Korea Trip 2014 Part III

Day 2 is finally here, and for this post I'll be about, the bukchon ginseng chicken place, gyeongbokgung, myeongdong and Sinchon station!

So without wasting more time, let's get started!

As you can see, this is the ginseng chicken place that we went. Sadly, I'm not exactly sure of the directions but I it should be easy since it's accessible through the subway and a little bit of walking. Before going to this place, I've heard about the queue for it, and everyone just says that it's simple crazy. Fortunately for us because we went early, there wasn't a queue at all but when we went in, the place was filled with people already. In there, they do speak Chinese, so if you can speak Chinese, there shouldn't be much of a language barrier for you. Well, if you don't, it should be alright too, since you can just simply say "samgyetang" or just point at the menu. When you sit down, you will be able to see two pots(?) filled with kimchi; one would be the most typical cabbage kimchi and the other one is the turnip(?) or radish(?) kimchi. I hardly it turnip and radish so I don't really know the difference, sorry! Moving on to the ginseng chicken soup! There is ginseng chicken soup in Singapore too, and the herbs are just very strong and I would avoid this dish at all cost. So before going there, I had my concerns. Surprisingly, the taste of this ginseng chicken wasn't very strong and it's kind of plain? Not exactly super plain but the type of plain that is just nice. Salt and pepper is also catered as a dipping condiment(?) for the chicken. The chicken is stuffed with glutinous rice and ginko nuts, also expect to see ginseng and red dates in the soup. Other than having the ginseng chicken soup, we also had their pajeon, seafood pancake. It's a really big portion, and even when we had 6 people there, it's too much for us cause we each had a bowl of ginseng chicken to clear. Oh, the serving for the ginseng chicken is quite appropriate for one person, but if you don't want to risk it, then it would probably be okay to share one bowl among two people.

So after being finally done with the ginseng chicken, we head over to gyeongbokgung! I believe both the ginseng chicken place and the palace belong to the same station but just different exits, so if you are planning to go to this two places, it would be ideal to plan it on the same day.

You'll see this if you go to the right exit!

Just in time for the guard's changing ceremony!

My first snow fall experience!

Gyeongbokgung is really like an eye-opener for me probably because I've never visited a palace before but it's really something different from everything you'll see in your daily lives. So even if you don't have the chance to visit gyeongbokgung in seoul, I guess you can visit the other two palaces which are, Changdeokgung and Deoksugung. Oh, and for those who are a fan of the drama, rooftop prince, I think gyeongbokgung would be the place for you, because they said this is where they filmed it. In order to see where they film your favourite drama, you would have to purchase the tickets to walk around in the palace, but don't worry, if you are there for the guards changing ceremony, then it's free for you.

Next up, myeongdong! Basically this place is super well known for it's shopping. Don't worry, this place is easily accessible through taking the subway too! This place, I would say, it's more towards the products with brand so the the items would be a little more pricey and this includes the street food. Unlike the pasar malams we have in Singapore, where the food is super cheap, street food in Korea is different. It's around SGD3+ for maybe a stick of chicken skewer? Well, you can't really complain much cause I guess their standard of living is also quite high. Don't have any pictures of myeongdong for you guys because I was shopping, so yeah unfortunate for you. For those of you who are looking for something more affordable, myeongdong might still be the place for you because I bought a bag there for about SGD15-18. The quality is super good, and the bag has a definite shape, unlike some bags which is like super ugly because it doesn't have a shape. Besides, their designs are really nice too! If you are interested, the bag is from SPAO, and if you don't know, SPAO is endorsed by F(x) and Super Junior! Don't worry, myeongdong street is near Lotte duty free too, so you can shop there if you are tired of myeongdong street!

All that shopping landed us with heavy bags of mask, so we decided to head back to the hotel first. Let me just say, the masks there are super cheap, 20 pieces of masks for less than SGD10, like what????? So yeah, I bought 60 pieces and it weighed 3+kg :(

Let's continue this by talking about dinner. It wasn't early and it wasn't too late, so we just decided to walk around places near our hotel and we ended up walking one station to Sinchon. For your information, Sinchon and Ewha women's university is just one station apart, but if you choose to walk, the distance is manageable and surprisingly short. If you went to Sinchon by the subway then I suggest you to head over to the exits for food and shopping. We had this octopus stew when we were there, it's a octopus shop I guess? The food sold there were all octopus, live or dead. It's fresh anyway.

So basically, they will prepare the stew for you and once it starts to boil, the auntie over there will bring the live octopus and put them into the stew. The stew is really great and the octopus is really chewy! It's totally different from what you will eat in Singapore. In the stew, as seen from above, there are other types of seafood like calms and prawns. Overall, this dinner is great except for the part where I had to eat the head of the octopus, as shown in the last picture above. When you eat the head, it's damn disgusting, seriously, but I think you all should give it a try too! Come on, how many times do you actually get to try this type of stuff?

Digestion is definitely needed after dinner, so we decided to walk around Sinchon area. There are quite a few things to shop over there, they have streets and shopping malls for you to shop. Basically something like myeongdong, but probably less pricey.

Etude house is everywhere in Korea, but I just wanna talk about their bangs cutting kit since I bought it in Sinchon. The bangs cutting kit is definitely worth it. It's easy to use also, and it does it's job pretty well. It's just that the scissors given along with it, is a little disappointing because it doesn't cut very well. For the price of just SGD8, there's nothing much to expect for that pair of scissors, we can just use our own scissors anyway.

Hopefully you guys have enjoyed this update for my Korea trip! And as usual, if you have any questions, feel free to ask me about it!