Kembara Musim Panas - Part 2

Salam.

I hope you enjoy reading my picture-blog. Here's the continuation of our adventure in Seoul.

Day 3

Off to Gwanghamun square and Sejong Center for Performing Arts. 

Gwanghwamun - the main and largest gate of Gyeongbok Palace

A breathtaking scenery

Sejong Center for Performing Arts (Running Man Ep 7)

At King Sejong Museum ( Running Man Ep 7)

King Sejong is great king in the heart of the Koreans. Apart from taking care of his people well, he had great ideas of systems and inventions which really helped his citizens. He is also the one who created the Hangeul writing system (which is still used till today) which shows his concern towards the illiterates. 

Running man fans, does this ring a bell? hehe

It also houses an exhibition about Admiral Yi Sunshin who was famous as the creator of the turtle ship and his intelligent war strategy against the Japanese in his time.

The museum is free; free admission plus free PDA borrowing. Cool. Plus, the PDA made the museum more fun. Extra cool. And I bought a cute King Sejong pen et the souvenir shop...hehe saja nak bagitau. There is also a booth at the entrance where the visitors can try out the king's hanbok. For free. Double cool.

With Haechi Seoul - the mascot of Seoul City. See the red-blue spiral thing? That's actually the mark for the beginning of the Cheonggyecheon stream

Crossing the stream that runs west to east through the downtown Seoul. 

Day 4

Seoul Folk Flea Market is actually a walk-able distance from our lodging. When we arrived, it was still very early. So we skipped the market and headed to the next destination after taking commemorative photographs. You know what, the old folks passing by were actually staring at us with a puzzled face. I am not sure if it's because we were taking picture there or it is due to our tudung. Hmm, the stares are really puzzling. They were even turning their heads to see us as they were passing by us. Oh, I should have greeted them in Korean language to see their reactions. Haha that could be fun...

Seoul Folk Flea Market (Running Man Ep 39)

Then we head to the National Museum of Korea in Yongsan-Gu. It's a very big museum with no admission fee. Yes, it is free of charge. Quite impressive. But there is no PDA in this museum. What a pity.

We were greeted by the beautiful scenery of N Seoul Tower at the museum entrance. Macam gambar poskad tak?

The extensive building of the museum (Running Man Ep 48)

After that, we headed to Itaewon and stopped by at Itaewon mosque. It is also open for non-Muslims who visited Itaewon, but they had restricted access. They are not allowed to go into the praying hall. An ahjumma tried to go inside, as she was curious to see what is inside. When the person in charge told her that she is not allowed to go in, she was questioning the reason as she couldn't understand. If a non-muslim asked me, I wouldn't know how to answer either, without offending that person, that is.

Masjid Itaewon

Itaewon is a place where you could find the imported goods and European-sized clothes and shoes. There is also a lot of halal food restaurants of Indian cuisine, Pakistani restaurant, makanan Arab, etc; but no Malaysian cuisine yet.

Our next stop that evening was Banpo Han-gang(river) park to see the rainbow fountain. There is a funny story about this. We asked the subway information center about which stop is the best; and with a puzzled look, he said it is of 10-15 minutes of a walking distance, so we decided to walk. And then we met with a very friendly English-speaking volunteer. They wanted to walk? was written clearly on his face. However, since we said we don't mind walking, he kindly instruct us on the directions. And you know what, the walk from Itaewon to Banpo bridge took up about 50 minutes! But since it was windy, and we still had time to catch the rainbow fountain show, I enjoyed the walk, especially while crossing the bridge.

The riverbank park from the bridge.

There were so many people; family picnicking, friends hanging out, bicyclers, and not to be missed, couples dating. It was a very nice park with a very nice view.

To think that we actually crossed the bridge on foot. From Itaewon to this Banpo bridge, crossing from that end to this end. Whoah! Jambatan Sultan Ismail yang kat Muar tu pun aku tak pernah lintas jalan kaki.

People gathered to see the rainbow fountain. I bet the best angle to enjoy the dancing fountain and light effects is from the river

A pair of Japanese tourists helped us took our picture

The two students were very helpful when we asked for the nearest subway station. Haha knowing some Korean phrases from Kdramas sure helps

Day 5

This time, we are going to have a look at one of the palaces. The biggest palace is the Gyeoungbok palace, but as Running Man fans doing a Running Man tour, we went to Gyeonghui palace where the Running Man did their recordings (Running Man Ep 8, Ep 71)

At the entrance of Gyeonghuigung, the Sungjeongmun gate

We met with a group of Singaporean tourists who mistook Gyeonghui as Gyeoungbok palace an ended up taking pictures for each other. "Wow, you ladies are very adventurous..."  The Singaporean tourist said upon knowing we traveled with just the two of us.

Say "Kimchee..."

Two adventurous ladies, huh?

Praise be to Allah for protecting us along the journey

Next door building of the Gyeonghui Palace is the Seoul Museum of History, the maroon painted building. Yes, there are sooo many museums in Seoul 

The interior of Seoul Museum of History (Running Man Ep 8). Jauh botol air tu merantau; dari Malaysia ke Korea

Seoul Museum of Korea is a museum dedicated for Seoul history as a capital city since the Joseon dynasty. There is no admission fee to see the evolution of Seoul going through the eras, and re-developing after the effect of war with Japan.

Current Seoul City model in the Museum

Day 6

We had a last minute shopping in Namdaemun in the morning and off to Incheon International Airport with the limousine bus at noon. With that, we wrapped up our adventurous journey in Korea...

At the front gate of hanok that we stayed for 5 nights before checking out

Subanallah...Another breathtaking scene from the plane window

It was fun. Did you have fun reading my blog? I'll be writing a few more additional posts later ^_^

Running man jjang!

