Day 2: Namdaemun Market
After leaving Seoul City Hall and Plaza, I took Line 1 down to Seoul Station and then transferred to Line 4 and took it to Hoehyeon Station with the intentions of checking out Namdaemun Market.
I should mention that one of things I noticed about Seoul’s subway system is that it seemed really well heated, almost too well heated. Every time I entered a subway station I would always get really warm and need to buy a drink or equip myself with one before hand to cool down. I think part of it was because I was always constantly moving and then wouldn’t realize how warm I was until I stopped moving, but I also think that Koreans are just use to having a warmer body temperature... or you could say that Canadians are better at tolerating the cold. At first that may seem like an obvious statement that Canada is colder but I didn’t think I would feel that way as I always thought that the weather between Toronto and Seoul was very similar. When I arrived at my aunt’s place yesterday, the first thing I noticed was how hot the condo was. If a comfortable room temperature for me during the fall/winter is 21-22°C, it felt like my aunt’s place was like at 25-26°C.
When I exited the station, I was already feeling very warm and then on top of that the weather must have been around 22-23°C. While I was in Seoul, the daily highs pretty much stayed around 20-22°C the entire time was there. The week before and the week after I left, the temperatures plunged so Mother Nature must have been looking out for me (although daily highs in the high teens would have been ideal for me). The sun was at it’s peak and shining bright and warm when I got to Namdaemun Market.
What can I saw about Namdaemun Market? It’s like an ahjumma’s paradise.^^ Namdaemun Market is comprised of hundreds of stores and vendors within a several block area that sell all kinds of items you can imagine. It has an overall flea market like feel to it and the quality and luster of the merchandise can vary greatly but I think that’s the whole charm about Namdaemun Market. It’s all about the search, looking around, getting a deal and finding that potential diamond in the rough. As I mentioned, you can probably find anything you can imagine being sold somewhere in Namdaemun Market but it seemed like the majority of the vendors sold clothes. When I think of Namdaemun Market, the first things that come to my are: cheap prices, cheap non-brand name clothes, makeup boutiques, socks, underwear, long-johns, pots and pans, bath scrubs and towels, women’s shoes, slippers and overall just the kind of every day stuff one would need…and ahjummas. I saw a lot of ahjummas (middle-aged women) shopping for clothes.
Every which way I walked in the market, there were alleyways of shops along both sides and sometimes right in the middle of the street or intersection. Parts of the Market were more alive than others.
One of the charms of Namdaemun Market is that haggling on prices is expected. When I told my aunt I was going to Namdaemun Market, she told me that I probably wouldn’t get as good a deal as the locals because they would be able to tell I was a foreigner. She was adamant though that I had to haggle and to never buy anything at the prices listed. It was very funny and entertainment the way she explained it. She even wanted to accompany me because she was worried I wasn’t going to get a deal like the locals but I assured that I was just going there to check it out and I wasn’t going with any intentions to buy anything.
When I was there, there was one thing I did wanted to look for which was a Korean National Soccer jersey as a gift for my brother. I saw several sports stores and inquired about a Park Ji-Sung jersey they had on display and I think it was about 38,000WON (~$30CAN) but I could tell it was a replica and I wanted to buy an official one. It actually looked like a replica of the replica but again, this was Namdaemun Market. Another thing I wanted to get were some ahjumma-style pants, the really baggy and colourful kind, and a matching sun-visor but then I figured it would only be fun to have at first but then be a waste.
At this point, it was unbearably hot so I started walking out of Namdaemun Market. The farther away from the core of the Market I got and closer to the streets, the more restaurants and street food vendors I saw. I knew that Shinsegae Deparment Store was practically right next door to Namdaemun Market and would have a place for me to rest so I located it on my cellphone and headed that way.
When I got to Shinsegae Deparment Store, I felt much more at home.
