eunjin in SOUTH KOREA: Day 6: 30 July 2009 Thursday

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Day 6: 30 July 2009 Thursday

My last day in Korea, my 39th day here :( It was a mad rush throughout the day.

At around 9.30am, we headed to Insadong’s Bizeun to purchase rice cakes. Chun En was right…we should have made reservations for the rice cakes in advance because when we reached the store, certain types of rice cakes that we saw in the store on Monday weren’t available. I managed to purchase a few boxes of rice cakes but I didn’t get to buy the ones that I knew my mum really wanted.

After getting the rice cakes, Garima and Chun En went back to the hotel on their own because they were taking Korean Air and their flight was in the afternoon while Mel’s and my SQ flight was in the evening. I felt bad because I didn’t really say a proper goodbye to them as we were rushing. I had no idea how long the hair stylist would take to do Melissa’s hair and we had to rush back to the hotel to check out by 2pm. So from Insadong, we took a cab to 이대 area and I brought Mel to the hair salon, Hair Club (just behind Yes A PM Building) where I had my digital perm done a month ago.

After I had told the stylist what kind of perm Mel wanted, I rested in the salon for awhile to catch a breather before rushing back to Insadong again to hunt for other rice cake shops for the rice cakes I wanted. But no, I didn’t find them. But at least, I kind of said goodbye to Insadong and here are the photos of the quaint area.

Disappointed with my futile search, I headed to Hongdae area in hope of finding the tie-dye dress that Mel and I tried hunting down for in Dongdaemun Wholesale Market yesterday. But no, I didn’t find the dress either. So throughout the near 2 hours of mad rush and walking, I couldn’t find the items I wanted but at least I kind of said goodbye to the 2 places by taking photos.

Tired, hot and flustered

By the time I reached the hair salon, Mel was ready. Surprisingly, her perm took a much shorter time to complete as compared to the 3 hours + I spent in the salon when I had my digital perm done. We shopped around 이대 area for awhile before heading back to the hotel. I bought another handbag from the same shop from which I purchased a bag 4 years ago, and another bag just last week for 42,000원. It was originally 64,000원 and after discount, it was 45,000원 but I successfully bargained for a slightly lower price of 42,000원. I know it's only 3,000원 but the SA was so firm on sticking to 45,000원 that it took me quite a bit of time and effort to lower it by another 3,000원. I know the bag's quite pricey too but it's too beautiful and I'll definitely regret not purchasing it! I promised myself I'd stop thinking about a second Le Pliage if I were to get the 42,000원 bag so hopefully, I can stick to my self-promise (which I highly doubt is possible because everywhere I go in Korea, I see the Longchamp in the colour and model I want)!

The new Starbucks that opened only on my last day here. What a pity! If it had opened earlier during my 4 weeks at Yonsei, I would have gone there quite often.

The last time taking the Seoul Subway

Back to the hotel

So sweet of Chun En! Mel was touched, I could tell!

Goodbye room 1433...I had an enjoyable stay and I love the bed! I'll definitely go back to Hotel Ibis Myeongdong again if I were to extend my trip again next year. Perfect location!

My 30kg check-in luggage, hand carry luggage, rice cakes, and my fedora, which again, couldn't be fitted into any of my luggages so I had to wear it.

After checking out of the hotel, I met Sze Min and Wan Ling at the lobby area of the hotel and we had lunch together at my favourite porridge eatery in Seoul. It was the 1st meal I had in Seoul when I arrived on 22 June 2009, Monday. And it was also my last meal in Seoul.

Somehow, I'm always mistakened for as a Japanese everytime I patronise this eatery when I don't even look like one. Post-lunch, Mel and I did some last minute shopping in Myeongdong. I went back to Romantic with Nature to get THAT tie-dye dress for 49,900원 which I concluded I couldn't do without.

[EDITED 22 August] Alright, this is a photo taken on 12 August of me in the tie-dye dress that I was so obsessed with when I was in Korea with my fedora from Busan and silver havaianas from Myeongdong. You can't see the beige bag beside me clearly but that's my pretty 42,000원 bag. (Sentosa with the new Korean friends I made for the new semester)

At Migliore in Myeongdong

At Krispy Kreme

One thing irritating about taking the airport bus from outside our hotel is that there are no bus timings available. From the airport to Myeongdong, information for the bus timings was provided and at least we knew how long we were supposed to wait for. But from the hotel to the airport, there was no such information. It was like a normal bus stop and we didn't know how long we had to wait for the bus 6015. Our flight was at 7.45pm and we were supposed to be in the airport by 6.15pm; and I didn't know how long our bus journey would take. At 4.10pm, we brought our luggages out and waited for the bus outside the hotel.

My expensive 3,000원 strawberry juice from Krispy Kreme. At least there was service (as the Koreans call it): a free original glaze donut.

I think we waited for about 20-25 minutes before the bus finally came. I didn't like the bus driver because he was so grumpy and kept cursing when he put our luggages in the luggage compartment. But the worse part was that after we boarded the bus at around 4.45pm, the bus didn't head straight for the airport. It went around Myeongdong, picking up other passengers from other hotels and by 5.15pm, we had gone nearly one round around Myeongdong. I couldn't believe it...we spent half an hour on the bus and we were still in Myeongdong?! What if we required 1 and a half hours to reach the airport? Wouldn't the roads be congested because it was after office hours? I was really quite stressed about it but because of the lack of sleep from the previous night with us shopping till 4.30am, I fell asleep in the bus. When I woke up, it was 6.20pm and the bus had driven to the drop off point at the airport. Thank goodness!!!

You see the guy in orange in the above picture? He took the same bus as us; he helped me carry my luggage and put it on the trolley because I couldn't lift up my luggage at all -_- In the airport when we were checking in our luggages, I couldn't lift up my luggage again and a man waiting at the counter beside us came up to me and helped me lift up my luggage and put it on the belt. I was so grateful to him! He probably saw me struggling, trying different positions to lift up my luggage which was 30kg heavy. Well I didn't know it was that heavy until the airport staff at the counter weighed my luggage once it was on the belt. I went with 19.1 kg and at the end of my 39 days trip, my luggage was 30kg (excluding my hand luggage and the 13.05kg I had mailed back via EMS).

So after checking in our luggages, we did some last minute shopping at the airport. We bought donuts from Dunkin Donuts to bring back (obviously, I was away for too long and didn't know that Ion Orchard had opened and that we finally had Dunkin in Singapore).

We were one of the last few to board the plane because we spent time looking for Bizeun. G told us that there was Bizeun in the airport too and we wanted to get more rice cakes but we couldn't find it :( And secondly, the airport is huge. At least Changi Airport has different terminals for different airlines. But not for Incheon. Our gate no. was 122 and we had to take a train to go to another part of the airport to look for our gate. As a result, we were really late and practically ran to our plane.