A few months ago (long time ago I know) I went with one of my best friends to Insadong to take sticker photos. It was actually the same day as when I took my photos at the dress up cafe. After the dress cafe me and my friend Rebecca got the idea to go to Insadong to take sticker photos because there you can wear Hanbok for free while taking pictures. This was one of the last times I saw Rebecca, sadly she had to go back to her home country, one of the reasons why we took so many pictures that day. Isn't it sad when you meet someone you like so much, and someone you become instant friend with after meeting once and then they have to move to the other side of the world? Yup, this is what have happend to me so many times during my stay in Korea. But on the bright side, she is from Sweden, therefor it's so close to my home country Norway so we know we will see each other again someday, so no worries <3 again="" alot="" and="" be="" do="" drink="" eat="" even="" fun="" going="" have="" her.="" her="" hongdae="" i="" if="" in="" know="" korea.="" miss="" nbsp="" not="" p="" same="" see="" the="" to="" will="" without="">
So I'm posting these sticker photos mostly because I'm afraid my computer will crash someday, and that I will loose the originals. That would be horrible. And a side note, the quality might not be the best, but thats fine. At least it will be a day I will never forget.
Today I went to Nagan Fortress Village. I have been wanting to go here since I saw it on photoes a while back ago. The fortress and village was built in the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910) and is on the UNESCO world heritage list. The cool thing about this village is that its so old but so well preserved and people still live there today. Some of the houses in the village are stores, restaurants, private houses, part of the museum and also some are guesthouses where people can stay overnight. Next time I will make sure to bring enough money to stay one night in one of the old houses.
This entry will be kinda picture heavy, so if you wanna skip all the photoes and watch the video just scroll down :)
This is one of the first photoes I took in the village. This house is a private owned house.
Another private owned house surrounded by fields growing corn.
This house if I'm correct was a part of the museum. In the museum buildnings they had different activities, like experience some of the traditions, try on hanboks, take photoes and so on.
This house as you can see is also a private owned house. You can spot their mailbox and a letter inside. Walking though this place I thought its such a pretty place to live, and so peaceful. And if they got mailbox it means they can do online shopping. I could totally live here.
This house with the beautiful three is a store where you can buy different art and sculptures.
These wodden statues was all over the village with different funny faces, like this one. I guess a woman because of the nice breasts O.o
And for all the animal lovers the village also have some few animals also. My favorites was of course all the bunnies. Who doesnt like cute fluffy bunnies?
After finishing Nagan we decided to go back to Sunchon. It started to rain and we had already been walking alot and seen everything. The busride back took 50 minutes and we decided to go to the shopping street in Suncheon for some eyeshopping when we don't have any money to do real shopping with. But shortly after we arrived and walked for five minutes a cat cafe caught our attention. What we found interesting with this cafe is not only that it's a cat cafe, but all the cat are cats which has been left buy their owners or street cats. So entrance fee is 6000 won that includes a cup of coffee. The money goes to the coffeeshop to take cafe of the abandoned animals. Not only can you enjoy coffee and play with cats for as long as you want, you can also adopt a cat there if you promise to take well care of it and also update every month about how the cat is doing. Its a great deal to get coffee and help animals at the same time.
This is one of the cute cats at the cafe, look at those big green eyes! I told my boyfriend that this cat looks like a anime character. I hope it can find a good home.
On of my favorite cats there was this cute little princess cat. I know that most cat does not like to wear clothes, but weirdly it did not care about the dress at all. I got a cat back home, and Im sure if I tried to dress it up it would kill me. The reason why I like this cat is because it stayed on my lap for hours, we got a connection from the moment I walked in the door. I asked how much it cost to adopt, its 50,000 won. If I did not have had plans to go Norway this summer I would have taken this back to Seoul with me for sure. Any other cat lovers out there?
I guess I've have done enough picture spamming now and it's time to show my video. Actually, I must agree the music is alittle annoying. But its so hard to find music to use in video that is legal, would suck to use some catchy popsong and being banned from youtube foreeeever.
Last summer when I visited Suncheon with my boyfriend we were supposed to go to Suncheon Garden Expo. The Garden expo was popular in 2013 when it opened with flowers from all over the world. At that time the entrance fee was kind of expensive so we ended up never going there. But this year, one year after the price is not as expensive as last year so me and my boyfriend decided to go there some few days ago.
The garden expo is quite big and It's alof of walking. I used jeans the day I went there, and I almost died of heat.
The place is super pretty and perfect for dates with boyfriend or friends
And if you go make sure to have full camera battery because It's so many beautiful places to take photoes.
This photo was taken in the Japanese Garden. The Expo is for international flowers, so they have many different gradens from different countries.
