Korea Day 8 - Samcheong Dong

We slowed our pace today and took a long, leisurely walk through the Samcheong Dong neighborhood, north of our hotel and set in the foothills of the mountains we see from everywhere in the city. This area is quite upscale. Traditional single-family homes are perched on steep hillsides, overlooking the modern skyscrapers of the city. We climbed up small alley ways, and gazed at tile roofs, beautiful stone walls, elaborate doorways, and persimmon trees covered with bright orange fruit. Many homes had views out over the Gyeongbok Palace, which we saw yesterday, and across to the Namdan Tower. There are also many stores and galleries and small museums scattered throughout this area. I'm posting just a random scattering of photos from the day.



We've only seen two dogs in eight days here, but we did see this little fellow.... kind of sad to never see any doggies.


These school children were painting in the Gahoe Museum of folk arts, where we stopped for tea and a visit. We also visited the Han Sang Soo Embroidery Museum. The Chicken Museum was unfortunately closed, and the Owl Museum was farther up the mountain than we were willing to walk, alas.








We had a challenging lunch, and it was one of those moments when we had to just take what was brought to us. Some of it was delicious, and some of it was difficult. Later in the day, after walking miles to find some ice cream to console ourselves (we did!) we came back to the Frazer Suites for a rest, some eventual dinner in the neighborhood (not as challenging!) and a good game of Spite and Malice. One of the things about tonights dinner was that someone ordered chicken teriyaki with noodles. The dish arrived covered with small pink flakes all over the top of it which were all waving and wiggling. We were not too amused, fearing that there was something alive on there (it happens, we're told). But it turns out that it was shredded fish just blowing merrily in the steam from the hot dish. Not all of us eat fish, so I've been taking one for the team and eating the fish dishes, or in this case, picking off the fish flakes so others could get to the chicken below - but today (it's now early Saturday morning) I have such a taste of fish in my mouth, feel like a pelican! The photo below shows another view from our apartment here, looking straight down at the stone sculpture store 12 stories beneath us. Tomorrow we are up and out early in the morning for an all-day trip out of town to the Craft Biennale. It's a 2 hour cab ride from here. Wish us luck!