On Monday, after discovering I wouldn't be going to the immigration office until the next day I decided to be adventurous and go to Seoul for the afternoon. Having been on the subway and being in posession of a Korean 'Oyster card' (which ironically has a picture of a smiling pig on it!) I decided to head in Myeong dong in search of shops. Korea has a lot of western stores, most of which are located around the Myeong dong area so I decided it would be a relatively safe and easy place to head to. I took the subway from Munsan to Seoul Station and then managed to swap lines and stations to take another Subway to Myeong Dong. Having navigated my way out of the station (some of the stations are HUGE - Myeong Dong for instance is like an underground shopping centre!) I decided I was actually starving and not feeling up to braving the korean eateries, I took the easy option and followed the signs to KFC. KFC (and I have now had too since leaving the country) because apart from some local options it is essentially the same everywhere. The Zinger Tower burger tastes exactly the same as it does in both the UK and umm Dubai! After a major chicken intake I decided to 'wander', I wasn't there for any specific reasons I just wanted to check the place out and try not to spend any money.. I found some great stores including an adorable 'Hello Kitty' store, as well as some staple stores such as the Japanese-American brand Forever 21, Uniqlo, Codes Combine and a giant empty building plastered with signs saying H&M opening March 2010!!! I managed to stop myself from buying any kind of clothing, footwear or jewelrey, however I failed when I say a rather fabulous and totally fake canvas Vivienne Westwood bag for 10000 won (equivalent to 5 pounds) and I also majorly faltered when it come to the skincare shops, mainly due to the unsurity of what exactly to do. All the skincare shops seems to have dressed up people outside handing out free samples of various random products -they give you the free sample and then quite literally grab your arm and drag you into the store. Luckily the 2 stores I accidentally got dragged into where pretty good and I ended up with a black honey face scrub (which smells lush and is really good) and a Sprout (yes sprout) cleansing foam, as well as a million free sachets of various random products! After the bag and the skincare I decided my best option was to vacate the area before I ended up broke, I was feeling on a bit of a shopping roll at this point.
As well as great shops, Myeong Dong also had some great sights - a truck filled with trays of eggs?!, a stall full of outfits for your dog. Enough said, although I wish I had a dog to put in the outfit!
No comments:
Post a Comment