Day 7
Met sis at Sinchon station, as she would like to bring us to her favourite restaurant which my mum loved it so much when she was there for a month. The restaurant is called Gosami Grilled Fish Restaurant 고삼이 and it is located at 53-8 Changcheon-dong, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, South Korea (38 Yonsei-ro 7an-gil).
Below are the directions to the restaurant.
The restaurant is usually fully packed during meal times so you might have to wait to get a seat especially if you are in groups of more than 3. We ordered their popular dishes - grilled saba and spicy squid. And we ordered soybean soup. They serve the best saba fish that I have ever eaten. And the spicy squid, omg its totally to die for! Love the soup too! They serve free cold buckwheat drink, yummy! It's good to drink it after eating all these barbeque dishes :)
The best thing about this place?? It's the price! It only costs 19,000won (~S$23). Plus the portion is generous for that price. CHEAP!
After lunch, sis went back to study while we headed to Insadong to walk abit before going to dongdaemun shopping district. At dongdaemun, we settled our dinner at a restaurant that serves army stew. We ordered the original army stew for 2- there's instant noodles, rice cakes, sausages, eggs, kimchi and other vegetables in it. It was quite filling for both of us so we didn't order any additional ingredients like how the Koreans usually do. When we asked for the bill, we were utterly surprised! The bill was only 10,000 won (S$12)! Yay!
After walking for 3hrs from one mall to another, my chubby legs were about to break so J brought me to Angel-in-us cafe. Both our drinks and the cake tasted pretty good, total price is about the same as in Singapore - 15,400won (S$18.50).
Our Loots for the day: I bought a bag and 2 sweaters, each at 10,000won (S$12), without having to bargain! Happy! While J bought 2 work pants from Lotte fitin at 39,000won (S$46.50) each, the cut and material are really nice, it doesn't crease easily.
Overall, I still prefer Myeongdong to Dongdaemun. Even though both places are very touristy, the prices at Myeongdong are lower and the shop owners are friendlier and less pushy. It was quite a traumatizing experience for J when walking around the men's section in the malls at Dongdaemun - Goodmorning city, Hello apm, once the sales guys see us coming up the escalator or walking past, they will follow closely behind us or shout from a far to ask us to take a look at their stall instead or grab J to see their goods hahahaha scary. I noticed that these malls usually do not have as many locals and the men's level is usually very quiet so maybe the sales people seems more earnest :p
Tips: If you do not want them to follow you or keep asking you to see their goods, which can be quite stressful, do not speak in English unless necessary. Or using some Korean words like "It's alright/ it's ok" (kwaen chan nah yo 괜찮아요) should do the trick, I tried it a few times to fend them off hahaha.
Day 8
For brunch, we bought banana milk and our favourite tuna kimchi gimbap from 7-11 to share, less than S$3 :)
On the way to Gyeongbokgung, we saw some trees being hooked up on drips, not sure if they are unwell or just being fed more nutrients..
Entrance of Gyeongbokgung. Due to time constraint, we just checked out the exterior of the palace.
We met sis for late lunch at a nearby restaurant, ordered 3 different soups for 19000won (S$22.50). From my experience, no matter which restaurant you go to in Seoul, the food tastes awesome especially their soups, it has this very home-cooked feel to it, compared to those in Singapore :)
After lunch, we went shopping for snacks to bring for our field trip tomorrow to nami and petite france, as the journey takes about 2 hours from the guesthouse. Bought about 8000won worth of snacks such as choco pie, tteokbokki-flavoured snack, fish shaped cake filled with sticky chocolate and marshmallow :)
It's dinner time! We went for a cheap but super yummy barbeque about 10 mins away from Sinchon station- paid only 17,000won for 2 servings of samgyupsal and 3 bowls of rice and it comes with complimentary steam egg and corn with mozarella cheese. Yums!
For supper, we went to the popular bar (sorry didn't take note of the shop's name but should be called Gamakse, it's near Sinchon station), sis initially expected that we had to wait for half hr or more but we were lucky that day, we didn't have to wait at all! We ordered a makgeolli and Gamjajeon (potato pancake) to share.
BUT we were pleasantly surprised when they served us an acorn jelly salad, corn with cheese hotplate and spicy ramyun for FREEE! Pure happiness! And we paid only 20,000 won (S$24) for all these food! #happy people
Everything was so delicious! Even though I don't really drink and can't hold my liquor, but the homemade makgeolli, mmm OMG couldn't stop drinking, so satisfying when you have it with such awesomely cooked food! Highly recommended! Too bad we didn't have time to come back here before flying back to Singapore :(
PetiteFreckles ♥
