Seoul

Seoul has redeemed South Korea for us! We've spent five days trying to cover a lot of ground around the city, clocking up 15-20k steps every day despite the heat and humidity. We've also been out late a few times, which has left us pretty exhausted and ready for the calm relaxation and slow pace of China 🫠

On day one, we went to a craft beer pub with Kristian, an Aussie colleague of Chelsea’s, in the trendy student area of Hongdae. Dan felt it would be immoral to say no to a 1-litre glass of 8.8% beer, and we missed the last bus, which lead to a very slow morning after. We also spent an evening in the edgy neighborhood of Mullae with Manti, Chelsea’s friend from Rhodes days, and had drinks in the westerners' nightlife hotspot of Itaewon, where we finally took our chance to go into one of the 'self photo studios'. Mixed results, see above. We took a pilgrimage to upmarket Gangnam, which was underwhelming, despite the original K-pop banger. Nobody on the street was doing the PSY horse-riding dance move 😢

South Korea is a hotspot for plastic surgery because of the K-beauty industry. Chelsea’s skin care process consists of two things: drink water, wear sunscreen, so K-beauty culture has been a source of constant bemusement. We met two Singaporean girls in our hotel who were on a cosmetic surgery tour, and very open about their procedures. They travelled to Seoul for two weeks: got their eyes reshaped and spent the rest of the time sitting in the cheap hotel with bruised faces. It's such an alien idea to us that anyone would travel this way, but this was their third such trip: boob jobs in Australia, lipo in Thailand, eye lids in Korea. Chelsea recommended the excellent Korean novel ‘If I Had Your Face’ to them and one asked ‘Is that on Netflix?’ 🙃

Other activities: we explored Changdeokgung Palace, took a cable car up to Namsan Tower for sunset city views, and hiked Inwangsan in the sweltering midday heat. The hiking across South Korea has been exceptional—the entire country is mountainous, with cities squeezed in between peaks wherever there is space. We also went shopping and took a Korean cooking class in tourist-central Myeongdong. Gimbap, pajeon, japchae, tteokbokki, bibimbap... it was great to understand more about meat-free Korean cuisine, which has been a persistent difficulty since we landed in Busan. We'll 100% be bringing some recipes home.

The museums in Seoul are excellent too—we visited the War Memorial Museum and National Museum, as well as a museum about the life of Admiral Yi Sunshin, who is something of a Korean national legend for repeatedly destroying the Japanese navy in the 1590s without ever losing one of his innovative 'turtle ships'. In more modern history, neither of us knew very much about the Korean War before we came here, so it's been an education! It's impossible to avoid comparing South Korea to Vietnam... both countries had a North-South partition after WWII, following a long history of colonial occupation. Both had wars where America supported the capitalist South against the communist North. But with very different outcomes, and with the US coming off as a saviour in the Korean narrative, a villain in Vietnamese history. The Korean War never technically ended, and tensions are particularly high at the moment with North Korean soldiers currently deployed against Ukraine, so it's no surprise that Seoul is full of uniformed soldiers and very visible bomb shelters. The shadow of a potential North Korean attack looms very large.

Seoul has definitely improved our overall impression of Korea, and we can see why people rave about it so much. The public transport is slick and so cheap, the views stunning, the neighbourhoods varied, the people helpful and friendly, the Squid Game merch hilarious and unavoidable. But then some of the challenges we've had: transport outside Seoul is confusing and difficult for foreigners to book, payment systems are inconsistent (why don’t they accept Mastercard?!), food very meat-heavy, bathroom towels inexplicably tiny. Why does every hotel in Korea stock only hand towels? Why?! So we can't say it's been our favourite country this year—definitely a mixed review.

We've now been on the road for 200 days. Our Chinese visas came through without a hitch, so we're jumping on the ferry across the Yellow Sea. We may scale back any spicy takes for the next while, so if you see an inexplicable emoji in future posts, read between the lines.

We’ve done light Asia (Singapore), medium
Asia (Korea), and now we’re graduating to extreme Asia.

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