Flight SQ 016 arrived in Seoul's Incheon Airport at 4 pm Korea time. We set our watches forward by one hour. Took a shuttle (13,000 won, about USD13) to our hotel The Seoul Shilla. Colleague has stayed at this hotel three times the past year, so they gave her membership this time round, upgraded our rooms and threw in complimentary "commuting" to our offices in the mornings. Clean impersonal room. Duvet. Aveda toiletries. Breakfast and daily newspapers. Local mobile phones for rent. Worth staying at if you can get their corporate rates.
We dumped our bags and went exploring, after all the next few days would be quite busy with work. We had no idea where to go, so I asked the taxi driver to take us to Myeung Dong. Turned out to be a good choice, Myeung Dong is full of little shops geared towards teenagers and young working adults. They come here in the evenings to drink, snack on the plentiful variety of street foods, shop for latest fashion and generally chill out.
From left to right:
1. Roasted chestnuts. Larger than the tiny sweet Chinese ones we get in Singapore, with a mild nuttiness but little sweetness. The vendor seemed to have undercooked them too.
2. Grilled meats on skewers. This stall was selling sausages, 2000 won bought us 5 different varieties. Eaten with some sweet bean sauce or mustard. I liked a curry flavoured one but the rest were quite nondescript.
3. Griddled flat buns with honey filling. My favourite, the bread was chewy and soft and some parts were even a little crunchy.
4. BBQ dried squid and calamari. Didn't get to try any, but the stallholders were very friendly.
Maybe it was just me, but I didn't quite like the street foods that much. Oh well.
Decided to look for some 'proper' food. Came across a fast food dumpling place that was very crowded, till now I cannot remember their English name, but the Korean name can be seen on the bowl in the picture. This was a good find, the food was cheap and good. The menu has only 4 items, each is 5500 wons. The house dumplings were similar to xiao long baos with juicy pork filling but the skin was not as resilient. The cold noodles dressed in a sesame and bean paste sauce was good for slurping too. Couldn't say the same for the green noodles in soya milk which was not very appetising to look at or eat. Most of the customers were tucking into hearty bowls of soup noodles, but we were struggling with our dumplings; I would like to try that if I ever return.
The weather was cool and fresh, perfect for wandering about the streets. The shops close at about 10 pm. We took a taxi back to the hotel (~ 3500 won); taxi drivers seem to have it quite tough in the city, they were at every street corner waiting for customers. Our driver asked if we were Chinese or Japanese, I told him that I live in Singapore. Ah, he visited our city two years before with a tour group. Didn't converse much, we didn't know Korean and he was not comfortable speaking English.
Husband called to say that he took the dogs out for a walk and Mimi was attacked by giant red ants. I called out to them through the speakerphone, Mimi barked at me and Rufus licked the phone. Aww...
