body says SLEEEEEP!!!! at about 8:30. So a cab ride and 45 minutes of subway and what felt like about 600 more stairs we were home, and I totally crashed. I couldn't even get into pj's. I just slept in my leggings and my tank top, but it was a great day.
The next day we went over to Lotte World. We walked around the department stores, ate some Japanese lunch, and took some pics by the ice rink.
Then we headed over to the folk museum that's inside on the top floor. It was really cool, because there's all this information about the history of the country, as well as replicas of all these important artifacts from around the country. So if you can't see them all (especially the ones in North Korea) you can see exact replicas there. They have some authentic things as well. They had some activities here and there and cute things you can do. Probably for the kids, but we had fun doing them too. Here's Hisung trying on a traditional kind of open backpack of sorts called a Jiggeh.
They also had a bunch of displays depicting life in Korea. Everything from ordinary homes and life, to temples, to royalty. Here's one of my favorites of the royalty.
And here's a replica of a Buddhist temple.
Then they had this room with tons of replicas buildings complete with little miniature figurines that were absolutely adorable. The buildings were on a miniature scale, but were still pretty big and full of details.
And the figurines.....well, here's a peak at how expressive they were.
So then on the way out, the coolest thing happened. There was this man who was doing some traditional painting and he let me take some pictures of him. I was really interested in everything he was doing, and so he offered to do a little something for me for free. Then he did another, then he did another. We got three free paintings when they're normally $15 each. The first was a painting where he told me to write my name next to his work. I thought for sure I'd mess it up and make it look terrible. It was ok though. Then the next two were pictures, but they were letters too. So one spells out I love you, and the other spells out my name. I couldn't take pics of those, because my camera for some reason just gave out on me all of a sudden and wouldn't let me take pictures. I thought my battery died, but that wasn't it. It was fine a while later though. Maybe I overheated it or something. But anyway, here's they guy painting and stamping the art. The stamping is apparently a big deal too. It's all official now.
Oh, and also! I almost forgot the coolest thing! He's basically been named a national treasure by the government because of his traditional painting. And in this drama called The Painter of the Wind, it was his hand that did the actual painting. I think that's pretty cool. :)
Ok, well we did some more stuff in the evening, but I have to stop for now. I have been at this for a long time now. We spent the day relaxing for the most part. Yesterday was too busy, and we needed a break today. We're going to get ready and meet Hisung's cousin Harin and a friend who's teaching English here for dinner and a norebang. Fun fun! Ok I'll write more later!
What a fantastic adventure! I'm loving your stories! I want to see pictures of the black "dress" outfit!
yeah, where's the pic of you in the black dress with wavy hair? huh? what is norebang?