The Week After

It's almost 2AM and I finally have time to blog - sorry for the hiatus! Melanie came on Saturday and we've been out and about ever since.

My new residence is at Banana Backpacker's Hostel in Insadong. Right now, I'm sharing a room with 5 other girls - 3 of which are from Japan. The room contains 6 "lockers" and 3 sets of bunk beds. The whole hostel is quite quirky and is extremely colourful and there are a ton of free amenities such as free irons, laundry, luggage storage, breakfast, tea and coffee, and wi-fi in the lobby area. There's also a TV and 3 public computers for you to use, too. Considering how it looks, it's actually pretty clean. An ajumma comes in every morning and scrubs our bathroom, wipes down the floors, empties our garbage and windex-es the mirrors. And there's always someone at the front desk until 12AM which is helpful -- they play some catchy music all day long~

Anyway, I've so far shown Melanie to Myeong Dong, Insadong, a bit of Dongdaemun, a bit of Anam, Coex, Cheonggyecheon, Kyobo bookstore, and Apgujeong. Yesterday, we visited the Leeum Samsung Museum in Itaewon!

Leeum Samsung Museum (actually, it's much closer if you get off at the station before: Hangangjin Station - exit 6, I believe. It's only a 5 minute walk to the museum from there).
The museum consists of 2 different buildings - they both have a different feel to them but they're designed by the same architect. Museum 1 is the "traditional" side and Museum 2 is the "modern" side. We rented audio headphone devices that automatically told us about the piece we were standing in front of~
This is a pillow (for royalty) made out of Celadon pottery in the 15th Century.
This sort of painted pottery is extremely rare. The "rich cobalt blue ink" is imported from somewhere in Persia via China so it was so expensive, you would only find these pieces in the royal households.
A mini pagoda~
The modern side didn't have as many pieces on display, but there were quite a few outstanding ones I wish I could have taken a picture of!
This is probably the most distinctive part of the museum... giant spiders.
Then, across the street from the museum, we totally indulged on the most decadent chocolates + pasteries at Passion5!
Chandelier~
We weren't allowed to take any pictures inside, but the whole interior was so chic and had a boutique/exclusive feel to it. The chocolate shop had it's own air conditioned room and housed the heavenly-ist chocolate I've ever tasted. We tried green tea, basil, rose, dark, and cheese chocolate.
I liked their motto:
I was very inspired to open something like this at home! I'm actually pretty surprised this cafe/bakery/chocolate shop is in/around Itaewon - it seems like something that would fit right in in Kangnam.

We also visited a couple random museums in subway stations and along Insadong:
Apple cores (picture)
In front of It's Skin in Myeong Dong~
Cheonggyechon
--- Korean kids are cute! They pose for pictures really well.
Around Insadong:
Apgujeong - window of the Hyundai Gallery
Hanging out at De Chocolate Coffee on Rodeo where chocolate isn't the only sweetest thing..

We're going to spend half the day at a jjimjilbang (Korean sauna) tomorrow~

A mini shout out: I'm a bit late, but Happy Father's Day + Happy Birthday to my mom (and Kyle)!

