Motorcycle Gang

This is probably the only time that Seoul's streets are this empty.

Most of the exciting things in Seoul happen to be down alleys, so you have to keep your eyes peeled for fun looking alleys.

This particular alley was the home of a motorcycle gang. I think they specialized in sport utility bikes.

Clearly the motorcycle gang values function more than safety.

Ghost Town

It's the Lunar New Year (about a week ago).

For the New Year everybody goes to visit their families.

Apparently everyone except for this shop selling assorted lighting.

It's the Lunar Holiday and as we have no family in the area we think this is a great opportunity to explore Seoul. The slight problem being that everything is closed because it's a holiday.

While searching for food in a very quiet city of 24.5 million people we wandered into what seemed like a very quiet market.

Apparently the "food court" was still open.

Each area seemed to offer a different exotic dish.

For instance mysterious meat,

steaming noodles,

dried fish,

or cute Americans.

We settled on a traditional Korean pancake.

Plus some festive side dishes.

The meal is traditionally washed down with Makkoli (a milky white fermented rice drink).

Pine Bud and Nature's Bloopers

This is a delicious and refreshing pine bud flavored soda. It was considerably better than the fizzy-fake-yogurt drink that Megan chose after she saw two old men chain-smoking and enjoying said beverage.

The snow has melted...but it is still very cold.

It is very difficult to find house-shoes/slippers here that will fit me. These ones have Velcro and I had hoped they would fit me.

Sadly, they do not.

Korean Computer

I set the computer's language to Korean and now I can't figure out how to reset it.

Itaewon

Our goal today was to venture to a new area of Seoul to visit the Leeum Samsung Museum of Art. By the time we arrived we were very hungry! Luckily we passed this cute cafe on our way to the museum.

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We had squid and fennel salad, a roasted pumpkin salad and bread with "artisanal jam."

The entrance to the museum was very modern. The digital displays on the floor continually counted down from 9 to 0.

We had come to the museum to see the Christian Marclay exhibit the centerpiece of which was a video meditation on time.

Megan thought that the Christian Marclay show was boring.

After leaving the museum we wandered and saw these beautiful views.

We also saw this very sad flyer. Poor little guy.

We had wandered into the hills and weren't exactly sure how to get out. I had a slight fear that we would be lost forever.

Megan would like me to point out that she did NOT think we would be lost forever and then said that she is no sissy and then she grunted and punched me in the shoulder (too much "man tea," I suspect).

Luckily for us a little fox came out of an alley and led us to the main road.

We found a coffee shop that served Intelligentsia coffee and a very British cup of tea.

Then they played two Led Zeppelin songs followed by Madonna's "Justify My Love" which prompted Gabriel to wonder aloud why coffee shops play such bad music.

All I can say is look at this amazing sunset!

All I can say is "Hey look a geodesic dome."

This is a spicy soup with noodles and fish. Megan told me not to take a picture because it would make us look like outsiders. I pointed out that we are outsiders and she approved the picture taking. P.S. This tasty dinner was only $5! 

Setting Goals

Here we are leaving the Bat Cave.

Our goal for today was to order food in a non-food-court setting i.e. not just pointing at things but actually looking at a menu and attempting to say a few words in Korean. This is a vegetable porridge, and it actually is what we wanted.

Isn't this beautiful!

This is an entertainment area.

This is a giant-mini Pagoda under glass. Korea lists it's national treasures by number and this treasure has a pretty low number (#5 or #6), so you know it's got to be a good one.

That is Megan in the blue puffy coat. The coat was a generous gift from our friend Ted after many comments about how thin Megan's coat was.

Gabriel was feeling weak and needed the power of some more hot man tea. Good thing there is a tea shop on every block!

This is a traditional style of quilting. The material is very hard and thin, almost like paper. Here the quilt is hanging in the window of the traditional tea house.


Don't I look like I'm ready to enjoy some man tea?

Or lady tea...

We walked around the arts district and ran into this little man.

This is the entryway to a Buddhist temple. We would have gone inside, however, it had started snowing and we were cold and needed to go home.