On our fourth day here in Korea, we finally make it back to Seoul for a proper city tour.
And first thing first, they starts all the shopping tour that anyone thought wouldn't come by since we assumed ourselves on this more expensive tour with Mayflower. But alas, the first thing our guide brought us to was the Korean ginseng shop, where you truly burn a hole in her pocket buying RM700 worth of powder and pills (still in the fridge now if you want to know).
I am sure the stuffs are good but it ain't good if you not eating them. Right?
So they claim lah, the powder were made from at least 6 year old ginseng root, thus doesn't have the heat effect after consume it. Whilst the American ginseng is too cold while the China one too hot, this is at the medium range, i.e. not too cold nor too heaty. I myself get confused later on what's really good or bad!
Anyways, after milking us at the most expensive place, it did not ended, we were chauffeured to more shopping places...
e.g. the so called KimChi school, where they dress you up like a Korean doll, then teach you about the variety of KimChis (more than 20 that is known now), and make you do the dirty job preping one!
Then to buy a 1kg bag, it cost something like USD16. Hmm... imaging paying USD16 for a bag of smelly cabbage, take that~! My colleague and I both bought a bag but it somehow doesn't taste quite right after we open them back in KL. We have had a lot better ones in Korea and in Malaysia. I somewhat reluctant to think that we were conned.
After lunch, we then came to the Gyeongbokgung Palace. In within Seoul, there are too many palace. So here we are at one of the many ones.
It seems that this whole place was burn down once, no wonder still much empty land around here. The palace guide says their government is slowly building them back one by one.
Dunno, I think it is not very important to built it back because no matter how much you try, it will never be the same. I mean, can you replace the finely crafted furnitures and delicately molded porcelain that gone together into ash? That's why I say, then the time comes, we should move on instead of dwelling into the past.
Dana says "Walking forward but looking back only trip yourself to the ground." Kih kih...
Anyway, we too went to the Korea cultural museum. Not too bad with nicely laid exhibitions that gives tourist a fast forward on Korea culture, both past and present.
Our days continued with going to a building's basement somewhere in Seoul where they purposely build a sub-zero bar out of it. I don't particularly find myself too chill to be there for long!
My god, even the glass is a big piece of ice.
Our night ended when we were let loose near Ewha Women's University shopping area. Nothing much for me at least, as everything seemed more expensive than I could probably afford.
