Kimberly's Adventures Abroad

Gamcheon Culture Village

It’s been quite a while since I’ve written, hasn’t it? It’s been about 2 weeks! However, I just got back from my Chuseok vacation in Busan, and I have lots to post about! I will be splitting my vacation up into three posts: Gamcheon Culture Village, The Busan Aquarium, and the random stuff we did on our last day in Busan. Now that I’ve explained that, let’s get into the post!

Our (me, my aunt, and her co-worker, Ms. Rebecca) first day in Busan was spent in Gamcheon Culture Village! My aunt had been twice before, but neither me nor Ms. Rebecca had ever been. We took a bus from our Air BnB to the base of the village, and had to climb uphill the rest of the way (the village sits on a large hill). On our way up, we saw lots of cool things!

There were tons of these cute little houses lining the path! They sat on a really pretty stone wall, and every single house looked different.

There is a lot of cute artwork like this one further on in the village. This mural is right outside of the front entrance to the main village.

On the way to the main entrance, we got lost and ended up at this overlook of the village and the city:

(I’m not really sure why these creepy little figures were here, but there were four of them. I’m pretty sure that the one on the left here is the singer PSY, who became popular for his song “Gangnam Style”.)

(In this picture, part of the culture village is to the left, while main city Busan is in the middle and towards the right. If you look far into the distance in the center of the picture, you can see both the ocean and Busan tower, which gives you a 360 view of Busan.)

After consulting some maps and figuring things out, we retraced our steps and found the entrance to the main village. Once we got there, we had been climbing for a while, and we were all hot, tired, and thirsty. The first thing that we did was head into a little (air-conditioned) shop that sold souvenirs. All of us bought a hand-held fan, and I bought a Gamcheon Culture Village shirt, which you can see me wearing in some pictures later on.

After exiting the shop, I saw a Bubble Tea stand just across the way. I absolutely love Bubble Tea! I bought the Green Tea Bubble Tea, and it was the best Bubble Tea that I have had in Korea so far. I love Green Tea, and the Tapioca Pearls in this Tea were perfect.

After getting the Bubble Tea, we went inside a small Museum that I believe told you about the history of the village. We went in and out pretty quick, so I didn’t have the chance to read about it. However, my aunt did take my picture in this tiny little hut:

After the museum, we went to the giant fish mural which is just outside the museum. It is a mural that looks like a large fish and it is made out of tiny wooden fish or fish scales. My aunt and I had our picture taken on either side of a Batman scale (because why not?)

There were tiny shops everywhere, that sold anything from clothes to souvenirs. One of my favorite things that we found in a shop was this hat:

English writing on clothes gets really confusing sometimes.

As we made our way down the hill, there was still so much to see. We found a spot where you can take pictures of the village through a window, which we did.

It’s so cute and colorful! I love it! We continued walking down and came across these two statues painting a wall (the 2nd one isn’t in the picture):

Upon closer inspection, we realized that the man painting the wall was Superman. I’m not really sure what Superman was doing in Busan, but he was there…

There were so many statues in this village, and it was super cool! We found statues of cats and dogs, which I excitedly took pictures with:

Right by the cat statues was a cute little Cafe called “The Green House” (I’m pretty sure, don’t quote me on that). We stopped in for some drinks and, while we were there, I filled out a postcard for their postcard wall! I wrote messages in both Korean and English, and drew a (messy) picture of the village with one house colored green to represent the Cafe.

We left the Cafe and continued our journey down the hill. After walking for a while, we came across a man standing by a sign who directed us towards a quicker path to get to the bottom of the hill. On our way down, we walked down a beautiful staircase, saw a really pretty garden, and a scary gorilla staring at us through a window.

I purposely made the picture ridiculously bright so that you could see the Gorilla. In real life, it looks like he’s staring into your soul…

And that is when we finally arrived at the main road that led out of the village! Even though it was hot out and I was tired from climbing, I really loved this village. It was beautiful! I would love to go back again and see everything that I didn’t get the chance to.

That’s it for this blog post! Throughout the rest of the weekend, I will post the rest of my adventures in Busan. See you soon!

Exploring Dunsan

Happy September Everyone!

This weekend, I got to explore Dunsan (a part of Daejeon) with my aunt. Dunsan is the “cool” part of Daejeon where all the teens and young adults hang out and shop. It also has more International shops, like H&M.

Before we went to Dunsan, we stopped at a local restaurant in Techno Valley called “Laven” for brunch. It was a very nice restaurant and the food was delicious! It’s one of the only local restaurants that does American breakfasts. I got pancakes, which came with syrup, vanilla ice cream, whip cream, blueberries, and caramelized bananas.

After brunch, we headed over to Dunsan. Our first stop was H&M, where I bought a pink NYC Hoodie, and my aunt bought some things for herself. Then we went into Art Box (the store that I took a picture with a penguin at), and we both bought some stationary supplies there. I think that Art Box is definitely one of my favorite stores so far; it has everything cute you could possibly imagine, and it’s super affordable.