Kangnam-gu 강남구

Our day actually started in Apgujeong (love this district).
Bich, me, and the Boys Over Flowers cast in the subway.
Another neat way to advertise - these T-shirts were hung all over this street.Drank chocolate lattes @ De Chocolate on Rodeo. It's a 2-floor, cozy, minimalist chic cafe where a lot of stylish people and celebrities happen to hang out.
I bought a neat skirt from this little boutique on Rodeo. In the other stores, I actually saw a lot of the exact same things I bought at Dongdaemun except in Apgujeong, they raised the prices by approximately 15,000-20,000won because they can. Those who regularly shop in Apgujeong don't usually step foot in Dongdaemun's wholesale malls.Then we taxi-ed to the Kangnam district to buy some CDs at Kyobo bookstore. It was my first time in Kangnam. It's considered one of the most affluent districts in Seoul.
Kangnam is known for their bar+club+restaurant+cafe+noraebang district. This little area we happened to be drawn to because of the bright fluorescent lights that really made it look like it was still daylight at 2AM wasn't more than 4 blocks by 3 blocks and the roads looked like alleys. Everything on the main streets consisted of banks, business buildings, or chain cosmetics and clothing stores.We also received this brochure 5 or 6 times by aggressive promoters while walking around the bar district. What was funny about it was that was advertising a bar called the Boys Over Flowers Bar (kkotboda namja bar)! I would never have thought of a bar to have spawned from the popularity of that drama! From the pictures, it looked like there were 5 decent-looking men working there who call themselves F4 (the 4 good looking and suave guys from the drama).
At 9PM we finally found a place to eat in the district after being followed by people trying to get us to try their restaurant. The front of the restaurant advertised a chicken, rice, and cheese dish you cook in a hot, black skillet for 5,000won/person. We both wore red aprons to keep our clothes clean and at the door, there was a bottle of febreeze you could help yourself to to spray your clothes before you left! haha
A cute name for a cafe. It caught my eye because everything surrounding it (people, establishments) were loud and fast-paced.
After dinner we ended up checking it out, hoping for a quiet place to chat. Once you walk down that hallway, you're brought to this dark area mainly lit by oil candles. The servers were dressed so casually, I thought they were customers helping themselves -- they were quite pleasant either way.
There were some great personalized details that made this cafe charming like help-yourself chalk to draw on the cement walls, random figurines and CDs layed out everywhere, wine bottles, and signs related to "slowness". They played mainly alternative rock and soft rock. Upstairs was like a loft. They had mini wooden boxes on the floor and a bunch of oil candles, which gave it a very intimate vibe.The bathroom was also only lit by candles. Nice message~I was quite taken by this cafe ;)
Lovely, relaxing day spent out despite the rain =)

Lotte Family Concert

Lotte Duty Free hosted the 7th Stage Family Concert yesterday!

