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| Gyeonbokgung Place. |
Joe was in Seoul for business in February 2017 and Stella, Spiro and Peter came to join him for the weekend. Flying to Seoul from Hong Kong takes just under four hours. Seoul is a huge city of over 10 million people, with a metropolitan area of around 25 million people--half the population of South Korea. We stayed at the Four Seasons, which is a fabulous hotel that is very centrally located.
Our general observations are as follows: (1) Seoul is COLD in February, (2) Seoul may be the only place on earth where people love Americans, including America, (3) taxi drivers speak no English, but most people who work at restaurants in tourist areas do, and (4) although the language barrier makes it tough to take a taxi, it is very easy to get around on foot and using the subway system, with the exception that the English spelling of each subway stop just seems like a long, garbled list of consonants and vowels thrown together at random.
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| Outside of Gwanghwamun Square. |
On the first day, we slept in, had an early lunch and walked through Gwanghwamun Square to Gyeonbokgung Palace. Gwanghuwamun Square is a huge concrete area surrounded by busy streets. It has statues of Admiral Yi Sun-Sin and King Sejong the Great (more on them later).
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| Temple in Gyeonbokgung Place. |
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| Gyeonbokgung Place. |
When we walked through the square around noon, the people of Seoul were preparing for their Saturday night protest. Live bands were warming up and street vendors were setting up their stands. It is very nice of the people of Seoul to only protest on Saturday night so as not to block traffic on the weekdays.
Gyeonbokgung Palace sits at the north end of the square. The palace was originally built in 1395, but was burned down by the Japanese in the 1500s and not rebuilt until the 1800s. It is a huge complex that reminded us of a mini-Forbidden City. Inside the Palace we went to the National Folk Museum where we learned that despite having huge neighbors like China and Japan that were constantly invading, Korea managed to fight them off and remain independent until 1910-1945, when Japan finally took over. Admiral Yi Sun-Sin is a Korean hero for leading the Korean fleet to victory over a much larger Japanese fleet in the 1500s, saving Korea. King Sejong the Great, who lived in the 1400s, introduced the Korean alphabet, greatly improved Korean prosperity, expanded into North Korea and defeated and repelled Japanese invaders in South Korea.
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| Gyeonbokgung Place. |
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| The streets of Insadong. |
Although we were freezing, we walked through Insadong (a cool area with lots of shops and street vendors) and Bukchon (an area with some traditional Korean architecture). After a while we were so cold that we decided to stop for a beer to warm up. There are lots of coffee shops in Bukchon, but finding a bar was a challenge. Luckily, we finally found one and avoided freezing to death.
The cold weather took its toll on Joe. He was completely out of commission on day two. Stella, Spiro and Peter took a bus tour around Seoul and spent a lot of time at the War Museum, which is excellent. Stella's father, Andrew, served in the US military and helped defend South Korea from invasion by the North in the 1950s. By dinner, Joe was able to get out of bed and the whole family went on a night bus tour of the 13 bridges over the Han River. The River is huge and some of the bridges are quite beautiful.
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| Outside the War Museum. |
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| The outdoor area of the War Museum in front of a B-52D "Stratofortress Bomber U.S.A. |
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| The outdoor exhibition area houses about 160 pieces from the Korean War. |
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| Peter and Spiro standing on a life-size replica of the vessel attacked during the Second Yeonpyeong Naval Battle. |
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| At the Bongeunsa Temple, we saw the statue of Maitreya Buddha. It is the tallest statue of Buddha in Korea. |
On the last day, we took a long subway ride to Bongeunsa Temple. The Buddhist Temple was originally built in 794 and has a huge statue of a standing Buddha. Like all Buddhist Temples, it was a very relaxing place. From there, we walked up a hill to the old city wall and took in the views. Finally, we went to the Dongdaemun Design Plaza, which is a totally cool modern building containing a design museum. Unfortunately, museums are closed on Mondays, so we only got to see the outside. Across the street, we saw a mall that had a Van Gogh exhibit. We slowly took the escalator up eight floors past many, many shops. At the top, we found a handful of Van Gogh prints. It was just a trick to get us into the mall! It was getting late, so Stella, Spiro and Peter took the long train ride to the airport and headed back to Hong Kong.
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| Staircase ar Dongdaemun Design Plaza. |
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| The Bongeunsa Temple. |
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| Peter looking at the fake Van Gogh prints. |
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| Sculptures in the underground subway. |
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| Spiro and Stella at the Bongeunsa Temple. |
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| The Shadow of Shadow-Flower blossom sculpture (27 feet tall) rest outside the Dongdaemun Design Plaza. |
