A Journey for my Seoul: "Wow" Filled Wednesday

What a day!!

We started with breakfast at our new hostel-Amanda had toast and I had ramen. :) Around 10 we headed out for our mountain hiking adventure to Korea's National Park Bukhan(san) (san meaning mountain). Amanda had researched some and we had looked into the route we were going to take, however, upon entering the subway, we were TOTALLY surrounded by other hikers. I mean, a good 80% of our car was filled and looking at the next one down, at least 75% of that car was hikers too. We were counting our stops when suddenly, 2 stops before we were going to exit, ALL the hikers left. ALL of them. We looked at each other and said, "Should we follow?" We decided yes, yes we should follow ALL of the hikers off the subway. We continued following the mass of hikers, past many shops selling 'to go foods', hats, boots, hiking poles, gloves, hats, and other hiking apparel and was lead to a trail. Onwards and upwards! We finally got to a point where there was almost sheer rock at a good 80 degree angle or so...Amanda and I started up, but as I was going, I could tell my shoes did not have enough grip, and I did slide a bit. I decided to go back down, but Amanda was at a point higher where going down would not be good. There were plenty of other hikers and one man helped me to a level spot. I was thinking "there has to be another way up" and sure enough I found the place where most of the other people were going-the sheer rock way only had about 7 people going that way... So again, onwards and upwards. I made it to the top and spotted blond hair! At the top, we sat and enjoyed the view for a good 40 minutes to an hour I think. Then we made our way back down. I found a kimbap shop and got lunch. Once we got near the guesthouse Amanda got a very Garlicy pizza from Domino's. We rested a bit, cleaned up and I researched places to go for dinner before heading out to the college area of "Sinchon".

I had found a crepe restaurant that looked really good, so we were on the hunt to find it. As it turned out, I couldn't remember the name and thought it might start with the letter M...were were walking and walking and were just about to give up when I looked to the 2nd floor of a building and thought-I think that's it! Of course the name did NOT begin with the letter M (however, the street it was on, DID). The restaurant was called Le Celtique and is owned and operated by a Frenchman who has lived in Korea for 3 years. (Amanda and I talked to him a little). We split a chicken, onion, green onion and a cream sauce crepe. For dessert we split an apple, ice cream, whipped cream, caramel and cinnamon dessert crepe....YUM. It was worth the extra walking to eat at this place!

Then it was on to find the place where the Kpop concert was being held. We were a little early, so we sat in an area near the movie theater waiting space and played war (winner to be determined!). At the concert, I found Brian; he's been my contact to Kyunghee because he attend the summer session and is doing the next session as well because he won a scholarship through InKAS (a Korean adoptee group in Korea). The concert was pretty interesting-a great cultural learning experience. All the bands except for 1 guy lip synced, but it's probably because they were dancing like crazy. The final band was a group of 2 guys with 2 back up dancers, and one of the lead guys targeted Amanda, talked to her and then later came up to her seat, and asked her to a front row seat, sang to her and then asked her on to the stage to dance!! Fear not, I have captured it on video. :) And now Amanda is famous.