Bedecked and beribboned

So we visited the famous Namdaemun market which, in one form or anoither, has been in Seoul since the 1400s.

It's huge and really difficult to navigate......yeah. I ended up not taking many pictures but in the end it's a market. Think of any you've been to yourself and imagine it on an enormous scale- packed tightly together, above, below, beside....

....and all the bag shops seem to be run by young men.

...and everyone has lunch delivered so they much on their noodles beside their workbenches.

....and there are several behemoths like this.

These places have enough hair accessories to bedeck every little girl in Ireland several times over.

While we were welcome to go in and shop these places are a lot like warehouses and I'm positive they sell a lot of wholesale packs.

Aside from that I have one word for the place: MEANDERING

Friendly Hyunja

This is the place in Insa-dong we were going to have lunch - we didn't.

We had spent a good part of the day in the famous Namdaemun Market but couldn't really find anywhere to eat. It didn't help I suppose that a good section of the sidestreets where we found restaurants had a smell that turned my stomach.  (Still riding the travel sickness wave at this point)

So it wasn't until later when we got to Insa-dong that we sought out a place. Unfortunately the steps were quite steep and made with wobbly stones. I wasn't thrilled with the angle (pr the precarious wobbling) but the menu looked interesting so I was willing to take the lunge.

However Karen - who is not great with steep steps- couldn't and after she stumbled on the higher steps we gave it up as a bad job. (I'm glad you're alright but Jesus my heart does not need such shock.)

So we ignored the stairs and simply went into the restaurant right there instead.

It was a nice place and at that stage I was just glad to be sitting down.  XD



They didn't have Chilsung (WTH, Dudes?) so I had to settle for Sprite. We questioned the veracity of it 'being' Sprite or 'being like' Sprite but hey, it's endorsed by the Coca-Cola Company so it probably is.......although I really ended up failing to care.

So I hadn't had chicken in a while so I asked Karen if she wanted to split an order between us. She agreed and we got a big ass pot as you see above.

It was delicious, really, really tasty. But the portion was enormous so next time we need more people.

Also, what we did not realise was how spicy it would be. Too spicy for me I'm afraid hahahaha (No, I most certainly did not stop eating!)

Karen, being much tougher than me, noted that the spice seemed to stick to your lips, not charring the nerves of your whole mouth.

Between the two of us I don't know if we made a respectable dint in the pot but we sure as hell tried.
We had a hilarious mime session with minimal English and Korean where we explained to the staff that while the food was delicious we just weren't manly enough to eat the entire pot.

Still, it was really nice.

It's thataway!!!.............or not

When Helen passed a Tourist booth the other week she picked up a rake of maps and paraphenali for us and became my girl!hero for doing so. (There are pressies coming for this heroic act, surely!)

One's a guidebook and the other is a big-ass map but that's not important. What's important is the subway maps in the back of the book.

Brandishing like I weapon I navigated our way (Karen indulged me that I wanted to do it all) and found us our way there and back again. (hooray!)

I also learned that it's true that most places don't seem to have a toilet and it can be impossible to find one in Seoul sometimes. D:>

Yes, those are tags and annotations poking out of the guidebook. I am that kind of a nerd.

Fans

Fans are everywhere over here.
The countries of Asia - much like anywhere else- have a long and tumultuous history but they doo seem to agree on the important stuff.

• Rice is tasty
• Tea is art
• Fans are awesome

Well they have been infamously  famously used for battle and there are countless records of people assassinating/saving lives through the use of a cunning fan. Obviously not the bamboo and rice kind but the prettily painted kind forged by the blacksmith.

Ah but they have so many uses martial arts, slapstick comedy, dance and keeping cool....wait.

Regardless, every other person on the street has some form or another fluttering from their fingers, (Hey, it's hot.) and a coupke of people say 'to hell with that' and seem to carry around electric fans a little bigger than the norm for hand held variety.

All the tourist shops sell a variety of the exact same model - paper, fabric, plastic etc with and without boxes/cases. Sometimes the prices surprised me in that the cheaper and uglier fans were more expensive than the larger ones -weird.

Anyway, most of it was nice but the same guy was probably supplying half Seoul.

In Insa-dong, we found an old guy who had set up a stall at the top of the street (I believe he was actually from a shop further down) painting fans. [see above]

These were decent enough quality fans but he had (and was still)
 painted all of the fans which is what made them interesting.

While there were lots of pretty fans painted with flowers et al I knew that for me it should be nothing other than the teapot and cups. XD

I bought the cover and accessory at a shop elsewhere. (two different shops in fact) Before that though, I had fun fluttering my fan as we walked down the street. It was hot so I really appreciated the breeze I can tell you!

I wrote down my name in English letters for him and he read my name in Korean. Pretty impressive Hangul. On the right is his signature as the artist and on the left is my name. How do you like that? ^_^

Bubble Tea

On Wednesday (1st) Karen and I went to Namdaemun Market.
Before we left we wandered into a cafe to get something to cool down and I had the opportunity to try a "Bubble Tea". (Thank you Taiwan)

Those black things in the bottom are tapioca balls - which had a texture and consistency unlike hard jelly which I did not like at all.

I got a Taro flavour - no I don't really know what that is - and it smelled like cookies.

Overall -meh. It was nice enough and was closer to masticated ice than a smoothie. I'd never actually had one before so I had assumed that it was supposed to be some sort of carbonated tea drink.

It's essentially a smoothie with Tapioca balls that pop up the straw. Yes, I did try them. No I didn't like them. Euck.

I should mention that I couldn't finish it though. It was quite filling and like everything else I get, the portion was just too big.

Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!!

With my new supply of stickers there will be absolutely no resistance to my assault! Victory is mine! 

That dangly thing on yer phone

Naturally enough, the first thing I do with a new phone is find ways to ruin it and generally offend sensibilities. (Since I am doing this from another hemisphere Sean, it is now an art.)

Having made brother #001 splutter in indeignation with my practical plastic case cover and selecting an annoying ringtone I judged it time to attach impractical dangling things.

Hoorah for pretties.