Day 12: Hongdae and the Search for Han River

I started off the morning (by morning I mean 2 pm) with my tea and potato bun from Bread Blue and then got on the subway to go to Hongdae (Hongik University Street). It was very close, only one stop from the subway near my hostel, and it was super easy to find the fashion street.

Hongdae is full of clothing and accessory stores as well as cafes and restaurants. It is also known for the busking performances that happen all day along the street. The bigger performers start showing up around 6 or 7 pm and they draw huge crowds of students and shoppers to watch them perform. Hongdae was one of the places I was most excited to visit when I was planning my trip and I was not disappointed. The busking was awesome, the food was great, and I bought so many fun earrings!

I knew it was going to be a great day when I stepped off the subway and the first thing I saw was a huge ad for one of the BTS members for their birthday haha. I tried to get a clear picture of it but the station was so busy that there was always someone walking by. The subway to get to Hongik University was probably the busiest one I had been on so far. It was super crowded and people were squished together. Fortunately, it was only a short ride for me.

I spent the afternoon walking up and down the entire shopping street and popping in to every accessory store I saw. It seems to be very popular to sell and wear earrings in pairs that are different from each other, which I love (never going back to matching earrings again). I got several pairs of earrings that have all sorts of cool designs and I have been mixing and matching them.

Everyone there was dressed very well. I absolutely love Korean fashion and I am super thankful that my suitcase is practically already overflowing otherwise I would have spent so much money on clothing. All the stores along the street had different displays outside of them and I wanted to buy so much stuff. It was also fun to just look around and see how everyone else was dressed. Koreans dress very well, with a distinctly different style than Canadians and I wish I could put together outfits like they do, I'll stick with my comfy hoodies and jeans though. I wandered around for several hours and watched a group of singers that were performing in the middle of a square. Then I had lunch in this tiny basement restaurant (I ate bibimbap again because I love it and it's super easy to eat).

I wandered around more and ran into two guys who were practicing some kind of fighting with sticks. They told me the name but I don't remember what it was unfortunately. They saw me walking and stopped me to chat. They were both Korean but one had spent a significant amount of time in California and had very good English so it was easy to talk with them. I then headed back to where I had seen the majority of people setting up to perform and hopped between watching groups. There were lots of people doing dance covers, but I really enjoyed watching the people that were there to sing. There was one girl that sounded great and she was singing lots of songs I knew including Bolbbalgan4's "Travel" (one of my favourite Korean songs) so I sat and watched her perform for a bit.

Groups were set up in the middle of the street that runs between the shops and they all brought along huge speakers and mics with them. People would form circles around each group to watch them. The performers on the street were mainly dancers although there were one or two people that came with a guitar and sang. Most of the people that were just singing set up off to one side of the street where there were steps for people to sit while watching the performance. It was very nice to just sit down and relax while enjoying the show.

Eventually there were too many people so I decided I would try to walk down to the Han River, which was fairly close by. I had no clue how to get to the trails along the river so I randomly dropped a pin in a green space by the water on my map and started walking. It took about half an hour to get there and I walked through many more streets with different shops. I eventually made it to a regular neighbourhood that was full of industrial buildings and definitely not a place where I could access the river. It was still a nice walk though! It was getting pretty late at this point so I wandered back to the subway station.

There is so much cool graffiti all over the place here.

To end the night on an even better note, I saw yet another BTS subway ad for Jimin's birthday while I was on the way home. I had to awkwardly stand to the side for a couple minutes to wait for everyone to pass so I could get a picture of it. There were other fans doing that too though which was fun to see.

Hope everyone is doing well,

Emily

(October 7, 2018)

Distance walked: 10.6 km