Departures and Seoul...Again =)

Sadly one of the freshman boys decided SoonChunHyang wasn't the school for him. He's in animation and is an amazing artist! He wants to study abroad so he withdrew from the school and is going to study English and go to America.

Before leaving he drew a picture for me as a present. We also went out as a group to dinner to bid him farewell.

These are the freshman babies Hae Seong, Seong Tae and Steve (the freshman that is leaving).

Kristen, Akiko and I went out with them to eat Sam Gyup Sal (삼겹살).

A night isn't complete unless we have dessert. Of course we stopped by the nearest convenience store to grab some.

On Saturday April 9, Kristen and I decided to go to Seoul to do some cultural sightseeing. We planned to set out at 9am, but both of us did not wake up till 9. On our way out at about 11:30 we ran into Olliver who also was in a rush to the subway station. We ended up taking the KTX with Olliver up to Seoul. It was my first time on the KTX. KTX is the rapid train in Korea that can get you from Seoul (pretty much northern part of South Korea) to Busan (in the South) in 2. 5hrs. Normally on the train it takes me 2 hrs 45 hours to get to Seoul or 2 if I take the rapid train (which I normally do catch). The KTX gets us to Seoul in 32 minutes!

Our plan was to visit Gyeong Buk Goong (경북궁) but we got side tracked at Zara. Kristen hasn't been able to shop very much so she went crazy in Zara. This delayed us even more, but the weather was nice and it was good not having to rush anywhere and just taking it easy.

On our way to the palace I found a great place to buy mini cakes and cup cakes in the subway station!!!

I got a Strawberry Chocolate Mini Cake, so delicious!

On our way to the palace we also saw people dressed up as udon. So cute!!!

We did make it to GwangHwaMun (광화문) to take pictures and sight see. This is the strip right before the palace where there is a statue of Lee Soon Shin (이순신) and King Se Jong (세종대왕)

Last time I was across the street so I didn't know that underneath this statue of King Se Jong there is actually a museum about his life and his impact on Korean society. The museum is free! I didn't get to go through the entire thing, but I definitely want to go back and spend time reading all the facts.

Kristen and I got to make paper cranes and write our wishes on them! It's a popular thing in Korea where you write your wishes on things (locks, hearts etc.) and hang them somewhere.

Those two pink cranes are ours =)

Here is a display of the Kings procession with all the military protecting him.

After this we slowly made our way to the front of Gyeong Buk Goong to find out it closed at 6pm, we got there at 6:30pm. Another failed attempt to see the palace!!! We will get to it soon, I promise. So instead we went towards Insadong (인사동), I've been there a few times now but it's such a great distract to relax in. There are SO many traditional tea houses and restaurants there. Kristen and I decided to try out a tea house since we both love tea a lot!!!

We found this cute place off the small side streets in Insadong.

It was so cute and they made their own pottery there. I had a papaya tea and Kristen had a citron tea (which said in the English description is suppose to help with Asthma...).

I was so tired by this point because this was the day that my cold started, so hot tea was definitely needed!!!

The tea was 5 000 won and also came with this side dish of rice crackers. It was light enough that it didn't fill you up, but had enough substance to it that it was nice to just chew on.

We set out to look for a place to eat dinner and to just look around. Kristen is taking the calligraphy class and really wants to get her own ink stone and maybe some brushes. Insadong is definitely a good place to check out if you want some of those items. They also have really nice tea sets and I really want to buy some but bringing them home might be hard.

We decided to eat pasta for dinner. I know, not Korean food, but we're at the point where we really want to eat other food. Korean food is great but we definitely need some variety.

We found this super cute place that is up on the 3rd floor overlooking Insadong. It's called Onesta Cucina. It's right on the main strip of Insadong and close to the Starbucks. Kristen had the Spaghetti Bolognese and I had Fettucini Mozeralla with Tomato Sauce. It was DELICOUS, I was so happy to be eating real mozerella.

We also took the KTX back to school which was nice cause the seats are so comfortable. However, the slight down side is I got sick so the next day I really did not want to do anything. I got up and declared a rest day.

I bought a really expensive cup of cream of mushroom soup to help with my cold and it was so worth it! I absolutely love mushroom soup. 1800 won and it was tiny!!! The cup looks decent there but the soup really only filled up 3/4 (if even).