myretroperspective

Seoul is by far one of our favorite cities in Korea. A major part of this love is the food that is available. Our island is fairly westernized and we are able to both buy and eat a lot of the food that we crave from back home. But this is still nothing compared to the vast assortment of foreign foods available in Seoul. We went to visit last weekend and therefore spent about 48 hours gorging ourselves on all of the delicious availability. Breakfast restaurants are far and few between in Korea, especially restaurants that don't overcharge and you can leave feeling full. Oh how we miss Denny's. We did however find a new breakfast spot that wasn't outrageous (although still much more expensive than prices we are accustomed to back home) and had large portions. Suji's is located in the neighborhood of Itaewon and offers a wide selection of delicious breakfast foods at a reasonable price. The french toast we had was 12,000w and the eggs were 15,000w. We opted for the french ...

we're back! but definitely don't want to be. it's really difficult for us to come back from vacations, even if that said vacation was only two days. seoul was great as always and remains one of our favorite cities to visit. even though it's the second largest city in the world according to population, to me, it doesn't feel like it. i compare it to chicago during rush hour. busy and crowded, of course, but not unbearable. while we were there we: ate amazing mexican food...twice. our island doesn't have any mexican restaurants that we currently know of so when we have the opportunity to have it, we indulge to the max. listened to some amazing jazz music at the oldest jazz club in korea and tried a brazilian energy drink

This past weekend was Chuseok, or Korean Thanksgiving. Koreans travel from all over the country to meet with family, usually at the grandparents home. For us, it means we get a long four day weekend. We heard that most people in Seoul leave the city to go to family's homes so the city is far less crowded than usual. Also, there there are big names such as Van Gogh and Monet on exhibit at the Seoul Art Center this month. We decided to head out early (and by early I mean 5:40 am) Saturday morning to beat any holiday traffic there might be. Thank goodness i have the gift of being able to sleep anywhere and got a nice long nap in on the bus. Our first stop was the art museum. It was so amazing to see paintings that I have admired for so long in person. Pictures truly do no justice to these pieces of artwork.   T hey have really tall ice cream cones in seoul (and hubs took the time to show me the "correct" way to point) A short side note. Starting the Wednesday before we left ...

Our last day in seoul! We were exhausted but ready to check out more of the second largest city in the world. We have been to some pretty big cities, but none even compared to the feeling that you have while in Seoul.  Our first stop for the day was Gyeongbokgung Palace which is located in the heart of the city.  Q uick history lesson: the palace was first built in 1934 by the Jeseon Dynasty but was burnt down and rebuilt a number of times throughout history. After being reconstructed in 1867, the palace is said to have had 330 buildings and 5,792 rooms. However, from 1911, the Japanese government destroyed all but 10 of the buildings, including the surrounding wall. In 1989 the Korean government decided to embark on a 40 year project to restore the buildings left. As of 2009, 40% of the original palace has been restored. W e had planned this trip to Seoul weeks before for the main purpose of going to see a Hillsong Concert. They are a band that we have been fans of for years ...

no better way to start the morning : ) contrary to what guide books say, seoul has some great architecture.  we stopped by itaewon to get mike some custom made suits for work. itaewon is known as the foreigner hub of the city. you can find the most foreigners and foreign goods in this neighborhood.  picking out the fabrics. a very tedious task if you can tell in the background just how many fabrics there are to choose from. the owner was amazing. he had been working there for over 40 years and was no where near retiring! he kept trying to sell jeremy and mike a nice linen suit jacket. "a must" for summer according to him.  seoul tower located in the middle of seoul. it is 777 feet high from top to bottom. amazing sunset view view of the city from one of the observation decks there were thousands of locks attached to a fence surrounding the observation deck. you could bring your own and be "locked" to your love forever.