Well, that’s a rather hefty title for a post don’t you think?

In truth, though I have literally only been in the country one full day, I have discovered that “the silent excitement of expectations being met” appears to be the theme of my South Korean travels.

For each person that has asked me ‘How is it? Is it really exciting?’ I somehow feel I’m letting the side down a little when I explain that everything is kind of how I expected it to be.

I think after the ridiculous amounts of exhilaration and anticipation I exhibited prior to leaving, my current reaction might seem a little anticlimactic, but let me assure you, it isn’t.

I really am very content and full of warm, fuzzy happiness. It is an internal joy and satisfaction, born from the time of my early throes of Korean fascination, having had to listen constantly to “don’t be so excited and taken in by watching drama because it’s all made up and life isn’t really like that”. Well, I’m here to tell you that actually, yes, Korea is 100% as I expected and I couldn’t be happier about that if I tried.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying there appears to be an overflowing population of chaebols seeking out poor peasants to marry; nor do there appear to be super sassy and successful lawyers floating all over the place; and there are no mermaids, mythical creatures, or magic flooding the streets of Seoul. I simply mean that everything looks and acts as I’ve been led to believe. I arrived at my accommodation to find it a small box-like room with a hallway for leaving my shoes in and a bathroom with a wet-room floor. Visiting a convenience store I find triangular ready-made gimbap and banana milk on the shelves. In the food markets there are little stalls with seats right in front for you to sit and order your food and eat. The people here do bow in thanks or acknowledgement, they do get nervous when you try to speak to them (even if you do it in Korean), and they do say phrases recognisable from TV.  Cheonggyecheon Stream is indeed very pretty and has stepping stones across it and lots of couples and families strolling along it. There appears to be a rather large obsession with cutesy-looking cartoon-type characters that I don’t understand at all, but adult and children alike seem to be in on it. And yes, everyone has amazingly awesome skin and Korean kids are all cute, no exceptions.

And this is why I am all glowy inside. It’s exactly what I had hoped to see and experience. I don’t need to wander round open-mouthed in visible and audible awe and surprise. I can quietly have my internal fireworks going off and everyone else is none the wiser. But for sure I am very happy to be here and having this experience.        

And now I have dispensed with that – let’s get down to some specifics, shall we?

First, the journey overview. Top marks go to my mum for driving me to the airport at 6am. Also, she gets extra credit for not immediately zooming off after dropping me at the terminal, especially given the fact I accidently dropped my mobile on the back seat while getting my suitcase out. Yes, I did that. I had a special type of panic attack as I realised my loss at the door of the airport and did a mad dash with a hefty suitcase and two carry-on bags in tow to get back to the car before she abandoned me with no way to contact anyone (ah, the age we live in where no-one remembers phone numbers anymore).  Even more special of me was the fact that as I was about to disembark in Korea I got distracted by an email telling me I passed my dissertation and therefore my degree (yup, thank you!) and helpfully left my passport sitting on the shelf next to my seat. Once again, a lucky save at the door of the plane when I suddenly realised my hand was empty. Really hoping this doesn’t set some sort of tone for my trip.

As for the good parts of my journey, I met a nice Kiwi chap in the airport and swapped stories of woe about long distance relationships while our flight was delayed (his wife lives in Scotland and he’s headed back to New Zealand while his visa gets processed). I can fully recommend spending the extra cash for better class tickets if you can, not only did I get a nice reclining seat, but the food was the best nosh I’ve even eaten on a plane, and probably in a few restaurants too. Finnair get top marks for culinary efforts but a down vote for their in-flight entertainment – I’m not making this up, they had exactly 8 films and no television offerings in their first class section on an 11 hour global flight. I have no idea why it was so scant, but I’ve never come across such a pitiful selection in all the years I’ve flown. Very odd.

Still, it did mean I got to spend a good deal of time reading (You’re Not Listening by Kate Murphy – very interesting, all about how people in general are really appalling listeners, gave me a few thoughtful moments for sure!) and the rest of the time I spent staring from the window. Now, I have been very lucky to have travelled a fair bit in my life, however, now thinking about it, most of those journeys have either been at night or over an ocean and therefore have limited my window peering opportunities. My advice, if you fly, do it during the day, over land and get yourself a window seat. I have seen sights I could never have imagined from the air during this trip. I experienced the beauty of the forests of Finland, the wavy sands of the Gobi desert, and the stark mountains of China. Honestly, I was pretty darn flabbergasted by it all.         

Final thoughts on travelling. I was in no hurry, not really. I had no-one waiting on my anywhere, I wasn’t running on a strict schedule. Yes, there may have been another mad semi-panicked dash through Helsinki airport thanks to Heathrow airport’s useless scheduling, but apart from that, I sat back and thoroughly enjoyed just being exposed to whatever happened. I’ve not ever really travelled like that before. Usually my head is full of thoughts and plans and forward thinking, but just then, it wasn’t. I people watched, read my book, ate the free food in the business lounge and posted photos on FB to annoy friends and family still with their nose to the grind (sorry folks). It was a great start to my trip.

And as I said, I’m here now.

I have now had practice in entering a country where English is not the first language. I have felt the relief that comes with realising I have done everything correctly in order for the nice Korean immigration lady to open the gate and let me in (though she did require my fingerprints and photo first).

I had the slightly confusing experience of trying to retrieve my portable Wi-Fi pack at the airport, though admittedly that’s what happens when you mix up KT telecom and SKT telecom and stand at the wrong booth for 10 minutes before realising your error. The Wi-Fi works great though!

I’ve had the immense pleasure of trying to navigate the COVID testing facility procedures and the delight of having a lady stab my brain with a Q-tip (though she pronounced me disease free, so I will give her a pass on this one).    

