This is pretty much going to be a rant about my experience on board a KTX train from Daegu to Seoul. So being pretty last minute, we decided to only get tickets on the actual day we were supposed to go back to Seoul. That was probably the worst decision ever which led to a hell of a night.
For some unknown reason, the station was really crowded that evening probably because it was a Sunday, the ticketing machines only had Korean unlike the ones in Seoul so some kind soul behind us helped us get the only tickets available back to Seoul which were like 2 hours later and were standing/unassigned seats.
So we were thinking standing/unassigned seats like okay la, maybe got some standing cabin like our MRT type. We were also getting fed up with waiting because it's a good 2 hours wait so we decided to be yolo and just board the next available train to Seoul since it was standing anyway, we won't be occupying anyone's seat. Guess where we ended up standing?
Yes this tiny little hole in between the cabins. There are only two seats in the cabin so it's already taken by the elderly so the rest of us would have to squeeze in this god damn tight space that isn't even supposed to have people standing around.
This is exactly why. With such a small space, we have to squeeze even further for the food truck that comes by every 5 mins. That's the first part of the series of unfortunate incidents.
As I mentioned earlier, we boarded the earlier train in hope that we will get to Seoul earlier. Dear KORAIL attendant (in blue blazer) for some reason started checking boarding passes of everybody. Actually he only checks people who are standing so it seems pretty much that those people in the tiny standing cabin are somewhat treated like 3rd class citizens.
So he realised that we are on the wrong train and we were asked to pay a penalty. So we decided to argue our way out but we were still asked to leave the train on the next stop and board the train we bought tickets for instead. I know it's our fault but we were hoping to be able to stay on the train till we reach Seoul, but no. So we alighted at some random stop and waited for our train.
I honestly didn't even know where we were at that point in time and dragging our luggage on and off the train didn't make it better as well.
So we got on the correct train and we found a empty spot in one of the cabins where Petrine could comfortably sit on the floor and rest for a while because the entire journey is about 2hrs long and it was extremely tiring to stand all the way. Here's the next part of the drama. We were again chased out of the air-conditioned cabin and forced to stand in the small little connecting walkway again.
So as you can see, never ever buy standing/unassigned seats because this is the treatment you can expect to get and just stand in the small corridor for your entire journey. It's not only squeezy, it's hot and stuffy as well.
After several more stops, we finally saw someone leaving their first class seats and our first instinct was to grab the seat and make ourselves comfortable. Just look at the legroom you get! All these difference for a couple of dollars so if you're intending to get on the KTX, always get the first class seats or at least normal seats because the price difference isn't really a lot. Secondly, always get your return tickets early because you'll never know when the tickets will be sold out and they sell out really fast.
It was a crazy experience for our journey back to Seoul and I know for sure I'm definitely not going to buy standing/unassigned seats tickets ever again.
Read the rest of my Korea posts here!
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 7 (Seoul Lotte Mart, Sinchon & Dongdaemun)
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 8 (Gangnam Underground Shopping Centre & Garogusil)
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 9 (Itaewon & Myeongdong Hanbok)
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 10 (Hongdae & Namdemum Market)
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 11 (Odusan Unification Observatory & Haneul Sky Park)
Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 12 (Yongmun & Hongdae)
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