Day 4: 28 July 2009 Tuesday

I think today was the highlight of our Seoul Trip because...

we went to LOTTE WORLD :):):)

We reached Lotte World around 9am before the amusement park opened at 9.30am. As you can see in the picture below, there wasn't much of a queue at the entrance to the amusement park at 9am.

The queue was here:

We queued for about 10-15 minutes and when it was our turn, I spoke entirely in Korean to the staff at the ticketing counter. But you know what? She told me that there was a discount for foreigners, instead of 35,000원 per pass, it was 31,500원. She could tell that I'm a foreigner without me uttering a single word of English. Crap... it must be my bad pronunciation or my wrong usage of grammar or sentence structuring :(

So after queueing up to purchase the tickets/passes, we had to wait in line for 9.30am so that we could enter the amusement park.

You know, kiasu-ism isn't a trait that is present only in (almost) every Singaporean. It exists in the Koreans as well because the moment we were allowed into the amusement park, we saw a substantial number of them walking really fast or jogging to their (favourite, perhaps?) rides before the queues started forming.

The 1st ride we headed to was: Atlantis. This was the ride that I took 4 years ago with my brother on a cold winter Christmas eve and we queued for nearly 2 hours in the -10 degree Celsius weather to take a ride that lasted less than a minute or two.

I like this picture because it is really funny. Chun En looks like she's the one who was afraid and Melissa and Garima looked like they weren't. But the real people who were afraid of taking roller coaster rides were, in fact, Melissa and Garima. And shortly after this photo was taken, both of them left the queue because they didn't dare to take the ride -_-

Chun En and I went on to take the ride which was great. I felt so much braver this time round and I didn't let out any screams of fear.  The first few words I heard from Chun En after we took the ride were, "again, again!". And so we did. We took the ride again, but this time round, we took it with Melissa and Garima who eventually managed to muster enough courage to do so.

The 3rd ride was: Gyro Swing but it is probably my least enjoyable ride for the day because it made me feel like puking after taking it even though I had a wonderful view of Lotte World when I was up in the sky.

Chun En and I didn't dare to check out the Ghost House attraction with Melissa and Garima so we took Comet Express, our 4th ride.

As if I wasn't dizzy/giddy enough from Gyro Swing, taking Comet Express made me feel worse because throughout the ride, our seats kept turning round and round and round. I think the ride was really cool except for the seats turning bit. So that was our last outdoor ride in the Magic Island since I felt quite sick after taking Comet Express. Chun En and I took photos and had ice cream while waiting for Melissa and Garima to come out of Ghost House which they said wasn't scary at all.

Our crackers for 2,000원

5th ride: Adventures of Sindbad which I also took 4 years ago with my brother.

At the shop where Chun En made customized photo necklaces for herself and her bf.

My 6th ride was: French Revolution with Chun En, an indoor rollercoaster which had 1 or 2 360 degree turn(s) and was quite fun but not thrilling enough for me, the one with the iron heart as 기홍오빠 described me when I told him that.

Super yummy hotdog we each had for lunch.

Mel's favourite snack

7th ride: Camelot Carousel

We went out of the park for awhile to look for the pretty black lace sun umbrella Mel bought from Lotte Department Store there about one year ago but we couldn't find that particular design :( Anyway, Lotte World's the same age as us!

We went to Uniqlo too where I bought a polo t-shirt for my brother. Later on, we went back into the amusement park and took our 8th ride: Flume Ride. I should have taken a photo of the photo the ride's camera captured of us because it was hilarious. My facial expression was quite grim and as Garima described it, I looked as though I was reading a Jane Austen's novel. I can't quite remember Chun En's expression but I think it was quite neutral whereas Melissa and Garima screamed.  Nothing really thrills me anymore I guess, how sad!

The 9th ride I took with Chun En was Pharoh's Fury which Garima and Melissa had already taken while Chun and I were taking the French Revolution.

The 10th ride/attraction we took was the Dynamic Theatre which Mel mistook for the 4D Theatre which she wanted to try. But it was quite alright :)

We had an early dinner at the National Folk Museum's Market Street: ginseng chicken soup with rice 삼계탕.

Bye Lotte World! We had a great time there from 9am to around 5pm+ :)

Back to the hotel where we had a short rest before heading to Namsan Cable Car Station.

The cafe in the picture below is my ideal marriage proposal venue :)

Beautiful night scenery of Seoul and the Hangang.

I didn't go up to the observatory floor of Namsan Tower with the girls as I had already gone there before with Jeannie and the rest a few Fridays back and I didn't want to pay 7,000원 just to take the lift up. Instead, I went to the gift shop where I had an engraved heart-shaped mobile phone charm made for 9,000원. I wanted to have one made when I went to Namsan previously but because we were there too late, the engraving service wasn't available and I made up my mind to have it done when I went back again.

The famed vending machine as seen in Boys Over Flower 꽃보다 남자.

Back in Myeongdong, Melissa accompanied Garima to BK because G didn't quite eat a proper dinner in Lotte World while Chun En and I checked out Tea'Us cafe and had a lovely ice cream in 2 delicious flavours: green apple and bon bon. The best!

My pretty customised mobile charm