After we had finished shopping and gotten some bubble tea, we had reserved seats at the movie theater to see “47 Meters Down: Uncaged”. The theater was on the 12th floor of the building. It was really weird to think about a movie theater being up that high. It was also weird that we were able to pick and reserve specific seats. I liked it though; it guarantees good spots. What’s also nice is that they allow outside food and drink into the theater! My aunt and I brought our bubble tea’s with us.

The movie was way more intense and a lot scarier than the first one. My aunt and I both jumped several times, and my aunt had her hands over her face most of the time 😂 Most sequels are worse than the first movie, but I think this one is better. It’s definitely worth watching. I already want to watch it again!

Overall, Dunsan was a really fun place, and more of what I imagined Korea to look like. I would really like to go back and explore some more!

Mandu and Milkis

Last night, my aunt and I went out for some delicious mandu (Korean dumplings)! Before I get into that, though, I’d like to talk about Korean parking garages.

One constant struggle in Korea is parking. There’s almost nowhere to park, and sometimes people park in the strangest, most inconsiderate places. Now, I have been in Korean for a week and been in multiple parking garages, but I had never seen anyone parked how these people were. Obviously, you park vertically into a space, and all the spaces were full. So, in order to park, several people had pulled their cars horizontally in front of the other cars!

Because I feel like I may not be explaining myself properly, I have taken the time to create this ~~beautiful~~ diagram for your viewing pleasure:

Hopefully it’s obvious that the blue things are cars… anyways, you can obviously see that the cars in the actual spaces are now blocked in! I asked my aunt how they were supposed to get out, and she told me this: the cars that are parked horizontally are left unlocked and in neutral, and you have to physically push them out of the way of your car, kind of like playing tetris. If you would like to see a video of this, I found one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aM17qREnNyM

After my lesson in Korean parking, my aunt and I left the parking garage and walked to a mandu restaurant just outside of it. I don’t remember the name and neither does my aunt, so we’re going to refer to it as “The Dumpling House”, per my aunt’s request.

We ordered a smorgasbord of mandu. Don’t they look delicious? We got deep fried mandu, shrimp mandu, kid’s mandu, generic mandu, and kimchi mandu. The deep fried mandu was definitely my favorite. It had very crunchy, deep-fried-type dough. I love dough, and I love deep-fried food. I did not try the Kimchi mandu, because I cannot tolerate any sort of spiciness. The shrimp mandu was good, I just wish that it had more than one piece of shrimp in it 😂

After we left the restaurant and ran a few errands, we came back home to watch some TV and enjoy some desserts. Earlier that day, we had found a box of soda belonging to my aunt and it contained a drink that I have wanted to try for a long time: Milkis.

I was very excited to try this drink along with my dessert! This drink is like soda mixed with milk, and supposedly, it is super popular and everyone loves it. I popped the lid, and it smelled like carbonated dairy. I took a sip, and it originally just tasted like a slightly thicker, blander version of Sprite, but then you get the aftertaste of milk. It was actually really good! However, I do not recommend drinking water immediately after, because it will taste disgusting.

Before finishing this blog, I would like to just say that Korean cake tastes like healthy cake. I like my desserts to taste like desserts, not like someone is trying to trick me into eating vegetables. It wasn’t terrible, I still ate it, but cake back home is ten times better. Just don’t get your hopes up when eating cake in Korea!

My First Adventures In Daejeon

For the three days that I have been here, I have gotten to go out and experience different parts of Daejeon! They have all been really neat and fun to go to.

The first place that I went was out in Techno Valley with my Aunt. We went to Lotte Mart to buy some snacks and storage for my room. Lotte Mart is like the Korean version of Walmart, and it is huge! It had 4 stories, as well as multiple stories for the parking garages. In order to get to the different floors, you take these ramps that are like escalators, but your shopping carts magnetize to them so that you can easily go up and down the building.

We also went to multiple smaller shops, like Etude House, Olive Young, and CNA. I did not purchase anything in Etude House because I don’t wear makeup 😅 CNA was an adorably cute store; I wanted to buy everything! They had stationary, hair accessories, stuffed animals, K-Pop merchandise, and tons of random cute things.

We then went out to dinner with one of my Aunt’s friends at a restaurant called New York Bueok. It was delicious. My Aunt says that it’s one of the best places for American food here, because the food actually tastes American and isn’t coated in sugar. I had a cheeseburger and fries, and they were some of the best that I have ever had! My Aunt says that she likes their burgers even more then Red Robin’s, so that should let you know how good it is.

The next day, I decided to trek into town by myself and get an idea of where everything was and what all I was able to do. My Aunt walked me out of the building and showed me the direction that I was going before letting me loose. Unfortunately, this adventure did not go the way I had planned 😅 I quickly got lost, tired, and hot. I also felt very intimidated because Korean buildings are huge! They tower above you and they are scattered in the weirdest formations. They give me the heebie-jeebies. Fortunately, I remembered the way that I came and I was able to return home. I was only out for about an hour.