I remembered why travelling is so great in the first place when, while sitting outside the COVID building simultaneously trying to check if my nose was bleeding and attempting to stop sweating from the ridiculous unexpected heat, I hear a voice pipe up “Have you hiked the Appalachian Trail?” Cue a brief moment of confusion before realising I was wearing a t-shirt with an AT proclamation on it, followed by a nice chat and exchange of phone numbers with a lovely American lady who is in Korea for 2 months doing a solo cycle tour. Travel leads to meeting new people and hearing new stories. I kind of forgot that for a bit. It’s nice to be reminded.

My initial adventures didn’t end there though. I still had the train and subway to navigate before attempting to locate my Korean digs. Back into the airport I go to seek out the AREX express train for my 40 minute journey into Seoul. Not going to lie – super easy to buy a ticket. The ticket machine had an English option, and the ticket was only 9,000₩ (about $6/£5). You wouldn’t get that price on British Rail let me tell you. Nice comfy seat, practically empty train, a chance to check out the scenery from Incheon to Seoul AND a nice train lady who came to give me an A4 card showing English instructions on how to transfer to the subway when I got off the train. If you are coming to Korea and heading to Seoul, do not be frightened to take the train or subway. As long as you have a bit of common sense and go get them attitude, you’ll be fine.

The subway only gave me pause due to my suitcase, and even that was only in two places. Again, getting a ticket was very straightforward and cheap at 1,350₩. Lugging my suitcase was made easier by the fact the subway system has little baggage escalators next to the stairs. You roll your bag up on to them and off they go while you walk next to them. The first one threw me a little, mostly because I couldn’t believe that it was there. I was a bit stunned by the ingenious thought of it (obviously they missed these out in the dramas I watched) and then a little apprehensive as to if it was in working order as it wasn’t moving. However, as I was stood there debating whether to try it, a nice young lad popped in front of me and waved at the scanner to start the belt to show me it worked, which I just thought was a bit lovely of him. I had a second helping hand at the next one too, my suitcase being a smidge on the hefty side and lifting it onto the belt left it a bit cockeyed, and a nice older chap pushed it in place for me and then bowed to me as he walked off. I had my first two practices at saying thank you in Korean right there in the subway!

I purposely chose my accommodation as it pretty much sits right next to a subway line for ease of travel. The lady who owns it gave me excellent instructions for getting to it, but slightly neglected to tell me how to use the electronic keypad to get in. Now, hear me out, I thought I would be fine with this. I HAVE seen these on TV after all, but the ones I’ve seen always have a sliding panel that hides the actual numbers keys. So you can understand my confusion when confronted by a blank black door lock with no indication on how to make it work. I poked it a couple times. I tried jiggling it a bit. Then luckily was saved by an halmoni (older lady) who saw me struggling and came up to run her flat palm down the panel and voilà, the panel lights up with numbers! Maybe there is some magic floating around here after all…

As I’ve already said, my room is as expected. It will be my home for a month. Everything seems to function. I’ll take that as a win.

My adventures away from my accommodations so far have included the following:

Trips to the convenience store where I have learned how to buy ready-made porridge in a pot, single packet kimchi, choco pies and banana milk. I can successfully ask “How much is that?” and learned that my credit card and cash both work fine.

Discovering my local Artbox store which seems to sell everything ‘cute’ related – all the character driven items (including themed electric extension leads – an odd choice I feel in the marketing world) such as stickers, stationary, cuddly plush toys, and these weird little miniature house diorama-type things that seem to have no purpose or function at all. I really don’t get it. There is something culturally I am missing here. Even odder, young or older, boy or girl, singles, couples, doesn’t seem to matter, they are all in on it.

Discovering a whole host of restaurants, covered food stalls and markets selling cooked foods which is exciting and fantastic; but I’ve yet to discover a grocery store. Honestly. I’m 2 days in and eating nothing but food from the 7eleven as I’m yet to track down a proper food store. I’m feeling tomorrow is my day though, I’m honing in on it. That said, I did at least eat a real plate of food today upon visiting Gwangjang Market. Admittedly I hovered for about 10 minutes spying on other eaters before building up enough courage to brazenly walk up and sit at a food booth. Also, I purposely chose the only one that was selling japchae as I knew what I would be getting. However, I did order 100% in Korean, got what I ordered, ate with my wooden chopsticks, paid and survived! Super proud moment for me.

I have strolled a portion of Cheonggyecheon Stream which is a thoroughly enjoyable endeavour. It’s in the shade, has birds and plants along it and plenty of people for observational purposes. I think I identified willow and viburnum today (please corroborate, Bunny) and deffo saw magpies and a heron.

With no real plan in mind I wandered around a portion of the city streets and ended up finding the tourist information office, though it seemed to also have a bit of an identidy crisis as it was a rather odd building called HiKR (which now I think about it, I think stands for Hi KoRea.) It consisted of a kpop floor for kids to make videos, a kdrama exhibition, a café, and some tourist leaflets (but there were 3 people there to ask questions of and I got a nice map to go walking with this weekend). Additionally on my little bumbling jaunt, I stumbled across YP books which was a massive bookstore and promptly lost about 1.5 hours of my life in there. I’m going back again for sure.

And there you have it. My first day and a half in Korea.

Obviously there are more things to come, more experiences to be had, more sights to see. The plan of action for the weekend includes finding the elusive grocery store (seriously, I even had to ask a Korean online buddy of mine, it’s very embarrassing I can’t seem to locate a place to buy real food), a royal palace is in the offing, and I feel the Seoul City Wall Trail is calling me.

With that, I’m off to bed – 1.30am and it’s lights out for me.