New Year’s Eve and we decided to not set the alarm clock as we had to the day before. But the body clock, all out of whack got us up around 8am.
We got to the trendy gingko tree lined street of Garosugil by 9:30am and discovered half the shops were closed for the new year, and those that were planning on being open only opened their doors around 11am.
In Seoul, there are tonnes of shops with coffee and waffles (waffels in some places) and also, the other favourite – doughnuts and coffee.
So we decided to sit down in Coffeesmith. We were the only customers for a long while.
Their waffles are good. I haven’t tasted such waffles in a long time. They’re crunchy outside, soft inside, but drier with more airholes, less dense and doughy and less thick-pancake-like inside.
I didn’t care for the whipped cream, but the blueberry that accompanies the waffles is great – not too sweet. In fact, we had another waffle later in our trip with the same jam. Real nice.
We waited for life to begin at Garosu and watched very few people go by.
There was shopping for some people.
And interesting light play for me.
And strange shops for all…
Then we headed to another neighbourhood – Insadong, which is more traditional. The vibe is totally different, and there seem to be more older people around too.
And the roads are tiny.
Taking it slow, we had another break – this time for citron tea.
When you order citron tea (that has a dried date cut in the shape of a flower floating on it), it also comes with a little kueh and another (bitter) type of tea that clears the palette. They mention nothing of this in the menu, so for a first-timer, it’s a nice surprise.
Then we headed to the Dongdaemun Markets – which are huge buildings with floors and floors of little shops selling clothes, shoes, bags etc etc.
There’s a huge entrepreneurial spirit here, and owning your own shop makes it easy to negotiate on prices to get things moving.
I didn’t take a photo in those buildings as I didn’t see anything that caught my eye. Also, the narrow space between stores made me feel rather claustrophobic, even though it was devoid of crowds. I can just imagine how mad it must get when it’s full of people.
Then it was dinner time. Well, it was a bit early to have dinner – 5? Maybe 6. But I was already very hungry.
For me, dark sky = night = time for dinner.
Being ya-ya Singaporeans, we ordered the spiciest gravy, which unlike the hotpot in Hong Kong, isn’t just spicy, but sweet. So I preferred this to the Hong Kong one, which is all chilli and makes your tongue so swollen you can’t taste anything.
My nose leaked as I ate this.
Then we walked up the Cheonggyecheon again (this time at night) and in about an hour, reached the head of the river and took photos of the lights there.
This time, the lazy me swapped the mobile phone camera (which I’d been using for most night shots) for the real camera.
Note the sponsored Christmas Tree.
By the end of this, someone’s feet were very unhappy and it was also very cold.
While Seoul rang in the new year, we fell fast asleep. When I woke up at around 2am to go to toilet (yes, I’m an auntie) I looked out and the streets were lined with cars. I’m sure there must’ve been some mad shopping at Dongdaemun that night.
But bringing in the New Year to me is like the gigantic tree that falls in the forest and makes a big noise that no one hears. It doesn’t matter. While others pop champagne and make drunken resolutions they’ll never keep, I’m usually cleaning my room. Since I was on holiday, I went back to sleep.
PS: Words I’m starting to get:
gil (pronounced “kil”) = road
dong = neighbourhood
cheon = river
san = mountain