First Visit to Seoul

For those of you that think that Toronto is a busy, fast paced place with tons going on and too many vehicles on the road - visit Seoul. I have never seen anything like it. (Pics to come.)

We have a bus that is right near our apartment that will take us directly to Seoul station and were told that it takes anywhere between 40 minutes and an hour. Apparently this person did not head there on a Saturday afternoon. So - one hour and 40 minutes after we got onto that bus (thank goodness it's a Greyhound style bus and not a city bus, or I might have actually died) we arrived at Seoul station.

Wayne has a friend from his last stint here (Chris ...or as people coin him, "Angry Chris" ...though I am assured by him that this is completely unfounded) that married the sweetest, cutest Korean girl, Rachel. So they currently live in Seoul and were absolutely amazing to us. After the bus, we hopped on a subway and made our way to one of the stops for them to pick us up. (Yes girls, I now have a subway card and will be riding it frequently! Proud?) We then proceeded to go and get new cell phones (matching! Wayne's going to kill me for that one, if he ever reads this) and then out for dinner.

This may sound like a fairly quick, easy process, but I assure you that after all of the paperwork with our phones was done and we set out into traffic, it took us about one million years to make it to our destination! I have never seen traffic of this magnitude before ...thank goodness the scenery was so alive and nice to keep me entertained:)

We had probably my favourite meal yet - Shabu Shabu (there is no way that I spelled that correctly) and after eating for like 45 minutes had still only consumed under 300 calories! Hmmmmm, coke or full meal? This food is crazy.

Then we headed home for a little pre-drink and then out. I will sum up my night by giving you a few interesting tid bits into what I discovered and what I experienced:

1. This is one of the things that I find incredibly interesting: when parking in a parking lot, everyone simply lines up their vehicles and packs that parking lot full. Then (since, there are numerous cars buried in this lot) they leave it in neutral so that if someone needs to get out, they simply push the other vehicles out of the way! You would think that this would get confusing, but in actuality it works amazingly well. (Again, pics to follow because you need to see it to believe it.)

2. I actually went to a place called "Hookers Hill" ...and you may be thinking that they simply call this location that in some type of inside joke, or snyde remark ...nope ...when you walk down the hill, all of the doors will open to the hookers lairs. (No pics to follow, not allowed.)

3. On the way home the next day we went to a Cosco. I have never been so happy in my life to have ritz crackers, cheese and cheerios. It might have been Christmas.

And that concludes my first (of I'm sure many) trips to Seoul, where I will love to visit ...but will always make me happy to come back to my quiet, relaxed lifestyle.