Also from the same garden.
From the Korean one. At this place me and my boyfriend played Korean traditional games outside and I won! Guess I'm a natural talent at playing Korean games.
Netherland Garden if I'm not wrong. It had a big mill, and its the most popular spot to takes photoes at the expo. It was hard taking a photo of the mill and not have people photobomb me.
Also from a Korean Garden. So pretty flowers!
Found my future car. Pink with pink flowers, Its perfect!!
How cool would it be to drive around in this car?
And the last photo is from Thailand Garden. I want this three in my own garden in Norway someday, together with my pink car.
For you to save money on entrance going the the garden expo I was so kind that I filmed everything you for guys^-^ now you saved 4000 won!
YEY! It's finally summer vacation! In two weeks I'm going to Norway for a short time to spend some time with my family and friends. But right now I'm at my boyfriends parents house in Suncheon. I personally like Suncheon better than Seoul. Suncheon is smaller, more quiet and people more friendly. For those coming to Korea to study or just travel you should try to go outside Seoul and explore other cities also, see Korean culture more up close.
I've been here for some few days. Me and my boyfriend have spent most day just relaxing. I'm currently sitting in a coffee shop and drinkin iced americano, so humid outside today!
Our first day in Suncheon, and the reason why we came is that we went to my boyfriends cousins wedding.
Wedding is Korea is......Interesting. Its so far from a Norwegian wedding as possible. When you arrive to a wedding hall you must find out what floor you are going to. Every floor has a wedding room, so you must find out where the wedding you are going to are being held. When you get to that floor you will see a table where you must go to give money for the couple getting married. Weddings in Korea is super crazy expensive, and couples family must spend alot of money paying for their wedding, so every guest must pay money to attend, which will go to the parents for paying back. Therefor the more people who come, the better. When the wedding starts you can go inside the room and sit down to watch. The fun part here is that the rooms are small, so not everyone can go inside and watch if you have invited all people you know. And the most annoying part and surprising for me is how non romantic it is. Most people are talking during the ceremony, even on their celephones, not paying attention at all. The ceremony itself takes like a half hour at the most. The wedding ceremony itself is some weird also. Firstly, the person who marry the couple aka the priest can be whoever, it can be someone in the family, a friend, old professor, whoever can do it. Second, in the middle of the ceremony it's normal that a friend of the couple sing for the couple. And my favorite part that makes me giggle everytime = at the end of the ceremony when they are married and they walk down the aisle, two females stand on each side of the aisle with trumpets shooting out sparkeling stuff at the wife and husband. I wonder who came up with this tradition.
After the ceremony is finished its buffet time! This is probably the last time we see the couple at the wedding except if you are close family. Parents of the couple go into another room alone having traditional tea ceremony where the bride and groom change into wedding hanboks and do traditional ritual with theit parents, this last also for about a half hour. After that the couple leaves the wedding and most likely go strait to their honeymoon. Rest of the guest, and main reason why people attend weddings here is to eat buffet. Here you can eat like crazy, eat dessert and drink alcohol. This buffet is shared with all the guests of all the weddings taking places in the buildnings at once. After the bufett the whole wedding is finished and time to go home. There is no after party, no cutting of cake, no dance, nothing. Just a short ceremony and some food. My boyfriends parents of course wants us to have this kind of wedding also in two years time. I don't really want, because for the price of this wedding I can have 10 westerns weddings, a romantic wedding in my homecountry. But here in Korea the wedding is more for the parents than the couple. It's to show off the families status, show off their son/daugther, show they have money etc.. So its not only for family, but coworkers of the parents. Its more business than it is to celebrate a couples love.
After the wedding and buffeet we drove to my boyfriends uncles restaurant nearby. Here we ate fruits and traditional cakes made by the bride. The bride is suppose to make beautiful food and snacks for her new family in law. I will fail at this big time in the future.
It's now four days since the wedding took place, and we are just relaxing at my bf parents place. It's better to stay here than in Seoul. The weather is not hot as in Seoul, and his parents apartment got aircondition which we don't have in ours. We have spend the days doing almost nothing, just spend time with each other. I think its good for our relationship to get out of our hobbit size apartment and just relax and enjoy each others company. Its easy to get tierd of each other when living in such a small apartment back in Seoul. We have mostly been in coffeeshops, out eating, watching word cup at bar, walking the the park and so on. Vacations are for relaxing right??.
