Chinese New Year in Korea

8th of Feb

It's CNY!! However, I decided to stay in the guesthouse for a change of pace.

9th of Feb

Since today is Lunar New Year, one of the OCs brought us to Namsangol Folk Village to allow us to experience Lunar New Year in Korea. As we entered, we saw somebody singing to traditional songs on the stage. There were also someone playing to traditional instruments, which was pleasant to listen to. Apparently, there was a traditional dance too, which my friend took a picture of. Guess I missed it.

Traditional Perfomance

There were a lot of activities organised in here to celebrate this festival. There were a few something-making stores like kite-making, archery bow making, spin top making and etc and we have to pay for it in order to participate in these activities (and they are not cheap...). These activities are geared towards children but adults are encouraged to participate as well. 

One of the OCs made a kite

Of course, there were some activities that are free. For example:

Calligraphy

We were allowed to ask the calligraphers to write some auspicious phrases, whether in Chinese or Hangul for free. However, it was only written in a piece of white paper provided by them. If you want it to be properly framed, it costs about 20000 won and it comes with different sizes. There were some books full of auspicious phrases in Hangul or in Chinese, in case you couldn't think of anything to write.

Writing wishing letter and stamping amulet

We also could take a piece of paper and write our wishes for free. After writing our wishes, we tied our paper on to the strings like above. The yellow papers seen above should be the amulet that the people stamped. 

There were also some traditional games held in this village. Some of them are the yutnori, tops-spinning, kite-flying and tuho.

Tuho

I particularly like to play the tops-spinning game as it is new to me and it is really interesting. To play this game, I have to, first, spin the top. Then, with a tool as below, I have to hit the spinning top so that it spins continuously.

Tops-spinning

Later at night, I went for dessert in Myeongdong's Beans Bins Coffee. It is famous for it's waffle served with Haagen Dazs ice cream. As it was strawberry's season, every cafe has their own strawberry products. However, we did not order waffle with strawberries on it but a waffle with 3 ice-cream of our choice and a strawberry latte. For the ice-cream, we chose green tea, chocolate and mango, but the waiter mistook our order and she gave us strawberry. Not wanting to wait anymore, we chose to not change the order.

The waffle is definitely the kind of waffle that I love. It is crispy on the outside and soft inside. The ice cream did not disappoint me as they are rich in flavours. The amount of the ice cream was just right to finish all of the waffle. For the strawberry latte, well, strawberry juice below and steamed milk above. So, it tasted like strawberry milk. The taste of it didn't surprise me. However, the total price of these did. It costed 16800 won, equivalent to RM 62!!! (There goes my money T.T)

On our way home, I also tried this:

Tornado potato with jumbo sausage

Before the vendor gave it to me, he dipped the stick into a seasoning and add some honey mustard on it. The potato was a little crispy yet a little soft, but I couldn't really taste the seasoning as he did not dip it all over the tornado but only a side of it (should have asked for more...).

10th of Feb

Today is an off day as well. So, I decided to walk to Namdaemun Market to look for some souvenirs. Although I succeeded in finding the spoon souvenirs that I was looking for, on a closer look, they are not of good quality. So, I decided to put them on a hold.

On the way back to our guesthouse, we saw this door below and decided to have a look.

Sungnyemun Gate

Sungnyemun Gate is one of the four main gates of the capital city and it opens to public everyday from 9am to 6pm, except on Monday. It suffered severe damages during the colonisation of the Japanese and during the Korean War and was restored and repaired recently.

Later at night, we went to Sinsadong to search for food recommended on the internet. However, we did not find it and the navigator led us to a weird direction. So, we decided to just bang in a restaurant that seems to have many customers.

As we entered, we thought it was a store that served normal dakgalbi and we ordered something with cheese on it. On a further look, it was not. It is a store that served the inners of an animal probably pig's or cow's inner. Of the 3 of us, there is only one of us that eats it. So, we changed our order at the last minute and the cook scolded the waiter badly. That made us feel very bad and sorry for the waiter at the same time. As the waiter served us, we apologised several times.

These aside, the food was delicious! We were allowed to add cheese or noodles to the meat, but to our surprised, with an additional charge (we thought it came together with the one we ordered and went with it). Of course, cheese was our choice.

Before

During

After

During the whole process of stir-frying, the waiter served us. So, all we had to do was to wait until the meat was fully cooked. The meat was so delicious as we dipped it into the melted cheese. It was tender and rich in flavour. Besides the meat, there are other ingredients in it too, such as cabbage, sweet potato, toppoki,... Of all of these, the sweet potato is the best. Not being a fan of sweet potato, I'm totally a fan of it when I arrived in Korea. Their sweet potato is so sweet, delicious and they go well with the food I've tried. I practically fought with my friends for sweet potatoes here (not openly though...).

After the delicious dinner, desserts of course! One of my friends recommended us Deux Cremes, which is famous for its tart. As we were walking around, we found it by accident. And so, we went in. As we entered, the place was quite extravagant, in the sense of dim light and amazing furniture. The desserts too was mouth-watering, but expensive. However, since it was late at night, there was not many choices to choose from. In the end, we chose the tiramisu tart. Apparently, each customer has to order something in order to dine in. So, we decided to take it away.

Tiramisu tart

Look at the layering! The taste was really good. It is just that the biscuit part was a bit tough. It was definitely not enough to share between 3 of us. Just thinking about it, I want to have it now =P.