Blossoming Seoul: Celebrating the Harvest

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Celebrating the Harvest

Since I returned from Japan, I have spent my time in Seoul doing "everyday" sorts of things...laundry, grocery store, planning lessons, you know the drill. By Friday night most of my friends had returned from their Chusok vacations so we decided to plan an outing on Saturday evening to celebrate. I spent Saturday morning at Dongdaemun market, exploring three buildings filled with fabrics, beads, bedding, and tons more crafty "stuff". The whole excursion became overwhelming after a few hours, so I headed home to rest up for the evening.

The gate at Dongdaemun

Kristen, Misty, Rebecca, Nicole, and I met at 5:30 and walked down to Sinchon to eat dinner. In trying to decide where to eat we came across a sign for a restaurant called...."Restaurant". We figured, "What the heck" and took the elevator up to the 14th floor. We ended up eating in our own little room, separated from the rest of the diners, and had a great view of the neighborhood as the sun set and the lights came on. The food was mainly Italian (yay for me) and I had my first margherita pizza in over a year without getting sick! By the time we finished eating it was getting late, so we hopped on the subway and headed for Seoul Forest.

Our plan was to go to the Drum Festival to see percussion acts from all over the world. Armed with only a city map we somehow managed to get to Seoul Forest and find the stage where we were treated to over an hour of incredible music performed by groups from Mexico, France, and Korea. By the time the show wrapped up it was getting cold, so we hurried back to the subway and headed for home. On our way back to campus we decided to stop for dessert and tried out our local Beans & Berries which turned out to be an excellent choice (think frozen yogurt, waffles, and berries). What a fun way to wrap up an awesome week of vacation!