Say Caleb: Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 7 (Seoul Lotte Mart, Sinchon & Dongdaemun)

Our first full day in Seoul was really tiring because we went to so many places. First stop we headed to Lotte Mart at Seoul Station to stock up on some groceries and also to buy some snacks back to Singapore.

I've never eaten Kimchi and I probably never will. The idea of putting preserved vegetables into my mouth just turns me off.

Some customized chocolate that looked pretty cool but we didn't get it in the end cause it's quite overpriced.

The really interesting about hypermarts in Korea is that they have this self packing service where you help yourself to the free cardboard boxes and tapes to pack everything inside. They don't issue plastic bags so the only way to carry everything that you bought is to put them into these cardboard boxes. I thought it was a really good idea until later on when I decided to take some stuff out to eat from the boxes and it was such a hassle to cut open the boxes.

TIP: Only do your grocery shopping on the last day and do not ever tie two or more boxes together because the airport doesn't allow you to check in the boxes together. You'll also need to plan exactly what you want in each box and label them accordingly because once you go back, all the boxes look the same and if you want to take out something you won't open every single box to find it.

After our grocery shopping at Lotte Mart, we headed to Sinchon next to shop for clothes. It's the place you want to go if you're looking for cheap and trendy female clothes. Apparently it's near Ehwa Women University so the clothes there are catered especially for that market. Prices range from 5000 won upwards but the average prices are about 10000 won.

Most of the shops in Sinchon sell female clothes but occasionally you'll be able to find some men's clothing as well.

There are so many street food stalls in Korea that you can actually be full just eating them. Here's some Korean style takoyaki that only has squid flavour. 10 balls for 3000 won. Taste pretty much like the ones in Singapore though.

That kind of concludes our shopping trip in Sinchon and we headed off to Dongdaemun at night.

Dongdaemun is the ultimate place to go to for nocturnal owls because they only get busy after sunset and remain open until the wee hours in the morning. The entire Dongdaemun area is really big and spans two subway stations - Dongdaemun and Dongdaemun History & Culture Park.

The cheap deals are all hidden at the side of Dongdaemun and there's one mall that everyone should check out. APM is the wholesale mall that sells really cheap clothing even if you buy only one piece. Do not mistake APM for Hello! APM.

APM is distinctly messy and if you can get through this mess, you'll get all the cheap deals.

The APM that you're supposed to go to is the one right at the edge of the above photo and not the one near Migliore and Doosan Tower.

Dongdaemun also has really upscale shopping centres like Maxtyle and Migliore which are slightly more expensive than APM and Pyonghwa. These shopping centres typically get more happening from 10pm onwards all the way to 5am but they are usually closed on Sunday night.

They also have restaurants that open way late into the night if you're looking to grab a bite after all the shopping. We tried some tteokbokki which is a famous korean street food that basically consists of rice cake cooked in spicy sauce and sometimes accompanied with beancurd skin and sausages.

One thing I realised about Korea is that the clothes and food are separated very distinctly and you hardly see a food stall pop up in the middle of a series of clothing shops. So if you're hungry halfway, you'll have to walk all the way out to get your food.

Saturday 1 November 2014

Korea Trip Oct 2014 Part 7 (Seoul Lotte Mart, Sinchon & Dongdaemun)

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