Calling Korea Home and Starting to Venture Further 😸
1 October 2022
Megane, the Tour Guide is born
Megane’s friend Nicole visits Korea and Megane takes Nicole around to all the hotspots of Korea
2 October 2022
Student Price KBBQ & Coin Karaoke
We found a really affordable KBBQ nearby as well as went to a coin karaoke with The Korea Edition Gang
3 October 2022
Bye Bye Nicole QWQ
Reuniting with Family
Spent the day with Nic and her family and then went to meet my own family as well
7-8 October 2022
Dongdaemun Overnight
Spent the night out at Dongdaemun overnight malls with the Korea Edition Gang
1 October 2022
Nicole came to Korea for vacation and she and I arranged to meet up. I mean, it is not everyday that one gets to be overseas with their best friend. Met up with her and took her around all of Hongdae. It was truly a blast.❤️
We visited many iconic Hongdae spots such as the self-manned Lotteria (fast food chain), Thank Nature Café where we got to pet two fluffy sheep and spent an entire day shopping. We ended the day at my favorite Dak Galbi chain Yoogane Chicken where they cook your meal in front of you in a huge pan, best part is that it is reasonably priced.😻Thanks for the outing babe.
2 October 2022
We went for a chicken based KBBQ nearby our school with Dat and Jonas. The portions were really big and student priced.🤩Afterwards, we took them to have their very first Bingsu and they were really happy with it. They wolfed it down really quickly.😂
To end off our nightly Sunday outing, we went for karaoke at the nearby coin karaoke at the bottom of the hill and sang till our hearts content. In Korea, their karaoke is really different from back in Singapore. Here, they do not have song and singer overlay, so all you have is the music. In addition, there is also a score meter, the closer you match the actual singer, the higher your score. Though we were more of shouting and singing off key, we had lots of fun.😆
3 October 2022
It was Nic’s last day in Korea QWQ. We had originally planned to go to Lotte World on Monday cause it would be less crowded, however, that plan backfired as for one, Monday was a public holiday and unlike Singapore’s inaccurate weather forecast, Korea’s weather forecast is pinpoint accurate. Monday was a heavily rainy day so all outdoor plans were cancelled and wet weather plans were deployed. Spent the say with Nic and her family as their tour guide and as Nic’s part time boyfriend.😚
We went to Times Square and to other big department stores such as Shinsegae. We finally ended the day at COEX Mall where the famous Starfield Library is and took pictures at the Gangnam Style monument that was built in PSY’s honor. After a tight hug and goodbye, I went off to find my father who had landed that day in Korea. I met up with him and his friends for dinner showed them around Gangnam.
7-8 October 2022
This was the craziest stunt we have ever pulled, staying out all night and returning the next day at 8am in the morning.🤪
Holden wanted to go to the famous night malls at Dongdaemun and invited us to join him, Dat and Jonas.
For context: These wholesale malls in Dongdaemun only open at the wee hours of the day. (10pm – 5.30am)
We stayed the whole night in Dondaemun and only returned back to school the following morning cause there is no rollcall on Friday and Saturday night.
Picture: Us at Dongdaemun at 2am
To fuel up for our excursion, we had a feast of a mala for dinner. Jonas and I were dying from the spice but luckily in Korea, every restaurant has free flow of drinkable water which you can help yourself to. (Honestly SG should implement this culture as well, might help to reduce diabetes in our population.)
On the other hand, Yong Lin, Holden and Dat were just chilling with the spice as they have much better spice tolerance than the both of us.
PS: The mala in Korea is WAYYYYYY cheaper than back home so to future batches, pls go ham ok. All this for $65 SGD😻
Overall the experience was rather interesting? I would say that once you go to GOTO mall(Express Bus Terminal), everywhere is too expensive for you.🤣
Also, Dongdaemun is rather shady so you feel on edge most of the time. Many of the shop owners can speak multiple languages and are constantly trying to find ways to get your money. So be sure to go with friends to be safe.
Many store owners also sell you rather expensive clothes or goods and get angry when you bargain so be careful.
There was a slight change of plans as Holden did not do his research as 4 of the biggest night malls are closed every Saturday.
Therefore, in order to pass the time, we decided to go check out the Seoul Wall which in my opinion, looks wayyyy better at night. We sat around and enjoyed the snacks and drinks we bought from the nearby GS25. The sight of Seoul, streets empty and only illuminated by lights from the streets was truly breathtaking.
Since nothing was open at this hour, we decided to just walk the streets until we find something interesting.
We walked all the way from Dongdaemun to Dongmyo, along the way we saw the night life of Seoul.
After awhile, everyone was starting to feel tired, so we camped outside a GS25 while we searched for a Coin Karaoke.
Luckily we found one nearby so we made a beeline straight for there.
Luckily all these coin karaoke are usually self-manned and the one we found was really high class. At this point we were just going off of adrenaline so we sang from 4am to 6.30am. To our surprise, there were also Koreans singing in other rooms at this hour as well.
We sang to our hearts content and Holden sang so well that it hurt all of our ears. Well at least he tried.😅
Best of all, somehow Yong Lin managed to sleep through the whole thing even with Holden’s singing.🤯
Overall it was truly a blast and before we knew it, it was already 6.30am and the buses were back up and running. Time for us to go back to the dorms.
We caught the first bus. During this time of the year in Korea, it gets bright really early and dark fast. So despite it being 6am, it was already super bright and the sun was high up in the sky, letting us know that it was a new day.
Everyone fell soundly asleep on the bus. 😴
Afterwards we all went back to the dorms and got our much needed rest from our crazy adventure.
Closing Thoughts
What an eventful week it has been, we stayed out all night and discovered so much around Korea. I guess we have really started to settle down here as I realize with every passing week, we get bolder and bolder and start to venture to more niche areas of South Korea. I am looking forward to the rest of our upcoming adventures.
Signing off,
Megane🐾
(NYP -> DKU) Exchange Program 