Oh, but there was one day, the day after the wedding, when we had to attend another of my bf's uncle ceremony for becoming CEO of an organization. We drove an hour to a country side place, like taken out from a money, only traditional houses and rice fields everywhere. My boyfriend spent the time sleeping laying on my lap in the car, but I was too busy watching outside the car window. It was so pretty, interesting and different from what I've seen in Korea so far. I didn't really know where we were going or what we were going to do there. When we arrived there was a big hall, I think it's the sports hall to a school or something. Inside people were dressed in suits, hanbok's and pretty dresses. Thank god I wore a pretty dress and heels that day. People of course looked at me like I was an alien, or first foreigner they have even seen. Well, it could be that I was the first foreigner they have seen when I think about it...... The place has round tables everywhere, and a hugh buffet and stage with flowers and instruments. I was suprised how formal this banquet was. We sat down and after a while the entertainment started and also some people holding a speech. And now the part that was very embarresing. Our table was the table of honor, the table of the family of the new CEO, we were only 5 people of his family attending. They started to introduce important people. And guess what.... We had to stand up infront of everyone, and bow twice infront of the whole audience, like 100-200 people. And I had no clue what was going on before my boyfriend told me to stand up, so I did. Then he asked me to bow infront of all..Confusing foreigner moment. I felt like hiding under the table when I finished... But I survived and I could enjoy the buffet later and also getting many people coming over talking to my boyfriends parents because they were curious who this blonde foreigner was. But everyone was really kind, told me how pretty I am and also I got flowers from one of the men there saying welcome to their town.
I had some really nice days so far, and I still got a week left. Today I've only been sitting here in this coffeeshop, and I did some quick shopping, bought two tshirts. This city shopping is alot cheaper than back in Seoul! 4000 won for a tshirt.
(Short hair day because its too warm to wear extensions, and they should be washed, buhu)
Today I met up with my friend Sanna to go Hongdae together. It's one of the few times I've been to Hongdae during daytime, and not at night drinking with my friends.
We decided to meetup to eat lunch together and do some shopping. We ate at Sushi in Sushi, a famous sushi buffet (always a long lone to get a table). So if you ever are in Hongdae and want some sushi, go there! Its close to exit 9. When you see Etude House turn right and walk for 2 minutes. Its always crowded at Sushi in Sushi because its very cheap and has alot of food! Not only sushi, but also potato, salads, different Korean foods, cakes, fruit, beverage, waffles,soups, ice cream and so on. All these foods, and you get 1 and a half hour to eat as much as you are able to.
After eating and talking for an hour we went out on our shopping mission. Hongdae has alot of great stores, and one of the few places that sell alternative clothing style. Our favorite that we always visit together is Ultra Fashion. When we saw it first time we were confused if it were a clothing store as it said on the sign or a club. The whole store has a club feeling about it, disco light, neon light, club music and the whole package. "Is it a club or is it a store?" Why go to one if you can go to both?
After the awesome club store we just went for a long walk. And today was super hot outside so we had to sit down to relax. On our way back from the clothing store to the main shopping street near the sushi place we went to a small cute coffee shop where we bought some ice coffee and brought it to the Hongdae park to relax.
Our fun day together ended up with going to a condom store. You know Hongdae is alternative place when you find a store that sell those kinda stuff. These things are very tabu in Korea, and other similar stores here are well hidden without any windows and in weird places.
I ended up buying two tshirts, both on sale, cheap student here!! One for my boyfriend, a coke shirt, because he loves drinking coke too much. And a shirt for me with a unicorn print on. Maybe some have already seen my sweather which is almost same. Finally got the tshirt version! Yey!
If you want to check out the club store they do have a online store also.
This blog have been dead for like 2-3 weeks now, wops....
I have been so busy with midterms. Sadly, I have gotten some of the midterms scores back already, and some of them is really bad. First time I've got a C on any test in Korea before ( a C in Korea is like super bad, idiot bad). Well, at least I tried even if my test scores suck badly.
After I finished my midterms I had another test waiting. On saturday I had to take IELTS test, english test for those who don't know. Reason why I'm taking a english test is because I want to transfer to another university, but still same major and in same country of course.
The test lasted like forever... It started 8 in the morning and at 12, four hours later I had a 4 hours break before my last part of the test, the speaking interview part.
During my four hour boring break I walked around Dongguk University where I took the test. It was superhooot on saturday, at the warmest it was +28 C. When I woke up that day it was not that warm, so stupid me wore a long-arm sweater. I almost died while walking outside.
I had to save myself with going to the nearest coffeeshop I could find.
And oh boy was I lucky. I found a Tous Les Jours not far from the university. Mostly this coffee shop, bread store chain got very small shops. But this one is the biggest Tous Les Jours I have ever seen. I took some photoes because I wanted to show my boyfriend, but my phone battery died after taking just a few.
