Street Food – Seoul, Korea

So yesterday, I showed you the bad things that can happen when you eat street food. Let me share a few pictures of the GOOD things that can happen! While the corn dog was a set-back, I would still try street food!

140508-01Okay, this is gonna make me look like I only want sausages but CHECK IT OUT. Five different meats on a stick. It was DELICIOUS. I believe this was in Myeongdong.

140508-02I always see this on Korean TV shows so I had to give it a try. It’s an odeng food cart, the Korean version of Oden. This is fish cake, it’s the only thing I got this time because we were between meals. Was good!

140508-03Sundae. My gosh, I was so disappointed by this. I got it at the E-mart next door to our apartment and it was terrible. The ones in Hawaii are much better but I am sure it’s because I got it at a chain grocery store. I gotta try a good one from a food joint next time.

140508-04I didn’t get to try this food stand but I thought it look super cute. There were a lot of these types of carts in the Myeongdong area…I really want to go back to Korea SOON.

The Day the Hot Dog Betrayed Me…

Oh you read that right. During my trip to Korea, in a crowded Edae Shopping Street…I met my match. A nice old Korean man was selling corn dogs covered with crinkle fries out of a cart. Let me repeat that, CRINKLE FRY ENCRUSTED CORN DOG. I had to get it. I did. You know what else I got? For those who have a faint heart, avert your eyes now. Diarrhea. This dang corn dog was not cooked enough. As I ate it, I thought it had melted cheese in the middle with the hot dog. Oh. That was raw batter. I suffered! Then I had to look up diarrhea medicine in Korean to show to a pharmacy. And yes, it’s just like the Korean dramas! You walk into the pharmacy store and get whatever medicine you need! I thought that was pretty cool. 🙂 The pharmacist who helped me was very nice.

140506-01Scene of the crime

140506-02Doesn’t that look good? 🙁 Why did you have to hurt me so corn dog?

Healthy Bibimbap – Seoul, Korea

Can I start this blog off with a rant? Sorry guys, you can skip this paragraph if you want to go straight to the happy (I wouldn’t blame you!). Anyway, I finished work today and did my usual walk to my car and guess what I see? Someone had scratched my car. My new car. 🙁 The car I saved so hard for…has a big scratch on it. It looks like the person had opened his/her car door and let it fling open onto my door. There was white paint all over, luckily I got side body molding installed on my car so it’s the molding that got the grunt of the hit. Still hurts though and makes me sick since my car is only 2 months old. Sigh, wish the person left a note. Even if it was just a note that said sorry. I understand things like this can happen and it’s an accident. I think I sat on the curb in the parking lot for about 20 minutes because I was so mad/sad…lol. I feel a bit better now, not great but nothing I can do now right? No can change what’s done.

Oh! I forgot to wish everyone a Happy Easter! I hope you folks had a good one. I had a nice and restful one…had some cleaning too. Today’s entry will be sharing a nice meal we had before we hiked up to Namsan Tower. I don’t remember the name of this place but I am pretty sure it was a restaurant for tourists. They had a menu with…interesting English. We were able to order okay! I liked the food. I didn’t take much pictures because the waitress was a bit rude…

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I’ve said this once and I’ll say it again, banchan is EVERYTHING. The banchan here was amazing. Not sure what the top right dish is…but it was my favorite! Does anyone know?

140422-02Sometimes a nice bowl of tofu soup can be the cure all…

140422-03I usually don’t love the earthiness of this type of veggies – but these were great!  Tasted great.

140422-04Until we meet again – so delicious…

Trip to Seoul Korea – Apartment Tour

I took a trip to Korea last year and it was awesome. I enjoyed my trip so much – the food and shopping was great and affordable! I long to be back on the streets of Seoul sometime soon! I haven’t been able to share my trip so I will try to post everything that happened! Today, I am showing you the apartment we stayed in. We decided to take a big leap and sublet an apartment through Airbnb – it was a great decision. The apartment was about the same price for a single hotel room. This apartment came with three rooms, one bath, full kitchen, living room and washer and dryer – tell me that isn’t a better deal! We stayed in Yeiouido which is a city located away from the hustle and bustle of the tourist areas, it’s also home to all the major television networks and the Han River. I loved taking the subway back home after a long day and unwinding in a nice and quiet neighborhood. This apartment was also right next to an Emart which made for super easy omiyage shopping..hehe. Okay time to share some pics!

