Excursions

Within the past week Ian and I have been able to see a few very different and interesting parts of Seoul. Some places we loved and others not so much. We visited two markets, the Namdaemun market and the Noryangjin Fish market, a beautiful man made lake, and an area that Ian and I call "America Town!"

Ian and I were really excited to visit our first Korean market, called Namdaemun market. Expecting the vendors to sell every possible good, our hopes were let's say very high. Unfortunately, after walking around for about 15 minutes we soon realized the only goods available were cheep/ugly clothes, kitchen supplies, bedding supplies, backpacks, sunglasses and purses. Plus the market had an extremely horrible smell, making the experience even less enjoyable. While we are glad to say that we have been to a Korean market, we do not plan on going back any time soon!

Fortunately, after our disappointing afternoon we decided to make our way to another area of Seoul called Itaewon. Since this is where the U.S. military base is located a lot of food vendors have set up foreign food options. Thank god! We were able to find an abundant amount of Italian, Thai, middle eastern, and Chinese restaurants. Having been away from Portland for over three months, we had been craving one of Portlander's favorite cuisine: Thai! So the decision as to where we would eat was easily made! It was surprisingly pretty good. We ordered sweet and sour chicken and phat thai (yes, here it's phat not pad). The phat thai was different from the U.S., but it certainly did the job! Ian and I already suspect we will be back to Itaewon very soon.

The following day Ian and I needed to get out of the city. Being surrounded by cars and people non-stop started to wear on us, so we took a public bus about 20 minutes outside of the city to an area called Ilsan. While Ilsan isn't completely out of the city, it does have a smaller town feel. The best part about Ilsan is that it has the largest man made lake in Korea! We walked partially around it looking at the flowers and the families having picnics. It was one of the most relaxing days we have had in Korea, and because of this I know we will be back very soon. It will also be even better when we aren't dripping wet from the humidity. It definitely got a little too hot, but was still enjoyable!

Last night Ian's friend Dan decided to take us to Korea's famous fish market called Noryangjin. All we can say is it was quite the experience! Imagine a HUGE building containing hundreds of vendors selling everything from crab, octopus, lobster, clams, flat fish, and even baby shark. Basically how the market works is you buy the seafood and then go the market restaurant and they cook it for you. So we found a vendor we wanted to buy the seafood from. There were four of us so we bought 1 crab, 1 flat fish, we believe to be flounder, and 2 octopus. The vendor's wife then fileted our fish, while the vendor put the crab and octopus in a bag for us to take to the restaurant upstairs. So imagine us walking through the market with a live octopus and crab in plastic bag! Once we got to the market's restaurant we handed them the bag and they cooked the crab and cut up the octopus.

The first thing we ate was the live, yes live, octopus! It was even still moving on the plate. Ian had been wanting to try this ever since we watched Anthony Bourdain eat it, so here was his chance! I thought it was absolutely repulsive. The tentacles suck to your tongue or your cheek as you attempt to force it down your throat. Plus to make it just that much tastier it is extremely chewy, almost like eating sticky rubber. Ian even ate part of the head ( including the eyeball) which he said was pretty disgusting. Fortunately, the crab came next, which was scrumptious! The fish was next, which was not cooked. It was sushimi, which Ian thought was very tasty. I, on the other hand, was not as big of a fan. The texture just didn't do it for me. With the last remnants of the flat fish and crab, the chef cooked up a spicy fish stew with tofu and fried rice with small pieces of crab. These were both very good.

Surprisingly we felt fine after eating all of that and did not have to break out the pepto bismol! Even though I won't be eating live octopus and sushimi anytime soon, it was an amazing experience and one that we will never forget.

That is all from Seodaemun! Hope all is well and a few pictures of the markets and lake will be posted soon.