This past week there was a holiday called 추석 (Chuseok). You can think of it as being similar to our Thanksgiving. So that means we had Monday through Wednesday off from work and school. It called for a mini vacation: a trip to Seoul with one of my coworkers.

We left Saturday morning to get on the 9:10 Express bus to 서울 (Seoul), which meant that we had to take a bus to get the the terminal. This trip was filled with too many buses in my opinion. Luckily, our supervisor at work is amazing and helped us book our bus tickets online.

Once we got to the terminal, we had to figure out where to go to actually get on the bus. So we asked a few people, and finally figured out where to go. And then we were off! 4 hours later, we arrived in 서울 (Seoul). Getting to where we were staying called for our first subway ride.

It took us about an hour and a half to make it to our room, but we did so safely, and that is all that matters. Then we explored Myeongdong, which took another bus ride. Myeongdong is a very large shopping center, similar to 5th Avenue in New York City, except with a lot more street vendors.

Our first stop was lunch, so we ate at a self-serve sushi restaurant that had plates on a conveyor line. That was super cool, and it tasted amazing.

I, of course, forgot to pack pants for the trip, so we got some clothes first. I was surprised to find pants that fit because I had heard that the sizes here are extremely small, but I managed it just fine, thankfully.

After shopping, we went back to our room, by way of another bus ride, and went to a Vietnamese noodle restaurant for dinner, which was also delicious.

After dinner, we walked around the streets where we were staying, while I carried around our leftover bottle of soju from dinner, which is a rice liquor. We got some ice cream espresso parfaits, which were good, and called it a night.

The next day, we got up, went back to Myeongdong for breakfast at Starbucks. I had sweet potato and carrot soup, which was delicious, and then we walked around, and shopped some more, this time for Korean skin care and makeup.

After shopping, we took another bus, which went in a different direction than we expected. So we got off the bus, and wandered around for a while, and ended up on top of a beautiful bridge that also functioned as a walking path. It was lined with all sorts of trees, plants and flowers. There was even a pond with lily pads in it. We also walked past the Seoul Train Station, which was really cool.

Over an hour later, we finally made it back to our room, grabbed some lunch at a Korean BBQ restaurant and changed to head out for the evening. We had plans to go see the Banpo bridge, and also go clubbing, but it took us 2 hours on the subway to figure out where we were going. We also got on the wrong train at first. But we found a bar in a basement in Banpo, had some fries and more soju, and got ice cream. Even though we weren’t able to do the things we initially wanted, I still considered it to be a fun evening.

The next day, I had 갈비탕 (galbitang) soup for breakfast before we headed out for the 경복궁 (Gyeongbokgung) Palace. We took the subway again, and managed to get there with enough time to spare. We walked around the grounds, which were beautiful, experienced the ancient architecture and saw a lot of ceremonial dress, called Hanbok. We then went back to our room and took the subway yet again to the Express bus terminal back to Jinju.

We made it to the bus on time and safely, and arrived in Jinju 4 hours later. To get back to our apartments, we got on the correct bus, but going in the wrong direction. A really kind gentleman helped us find our way home, and it just so happens that he lived in Michigan for 8 years and went to Michigan State University! So overall, it took us over an hour to get back to our apartments from the bus station when it should have taken less than 30 minutes.

No one can ever say that traveling with me is boring. I always find a way to get lost, and transportation seems to always take twice as long. The trip was a lot of fun, we spent a lot of time walking and eating, but I am glad to be back in my apartment to rest from our vacation before going back to school.

Thanks for reading and see you next time! Stay safe and stay happy.