I have to admit that compared to Namdaemun Market, this was my kind of place. You know sometimes I just need my air conditioning, brand name clothes, and pretty sales associates. I found that Korean and Japanese Department Stores were quite similar in setup. In the basement was the food court. The first floor was always dedicated to cosmetics. The next several floors were dedicated to women’s wear, usually formal or expensive wear first and then more everyday wear next. Then came the men’s floors. Then a sporting wear and goods floor. Then electronics and household items. Finally, the top floor or floors were usually reserved for restaurants and cafes. Shinsegae had all the Western mainstream brand names you find at malls in Canada such as Tommy Hilfiger, Ralph Lauren, GAP, North Face, Columbia, Nike, Adidas, etc.. The same thing went for cosmetics also with Estee Lauder, Lancome, Shiseido, etc… which got me thinking why we bought all that makeup to take over as presents when we could have just bought it here. I guess it’s nice being able to open up luggage and give a present right away instead of saying “I’ll buy your present later in the week when I hit the stores!”. Estee Lauder’s Tender Cream Cleanser in a jar costs about $40CAN and in Seoul I believe I saw it for 55,000WON which is about $42CAN. I always thought makeup would be more pricey in Seoul but that calculation puts it pretty close. Don’t ask me how I know the price of an Estee Lauder Tender Cream Cleanser…I just do.^^
I walked through all the floors of Shinsegae not with any real purpose to buy anything but more to do some eye shopping and to see what Seoul department stores and the service were like relative to Tokyo. I found the service in Tokyo department stores to be phenomenal. It was very uniform and very, very formal. In Seoul, I found the quality of service to be almost on par (Tokyo still gets the nod though) but with more of a relaxed flavour to it.
According to my map, I was sort of within walking distance to the Namsan Stairs and Park which I wanted to check out so I just followed my cellphone GPS from Shinsegae and started walking south. Well, this turned out to be a big mistake. First of all, it was a long uphill walk and I wasn’t exactly sure where I was going. As I walked further south, I started getting into a maze like neighbourhood with all these nooks and crannies and dead ends and alleys and so forth. I still managed to get very close to Namsan according to my GPS but I just couldn’t find a way to get to the other side of this wall to get there. A deliveryman on a scooter drove by and so I asked him and he said there was no way to Namsan through here and that I had to go back and all the way around towards the east to get to Namsan. Aigooooooo~. Defeated, I headed back from where I came virtually near Shinsegae and decided that it was a good idea to head home about now. I had been walking for a long time and didn’t have the energy to take the subway so I decided to take a cab instead.
The ride from Shinsegae to Dongnimmun was really slow at first as there was a lot of traffic in the area. While I was stuck in traffic, all I could think about and look at was the taxi meter and how it was still going and going and going. Luckily, traffic got better and we were on the move again and it was smooth sailing, almost. When we got to the intersection near Dongnimmun Station, the driver asked for additional directions but it took a while for me to get my bearings so I just told me to let me off there. The ride was surprisingly very affordable. I think it came to about 5000WON (less than $5CAN). It wasn’t a far walk to my aunt’s from here and it was one I made every day but when you are hungry and tired and your feet hurt, everything feels 10 times farther away. On top of that, because much of Seoul is built on top of hills and mountains, the walk up to my aunt’s place was killer. During my trip, there were times when I didn’t break a sweat the entire day until I had to walk back up that hill to get to my aunt’s place. When I told my aunt I took a cab and was dropped off near the subway station instead of right to the condo because the driver didn’t know which way to go, she had unpleasant things to say about him and said he should have known how to get here with the instructions I gave him. My aunt is so funny. She is the 막내 (youngest) amongst her siblings and is about half my height but she was so very protective of me while I was staying with her.
I should mention that one of things I noticed about Seoul’s subway system is that it seemed really well heated, almost too well heated. Every time I entered a subway station I would always get really warm and need to buy a drink or equip myself with one before hand to cool down. I think part of it was because I was always constantly moving and then wouldn’t realize how warm I was until I stopped moving, but I also think that Koreans are just use to having a warmer body temperature... or you could say that Canadians are better at tolerating the cold. At first that may seem like an obvious statement that Canada is colder but I didn’t think I would feel that way as I always thought that the weather between Toronto and Seoul was very similar. When I arrived at my aunt’s place yesterday, the first thing I noticed was how hot the condo was. If a comfortable room temperature for me during the fall/winter is 21-22°C, it felt like my aunt’s place was like at 25-26°C.
When I exited the station, I was already feeling very warm and then on top of that the weather must have been around 22-23°C. While I was in Seoul, the daily highs pretty much stayed around 20-22°C the entire time was there. The week before and the week after I left, the temperatures plunged so Mother Nature must have been looking out for me (although daily highs in the high teens would have been ideal for me). The sun was at it’s peak and shining bright and warm when I got to Namdaemun Market.