P/s: now I feel like re-watching Running Man Episodes. Anyway, congratulations for the 100th Episode. Daebak! 축하 해요!!

Kembara Musim Panas - Part 1

Salam.

At Gyeonghui Palace (Running Man Ep71)

We, i.e Nadia and I had a trip to Korea this summer. We stayed there for 6 days; spending our time shopping, walking, and people watching and being watched as they find it weird seeing us covering ourselves up especially in the hot summer.  The weather was hot just like in Malaysia, though at night it was very windy and quite cool. I personally had a good time enjoying the night walks above ground. Yes, I have to emphasize the ABOVE GROUND part as Korea has a veeeeery extensive underground area; subway stations, underground shopping centers, and pedestrian crossings.

In the 6-days time, we went around to the tourist attractions in Seoul city by using the subways and our own two legs...

Day 1

Our flight was at 0100hrs. We arrived at Incheon International Airport (Running Man Ep 33) at around 8 o'clock local time, took an airport limousine bus towards Seoul and arrived at our lodging at 10.30 am. We were lucky that we got to check in earlier than the appointed time. After cleaning up ourselves and  a quick nap, we set out for the summer adventure.

Namsangol Folk Village (Running Man Ep 19)

Iced Lemonade on a very hot day sure is refreshing

Aiming for the N Seoul Tower (the background picture) by foot

Met with Taekwon V(Running man ep 25) on our way up the mountain

Namsan Park at the feet of the mountain 

Ada burung...

The original plan was to take the cable car up and walk down by foot. But we accidentally took a wrong turn and ended up climbing these stairs and more stairs T_T to reach the mountain peak.To sum it up, we actually went for a mountain hike within 8 hours of our arrival. Terer giler, dah la malam tadi tidur kejap je kat dalam plane. Lebih kurang sejam la jugak panjat gunung ni...huh, berpeluh-peluh!

Bird's-eye view of Namsan Park

Akhirnya...sampai pun (Running Man Ep 6)

The long awaited scenery after the long hike

Love Locks at N Seoul Tower. Banyak ooo...

And we got down with a cable car...When we reached down, there were a very long line of people waiting for their turn to go up. Erm, mostly couples I would say.

Day 2

Day 2 were basically the day where we went for a shopping spree. In the morning, we went to Namdaemun market. Most of the goods sold were handmade by the store owners. Cool, huh? There were soo many things on sale. I bought hair clips which were made on-demand, so I had to wait 10 minutes for her to finish up making them.  Rambang mata seyh, jalan kat kedai yang jual accesories.

That evening, we went to another famous shopping area; Dongdaemun. This place is especially famous as a wholesale shopping center. It's a place where you could find the latest fashion in Korea. Name it, handbags, accesories, shoes, clothings, you can have it all! And the best thing is, the retail malls closes only at 0400hrs!!! 

In front of the Dongdaemun (the Great East Gate). Unfortunately, we didn't see the Namdaemun (the Great South Gate

Cheonggyecheon Stream

Dongdaemun at night. There are flocks of people; tourists and locals.

...to be continued

The eventful trip to Kelantan

Salam.

It had been long since I last wrote anything here. There's nothing much to write, really. But it's kinda boring seeing the old stories each time I visited my own blog. So, I'm actually forcing this story to be written down. Just bear with me in case it's not so interesting and I think my writing skills has become rusty too.

So, the trip to Kelantan begins on Sunday, 22 January and ends on Tuesday, January 24th. During our stay, we tried to be helpful to our hosts but it doesn't seem like we did much. Well, maybe Faein and Nadia did more than I do. On the other hand, I feel like the only thing I do is snapping pictures here and there. But yeah,  as an amateur, and a total beginner on top of that, my experimental shots didn't turn out good. Plus, my pictures of the big day are from the side view as I was trying not to be a hindrance to the hired photographer who is trying to do his work and the relatives who wanted to keep the proof of the happy day. Here goes a series of the not-so-good pictures:

 If I had moved a bit to the left, I would have gotten the full view inside the mirror. Well, I was too afraid to do that in case I accidentally become a photo-bomber in the hired photographer's shot.

Oh, this came out quite good. Haha, but then, so many people in the background.

Yeah, I lack originality. I'm not sure though why people take this kind of shots, but i did it anyway out of curiosity and self-satisfaction (of being able to do what other people could). What an idiot.

Another side-view picture. I managed to capture the right moment and the right emotion. But unfortunately, the wrong camera mode. Tsk, tsk what a shame. 

err..I'm not really sure what I'm trying to achieve here. and the cake is crooked.

 The traffic jam on the way to Pantai Cahaya Bulan. So we decided to give up on the beach and went shopping at the nearby shops.

The effect is different when I focused only on the sky. It looked as if it is almost dusk. Cool huh?

aww...so cute. But a bit blurry here. A second shot is somewhat impossible. This kid keeps on going here and there

Another failed attempt

We barely know each other. From left: Hani's maternal cousin, Hani's paternal cousin, Hani's university friend, Razan's friend, Hani's school friend. It's kinda sad thinking that I might not see them again in the future. 

And somehow these two kids got comfortable with me and started goofing off with me. Ahh...I miss my cousins

Oh, and yes, I lost my identification card. It was last seen was before boarding the flight to Kota Bharu. Alhamdulillah, I managed to settle the matter within the week and is currently waiting for the new card. It's a good thing that I'm still a student. If it isn't because of that, I would've had to pay RM110 instead of RM60. But I lost the picture of the innocent-looking 17-years-old-me eheh.

Currently I'm eager and excited to attend two more weddings. The nearest is this coming weekend and another one is in March. I hope there won't be any class on that Saturday.  

I pray that we would do well in the coming exam.