During the second weekend of November, I went up to Seoul to
see Jayeon. I arrived early on Saturday
afternoon, and we went straight to the Food Festival that was taking place at
the COEX (an absolutely humongous convention center). There was also a craft beer festival taking
place within the food festival, but we had been told a “mistruth” about being
able to purchase tickets at the venue.
First, Jayeon had called one of the bars that was selling tickets to the
craft beer fest earlier in the week and asked them if they could hold two
tickets for her that she would pick up on Friday. They said yes, but when she went there to
pick up tickets they said they didn’t have anymore. The person working the bar then told Jayeon
that she could pick up tickets at COEX, which ALSO turned out to be a “mistruth”. Well, we didn’t let these “mistruths”
discourage us. We were still able to
purchase some craft beer at the craft beer festival, so we walked around with
the rest of the festival with some beer in our hands. The food festival was alright, but wasn’t exactly
like I had pictured it. I thought we
would be able to purchase entire meals from different countries, but that
didn’t seem to be the case. Each booth
was just handing out small samples of food, some of which were absolutely
fantastic. One booth was selling little
pieces of grilled lamb with a cheese-stuffed pepper. The combination of the two was
incredible!
After spending a few hours at the food festival, we went to
Seoul’s lantern festival, which-as I mentioned earlier-isn’t nearly as great as
the Jinjun Lantern Festival, but was nonetheless a nice time despite some
drizzle. Jayeon and I walked along the
“underground” stream that runs through the middle of Seoul while admiring all
of the lanterns that portrayed Korean history and tradition. I actually went to this last year as well with
Daniel and Kate.
After leaving the lantern festival, we went to go eat
Chinese hot pot. I ate it all of the
time when I was in China, but I haven’t had it since. Basically, you are giving
a boiling hot pot of broth (usually half is spicy and half is savory), and then
you put any kind of vegetable or meat you want to into the pot to cook it. This particular restaurant was an
all-you-can-eat buffet, so we could just take anything we wanted from the
buffet bar to throw into the pot. It was
really good!
Afterwards we went to different bars in Hongdae and
Suwon. Some new places and some old
haunts.
Overall, a great weekend!
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