Seoul - Summary Of Day 8

The front corridor of the Main Hall connecting the individual room which enshrine the royal spirit tablets at Jongmyo Shrine.

• It was raining when I woke up this morning. It was cold and windy; so I decided to hide underneath my blanket to continue my sleep a little while more. By the time I got myself ready, it was still raining outside and I won't be able to go anywhere with such weather. Stayed in the room to online and check my mailbox while waiting for the rain to stop.

• It was almost noon when I went out and stopped at the bento shop again to grab my simple lunch. Saw a junior of my friend there who was getting his lunch as well and I got him to help me order my tonkatsu (pork) chicken rice.

• Took the subway to Jongmyo Shrine, a royal ancestral shrine of the Joseon dynasty. It has a long and rich history that it was enlisted as one of the UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995. There was a group of kindergarten kids visiting the place when I was there and they looked so blur when their teachers were trying hard explaining about the shrine to them.

• Saw a library inside the shrine and I took the chance to go online a while as they have two laptops for the usage of the visitors. Saw baby online and we chatted a while. We were actually fighting at first due to some misunderstandings but everything turned out well in the end. The wind was blowing so strong and I quickly headed to the next destination on my plan.

• Changdeokgung Palace was located in just next to the Jongmyo Shrine and I decided to stop at this palace first. Besides, the time for guided tour was going to start very soon and it just suit my timing well. They provide guided tour in several languages for the visitor because they don't allow visitors to tour the palace by themselves due to safety reasons as this palace is also on the UNESCO World Heritage list.

• In fact, the entrance fee for the guided tour is almost five times cheaper than a self-guided tour. I don't know why is that so but anyway, the Korean guide who accompanied us was talking in English in such a way that I guess nobody understood her. Everybody were more busy snapping pictures around the palace area. I asked one ang moh lady who helped me take my pictures if she got what our guide were talking, but she just said she didn't really bother about her explanations lol.

• Next destination on my list was Bukchon Traditional Culture Center. It is a Korean village where where hanok or Korean traditional houses have been preserved. Met with a guy earlier when I grab a piece of ham toast. He couldn't speak any Korean and I noticed that when he was making his order. Came across the same guys again at the entrance to the Bukchon Traditional Culture Center and I found out that he is from Hong Kong. He looked lost, so was I; so it was like a blind man leading another blind man and both got lost in the end lol.

• I wasn't that bad in reading maps, so I didn't get lost; I just overestimated the map and end up so much further away from where I wanted to go. In the end, I met with a Korean lady who opened a souvenir shops selling stuff on the actor and actress of Winter Sonata as the junior high school opposite her shop was used as one of the shooting site for that drama. She spoke fluent English and when she got to know I speak Japanese, she talked to me in Japanese. Her Japanese is just as good as her English. She used to stay in that shop last time but it suffered some damages; so she moved to a new place and used the current place for running her business. In fact, she invited me into her shop and offered me a cup of Korean traditional tea; it was a cold day, she told me.

• Met with two ang moh guys when I was halfway exploring the village and I asked one of them to take a picture for me. We started a short conversation and we asked each other where were we from. When I asked him, he pointed to my jacket and I knew for instant they are from England. I came across two young policemen on my way to take the subway and I approached them to have them locate my current location, thinking that it would save me some time. The first guy passed the map to his friend and it took both of them so long to figure out the location but in the end, they pointed me to the opposite end of the supposed location on the map and told me they were new at that area. Luckily I didn't follow their direction, or else I might get myself lost instead.
  

• Came back early today and had my dinner at Heaven 1. Wanted to order samgyetang but she doesn't sell such dish, so I settled with daktoritang. Never mind-lah, still got the sound "tang" behind, so it should be the same, I thought. But both of them are totally two different thing when it was served. In fact, it was the same thing I had with Heng Chiang the other day lol.

• Came back and got to Skype with baby after a lapse of two days. Continue to online and blogged on this entry. Will be planning for tomorrow's itinerary after this like usual and head to bed early.