What can I saw about Namdaemun Market? It’s like an ahjumma’s paradise.^^ Namdaemun Market is comprised of hundreds of stores and vendors within a several block area that sell all kinds of items you can imagine. It has an overall flea market like feel to it and the quality and luster of the merchandise can vary greatly but I think that’s the whole charm about Namdaemun Market. It’s all about the search, looking around, getting a deal and finding that potential diamond in the rough. As I mentioned, you can probably find anything you can imagine being sold somewhere in Namdaemun Market but it seemed like the majority of the vendors sold clothes. When I think of Namdaemun Market, the first things that come to my are: cheap prices, cheap non-brand name clothes, makeup boutiques, socks, underwear, long-johns, pots and pans, bath scrubs and towels, women’s shoes, slippers and overall just the kind of every day stuff one would need…and ahjummas. I saw a lot of ahjummas (middle-aged women) shopping for clothes.
Every which way I walked in the market, there were alleyways of shops along both sides and sometimes right in the middle of the street or intersection. Parts of the Market were more alive than others.
One of the charms of Namdaemun Market is that haggling on prices is expected. When I told my aunt I was going to Namdaemun Market, she told me that I probably wouldn’t get as good a deal as the locals because they would be able to tell I was a foreigner. She was adamant though that I had to haggle and to never buy anything at the prices listed. It was very funny and entertainment the way she explained it. She even wanted to accompany me because she was worried I wasn’t going to get a deal like the locals but I assured that I was just going there to check it out and I wasn’t going with any intentions to buy anything.
When I was there, there was one thing I did wanted to look for which was a Korean National Soccer jersey as a gift for my brother. I saw several sports stores and inquired about a Park Ji-Sung jersey they had on display and I think it was about 38,000WON (~$30CAN) but I could tell it was a replica and I wanted to buy an official one. It actually looked like a replica of the replica but again, this was Namdaemun Market. Another thing I wanted to get were some ahjumma-style pants, the really baggy and colourful kind, and a matching sun-visor but then I figured it would only be fun to have at first but then be a waste.
At this point, it was unbearably hot so I started walking out of Namdaemun Market. The farther away from the core of the Market I got and closer to the streets, the more restaurants and street food vendors I saw. I knew that Shinsegae Deparment Store was practically right next door to Namdaemun Market and would have a place for me to rest so I located it on my cellphone and headed that way.
When I got to Shinsegae Deparment Store, I felt much more at home.
I walked through all the floors of Shinsegae not with any real purpose to buy anything but more to do some eye shopping and to see what Seoul department stores and the service were like relative to Tokyo. I found the service in Tokyo department stores to be phenomenal. It was very uniform and very, very formal. In Seoul, I found the quality of service to be almost on par (Tokyo still gets the nod though) but with more of a relaxed flavour to it.
According to my map, I was sort of within walking distance to the Namsan Stairs and Park which I wanted to check out so I just followed my cellphone GPS from Shinsegae and started walking south. Well, this turned out to be a big mistake. First of all, it was a long uphill walk and I wasn’t exactly sure where I was going. As I walked further south, I started getting into a maze like neighbourhood with all these nooks and crannies and dead ends and alleys and so forth. I still managed to get very close to Namsan according to my GPS but I just couldn’t find a way to get to the other side of this wall to get there. A deliveryman on a scooter drove by and so I asked him and he said there was no way to Namsan through here and that I had to go back and all the way around towards the east to get to Namsan. Aigooooooo~. Defeated, I headed back from where I came virtually near Shinsegae and decided that it was a good idea to head home about now. I had been walking for a long time and didn’t have the energy to take the subway so I decided to take a cab instead.
The ride from Shinsegae to Dongnimmun was really slow at first as there was a lot of traffic in the area. While I was stuck in traffic, all I could think about and look at was the taxi meter and how it was still going and going and going. Luckily, traffic got better and we were on the move again and it was smooth sailing, almost. When we got to the intersection near Dongnimmun Station, the driver asked for additional directions but it took a while for me to get my bearings so I just told me to let me off there. The ride was surprisingly very affordable. I think it came to about 5000WON (less than $5CAN). It wasn’t a far walk to my aunt’s from here and it was one I made every day but when you are hungry and tired and your feet hurt, everything feels 10 times farther away. On top of that, because much of Seoul is built on top of hills and mountains, the walk up to my aunt’s place was killer. During my trip, there were times when I didn’t break a sweat the entire day until I had to walk back up that hill to get to my aunt’s place. When I told my aunt I took a cab and was dropped off near the subway station instead of right to the condo because the driver didn’t know which way to go, she had unpleasant things to say about him and said he should have known how to get here with the instructions I gave him. My aunt is so funny. She is the 막내 (youngest) amongst her siblings and is about half my height but she was so very protective of me while I was staying with her.
Comments
Post a Comment