Later that night, my Aunt and I took a taxi to Eunhaeng-Dong, which is more of what I expected to see when coming to Korea. There were tons of little shops and it was more like a city. Around where we walked, there was a giant structure overhead known as the Sky Walk, and at night, it lights up like a giant TV screen and displays cameras or commercials on it. It was very cool!

We also went into the underground mall that is located in Eunhaeng-Dong, and it is very, very big. Stall after stall after stall, and most of them sell similar things! There was clothing, phone cases and accessories, shoes, wigs, makeup, jewelry, you name it! A lot of the clothes were very cheap, so if you’re looking for cheap clothes with decent quality, that’s probably the place to go.

Lastly, we went to get Bubble Tea and went to a cute store called Art Box and a clothing store called Uniqlo. I got Chocolate Bubble Tea with Chocolate Foam. I asked for no ice and bubbles, and my aunt asked for ice and no bubbles. Sadly, our orders got mixed up and she got the bubbles, and I got some ice. I also decided that thick, chocolate bubble tea is not my style.

Art Box was one of the cutest stores ever! The picture above is a picture of me with one of their characters. I absolutely love penguins, and I jumped at the opportunity for a picture with him! They also have large seals and bears for you to take pictures with. This store has everything you could ever need in your life (besides food). Clothes, accessories, jewelry, stationary, office accessories, home accessories, back to school supplies, makeup, perfume, candles, stuffed toys, you name it! You can find everything there. I ended up buying a dinosaur night light for my bedroom since I love dinosaurs and am deathly afraid of the dark.

All of the T-Shirts that I brought to Korea with me were dark colors, and I wanted a lighter one, so we went into Uniqlo to find one. I found an adorable white one with Pokémon all over it. I am currently wearing it as I’m writing this. It’s really nice quality, and was only $5! I don’t like spending money, so the cheaper things are, the better.

And now, as I am writing this, my Aunt and I are at a Starbucks in Techno Valley. She had work to plan for and I didn’t want to be home all day, so we came out! I got the berry juice/tea and the chocolate filled croissant. They are both great! The Starbucks souvenirs here are also very cute.

So far, I have greatly enjoyed my time here. It is a very interesting country with beautiful people and a beautiful language. It’s only been 3 days, so I cannot wait to see what the rest of my time here holds!

A Long Flight

Welcome to my first blog post!

It has been a long couple of days. On Tuesday, August the 20th, I left the place that I had been living for all 17 years of my life. I boarded a plane that took me to Atlanta, and then I boarded another plane that took me to South Korea, which is where I am now.

The first flight left from Greensboro, North Carolina, and it took only one hour to get to Atlanta. That plane ride was smooth. It was the second time I had ever flown, and I loved every second of it! Flying is like the good version of a roller coaster (I absolutely hate roller coasters). I got a window seat, and was able to watch as we ascended into the clouds. I love meteorology, and it was very fun to look at all of the different clouds and the storms that we passed over.

I was only 10 the first and only time I had flown. I didn’t remember how it felt for the plane to descend and touchdown on the runway. When you descend, your stomach just falls; it’s like a good feeling and a bad feeling at the same time. We eventually got so close to the runway, and the plane was so straight, that I just assumed we had landed. “That wasn’t that bad; it was pretty smooth, actually,” I thought. Then, we actually hit the runway. It’s like hitting really bad turbulence for a couple of seconds. A girl in the back of the plane screamed as we landed 😂 Surprisingly, turbulence and landing didn’t bother me at all.

The second flight that I took was from Atlanta to South Korea, and it was a 14 hour flight! It was not fun. I was stuck in the smallest seat with no leg room. I felt like I would never get out of there!

I was told beforehand by a family member that I needed to drink every last bit of water I was given, and that I needed to use the bathroom 12 times… I did not follow that advice 😅 I did drink most of what I was given, and I ate all of the food as well (except for the vegetables, those are gross).

I did get to watch 3 movies and play multiple games while I was on the flight. I played Chess, Trivia Games, and Sudoku. All of it was free and done through the TV screens on the back of the chairs. You can listen to music, play games, watch movies, and keep up with the progress of your flight! I lost every game of Chess (that computer is good), and I learned a lot from the Trivia Games. I watched the new Pokémon Detective Pikachu Movie, and I loved it! Definitely recommend it.

Finally, the flight came to an end, and I was in Incheon! I was so excited getting off of the plane and setting my feet on Korean soil for the first time. South Korea is a place that I have wanted to visit for so long, and I am so happy to finally be here. It’s only my first day, but everything that I have already seen is incredible! It’s such a beautiful country, and I cannot wait to learn as much as possible while I am here!