ARTISTS:
Super Junior
Shin Hye Sung
Big Bang
Rain

There were 3 ways to get tickets:
1) You could buy 500USD worth from Lotte Duty Free to get 2 A seats (the worst seats), 700USD for 2 S seats (middle), or 1,300USD for 2 R seats. It's supposed to be a free concert for those who could afford to spend that amount at Lotte Duty Free.
2) You could look online on Naver (all in Korean) and buy off of people. (They usually sell tix in pairs)
3) You could arrive early and buy tickets from a scalper.
Or, you could stand around a cash register @ Lotte Duty Free, waiting for people with big purchases to give you their receipt...... (I did not do this, but I know of some who did).
It was difficult, but luckily Tiffany found some online. I transferred the seller the money (25,000 each for S seats) and the next day, we received our tickets!
We thought we were being smart by getting there early at 3 since they didn't have assigned seating - the earlier you came, the better seats you could choose and the concert started at 7PM, but there was already quite an extensive line! At 5, we were let in. Bich wanted tickets for her and her friend so I ended up finding some last minute tickets for her from a scalper (2 high school girls) in the R section (best seats) at a very reasonable price.
We bought light sticks to wave around. Each artist has its own colour. We chose Rain's (white) since he was the main event of the concert!
Since we were early, we were lucky enough to listen to the Lotte Duty Free commercial (a compilation of the stars endorsing Duty Free singing their theme song) around 10 times.... it's been stuck in my head all day. There was a good turnout - much more packed than the Sparkling concerts.
We also received a creatively nice program. I was so disappointed I didn't see the one song I was looking forward to seeing for both Super Junior and Rain on the program! But at the end, both artists surprised the audience with those songs =)
Super Junior (SuJu) opened the show! I was blown away by some of their voices. They sang Why I Like You, Reset, Let's Not..., and Rokuko... and then the song I wanted to hear: Sorry Sorry!! LOVED their last 2 performances.
Since SuJu has so many members (13), they have broken into mini groups for side projects. SuJu T (trot music) sang the energetic Rokuko and SuJu's K.R.Y (consists of the 3 best singers), sang Let's Not which was beautifully sung. KiBum was not present as he's currently concentrating on acting. Heechul... gotta love that guy haha Heechul + Yesung caught my eye.
The song I wanted them to sing was Sorry Sorry ~ shawty shawty micho micho hehe
Lots of blue sticks (their fan colour) in the audience.
Then wasssssss Shin Hye Sung who we had the pleasure of seeing last week. He sang the same songs.
It was cute when he was talking -- being a solo artist, he wasn't as popular as the other 3 performers that night and didn't receive as many fan screams... but you know audiences - any mention of an artist they like, they'll scream their heads off.
So SHS built it up.
He mentioned "Super Junior" and everyone screamed.
"Big BANG!" --- SCREAM!
"RAIN!!" ----- SCREAAAMMMM!!!
"Shin Hye Sung!!!" ------ superloudSSSCCCCCREAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMM!!!!
Big Banggggg next! I can never get tired of seeing or listening to these guys -- such catchy stuff and you know that no two performances are ever the same.
The guy in the cap is TaeYang. He's so smooth at dancing! He also put a little of his own R&Bness in his solos which was wow...They performed Last Farewell, How Gee, Together Forever, Heaven, Haru Haru, and Red Sky + then Sorry But I Love You as an encore.THEN... the biggest male artist in Korea (or was it Asia?) -- RAIN! I had high expectations from him. He totally met them and gave me much more. To be honest, all he really needed to do was stand there and move a bit and the audience (especially the ajummas!) would go wild, screaming, cheering, frantically waving their lightsticks and silver pom poms. He just has an incredible stage presence... and he always seems so relaxed, confident and comfortable.
Fresh Woman, How to avoid the sun, Touch Ya, Love Story (yay!!), September 12th, I Do, ...I hope to upload some videos soon! Here's a snippit of Rain's "I Do". It's very mellow in the beginning...
I wanted him to sing Rainism (not on the program) so he did!! Bad boyyyyy~ hehehe

After acting like groupies at the concert we ate dinner @ Olympic park and took the cab to Apgujeong where we attended some intimate party @ Hedone (I forgot who the connections were), the basement of an upscale Italian restaurant called Peppermint Dream.
It was the first time I've seen so many Westerners mingling together since I've arrived. There were no more than 50 people. It was kind of refreshing not having to speak in broken English, hoping they got what you meant. It reminded me of Lan Kwai Fong in Hong Kong.

We met some cool people. The gorgeous girl on the left is Deborah. She has a British accent (attended British school in Korea) but is from New York and is wearing an amazing D&G dress I wish was mine. The girl on the right was one of the few guests who hardly spoke any English, but she wore a pair of these awesome ($300USD) splatter-dyed slim-fit ankle jeans. They quickly became Bich's chingu (friend)... as did everyone else she happened to bump into that night (it was 30,000won entrance fee all you can drink wine bar so she made the most of it).
OH and at the beginning, I also met this girl whose blog I've read a couple times. She's a regular contributor on Soompi (an extensive forum I use to update myself on Korean entertainment culture). Her Soompi alias is Ginger (an adopted Korean from W. Virginia teaching English in Seoul). Quite the unique beauty - it was neat meeting her.
This DJ really reminded me of Onew or Key from SHINee -- the hair and the shape of the face but my goodness.. the width of his legs could not have been bigger than my ankle!

Me, Bich, Tiff

Interesting night indeed. I need to hang out around Apgujeong more often... I love the atmosphere, fashion, and people.

Oh yea while we were leaving, trying to catch a taxi, I saw this huge van with tinted windows -- the type celebrities get around in. I told Bich and she walked in front of the van, threw her arms up in the air and exclaimed, "MINWOO!" haha I glanced -- it was him! We tapped his window and said hi but he didn't roll down his window. 5 inches away from Minwoo. Wonder if his dancers were in the car too...