140421-01TV and Toaster…:) This apartment also had free wifi – we watched a bunch of shows we couldn’t understand. Loved the shopping networks.

140421-02Isn’t this living room so cute? I loved it. This apartment had a real cute and homey style that I loved.

140421-04Cute dining nook and bookcase full of books we couldn’t read.

140421-03Full kitchen with washer and dryer! The washer doubled as both the washer and dryer. Why don’t we have that here?? Or do we? Anyhow, the hosts were so gracious. They even had some food in the kitchen for us to eat, that was very nice. They greeted us when we got in and came to say goodbye to us as we left. A great experience renting this apartment.

Ewha Womans University – Seoul, Korea

So I woke up this morning with a bad migraine and decided to stay home to nurse it.  By lunchtime, my headache was gone so I decided to go to a store to browse for a gift.  I brought along my little brother and we had a nice and leisurely walk through the store.  I was in such good spirits.  Then as I was browsing in an aisle, I see this elderly Japanese man coming my way.  He is very old and moving slowly and starts to walk around me.  As he was walking by me, I start to walk and continue walking.  Suddenly, I hear him yelling something and I see a woman right behind him so I thought he was yelling for her.  I see that she’s not answering him and look back at him and realize he’s yelling at me.  He’s yelling in a very angry tone…Lady!  Lady!  So when I look at him, he points to something at the ground and says very angrily, when you drop something, you need to pick it up.

I’m completely fine with it at first.  I really didn’t realize I knocked something over so I walked over and told him matter of factly that I didn’t realize I dropped it and picked it up and put it back and he is looking at me as if I had just murdered someone.  I wish I were overreacting!  The lady who was behind him and I met eyes as I was walking back and she was like telling me, what is his problem?  I can’t believe that.  She was genuinely offended and I just brushed it off and told her, nah he’s just a cranky old man (lol!) and just went on in my business.  You know, if she hadn’t been there to witness and comment – I wouldn’t have through twice about it.  But as the day as passed, I realize it did bother me.  I didn’t appreciate the tone he took with me and honestly it was really rude but I think it was his look that really got to me, I don’t know what his problem was.  Ah well, what can you do.

Let me try to post some pictures that bring me to a happier place.  In Korea, we decided to check out a college populated shopping street off the Ewha station.  I came with no knowledge of this school but when I hit the end of the shopping street – I was amazed by its beauty!  It made me wish I were back in school, that’s quite a feat!

Picturesque!

Picturesque!

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Blacksmith – Jongno-gu, Seoul

Will this week turn into all posts from Korea?  Quite possibly!  We had a long day of touring the Changdeokgung Palace in Seoul – this is a famous palace that includes a tour of the secret garden. It was a beautiful day – one of the warmest we had while we were there.  I didn’t find that too helpful since I wore warm clothes and we did a LOT of walking to get to this palace.  Anyhow, we decided to go to Blacksmith for a late lunch after the Palace tour and I am quite happy we did!  This is a famous chain Italian restaurant whose spokespeople are Song Seung Hun, Kim Tae Hee and Park Yoochun!  It looks like Song Seung Hun is also the CEO of this restaurant so kudos to him!  Let’s get to the pictures!

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Park Ga Budae – Seoul

One of the dishes I most looked forward to when I traveled to Korea was Budae Jigae.  I know it’s not considered special by any means, but I am a fan of sausages and luncheon meat so this dish really appealed to me.  If you don’t know the history of this dish, check out this page.  Luckily there was a restaurant in the IFC Mall that specialized in it and I was able to try this dish out!

Before the stove was fired up...

Before the stove was fired up…

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Re-new, Re-view and Re-juvenate

I’ve decided to pursue a new domain and blog.  I hope that this new domain will provide a much needed rejuvenation into my blogging.  If you are reading this, thank you for joining me.

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Namsam Tower Locks of Love, April 2013