Finally, speaking to another person - Seoul Trip Day 6
26/5 23:15
I really needed today. I met up with a friend from a long time ago (we met once at an Avengers themed sleepover movie-night in 2011) that I reconnected with over the internet almost two years ago. She lives in Korea right now and agreed to meet up with me while I was visiting. She's also Finnish so I got to speak in Finnish/Finglish the whole time which was really refreshing!
After the usual get up and get ready I walked to the subway station and quickly realised my mistake. It was 30 degrees outside today and I wore long woolly trousers. Luckily they're cropped and wide-legged, so let a little air in, but boy today has given a whole new meaning to the term 'sweaty bottom'.
We met up with my friend to go visit a cafe nearby that was doing a promo for Jeonghan, a member of the Kpop group Seventeen. It's Seventeen's anniversary today so there were cute photos and the cup-sleeves all had his face on them. The cafe mainly did bagels, so I got a pink cranberry bagel with peach cream cheese. I've grown used to salty bagels and so this felt like a dessert! I also had a cherry coke, which at this establishment was mashed cherries with Pepsi poured over the top. It was yummy though the cherry bits surprised me at first. One thing that I find interesting on Korean drink menu's is the concept of an "ade". Basically there's lemonade, and then they replace lemon with any other fruit and add the word "ade". So far I've had a raspberry-ade and a grapefruit-ade. It's basically just the fruit with soda poured over the top, but it's really fresh because they use real fruit or berries.
After sitting around talking for a while we decided to head over to the Han-river, because there was an entrance down to the riverside nearby. We walked over and it became clear that the air quality today was not very good. The air quality website rated it as "unhealthy" and in the red zone. We walked down along the river anyway, and saw how popular the riverside really is! Because we were near Seoungsu it wasn't the most popular side of the river but there were still a lot of people with tents and picnic blankets sitting and eating food and drinking. There was a lot of greenery and even a small pond, which felt like an odd haven in the middle of a bustling city. In general as a Finn the concept of sitting by the riverside and seeing a huge city skyline on the other side instead of just trees is surreal.
We decided to head over to a nearby movie theatre that apparently had a Seventeen area for the anniversary. We looked and looked but it turned out that in order to see the area you had to buy a movie ticket to get past the ticket check so we weren't able to go. We found a place to eat anyway and sat there talking until the owner had to come tell us that the restaurant had closed. It was so nice to talk to someone who understands and speaks both of the languages I do, and is on the same wavelength as me. Today made me really happy!
We stopped by a stationary store called Artbox which was amazing! I'm always so excited for stationary and stickers and stuff, so I got some cool things including a card-holder, so I can now easily swipe my transport card here and upgrade my Ridacard back home. Armed with some noodles and a box of Chocopies from the nearby convenience store I said goodbye to my friend and we parted ways.
I arrived home a wee while ago (picked up a cheeky wee banana milk from another store though, I'm addicted) and just chilling out for now, I've got my cooking class tomorrow! My friend also told me about a strategy to get into a music show recording to see my faves, BTS, so I'm considering doing that...it does involve me waiting from midnight till 8am in a nearby McDonald's though, so we'll see.
Oh, before I forget, I said hi to the two girls staying in the room next to mine! They're definitely not Spanish but I didn't get a chance to speak to them as they just kind of popped their heads out the door while I was squatting by the fridge putting some cold drinks in as I got back. I'm confident we'll progress past the hello's soon enough.
Thank you for reading!
Cheers,
Becks
I really needed today. I met up with a friend from a long time ago (we met once at an Avengers themed sleepover movie-night in 2011) that I reconnected with over the internet almost two years ago. She lives in Korea right now and agreed to meet up with me while I was visiting. She's also Finnish so I got to speak in Finnish/Finglish the whole time which was really refreshing!
After the usual get up and get ready I walked to the subway station and quickly realised my mistake. It was 30 degrees outside today and I wore long woolly trousers. Luckily they're cropped and wide-legged, so let a little air in, but boy today has given a whole new meaning to the term 'sweaty bottom'.
We met up with my friend to go visit a cafe nearby that was doing a promo for Jeonghan, a member of the Kpop group Seventeen. It's Seventeen's anniversary today so there were cute photos and the cup-sleeves all had his face on them. The cafe mainly did bagels, so I got a pink cranberry bagel with peach cream cheese. I've grown used to salty bagels and so this felt like a dessert! I also had a cherry coke, which at this establishment was mashed cherries with Pepsi poured over the top. It was yummy though the cherry bits surprised me at first. One thing that I find interesting on Korean drink menu's is the concept of an "ade". Basically there's lemonade, and then they replace lemon with any other fruit and add the word "ade". So far I've had a raspberry-ade and a grapefruit-ade. It's basically just the fruit with soda poured over the top, but it's really fresh because they use real fruit or berries.
After sitting around talking for a while we decided to head over to the Han-river, because there was an entrance down to the riverside nearby. We walked over and it became clear that the air quality today was not very good. The air quality website rated it as "unhealthy" and in the red zone. We walked down along the river anyway, and saw how popular the riverside really is! Because we were near Seoungsu it wasn't the most popular side of the river but there were still a lot of people with tents and picnic blankets sitting and eating food and drinking. There was a lot of greenery and even a small pond, which felt like an odd haven in the middle of a bustling city. In general as a Finn the concept of sitting by the riverside and seeing a huge city skyline on the other side instead of just trees is surreal.
We decided to head over to a nearby movie theatre that apparently had a Seventeen area for the anniversary. We looked and looked but it turned out that in order to see the area you had to buy a movie ticket to get past the ticket check so we weren't able to go. We found a place to eat anyway and sat there talking until the owner had to come tell us that the restaurant had closed. It was so nice to talk to someone who understands and speaks both of the languages I do, and is on the same wavelength as me. Today made me really happy!
We stopped by a stationary store called Artbox which was amazing! I'm always so excited for stationary and stickers and stuff, so I got some cool things including a card-holder, so I can now easily swipe my transport card here and upgrade my Ridacard back home. Armed with some noodles and a box of Chocopies from the nearby convenience store I said goodbye to my friend and we parted ways.
I arrived home a wee while ago (picked up a cheeky wee banana milk from another store though, I'm addicted) and just chilling out for now, I've got my cooking class tomorrow! My friend also told me about a strategy to get into a music show recording to see my faves, BTS, so I'm considering doing that...it does involve me waiting from midnight till 8am in a nearby McDonald's though, so we'll see.
Oh, before I forget, I said hi to the two girls staying in the room next to mine! They're definitely not Spanish but I didn't get a chance to speak to them as they just kind of popped their heads out the door while I was squatting by the fridge putting some cold drinks in as I got back. I'm confident we'll progress past the hello's soon enough.
Thank you for reading!
Cheers,
Becks
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