dinsdag 17 mei 2016

Day 09: Hongdae, Myeongdong, Seoul Station and Yongsan

On our 8th day of our stay in Seoul, we went out to check out some districts we've been to before. First we needed to restock our resources at Myeongdong, and then we headed out for Hongdae. So we took the green line (2) towards "Hongik University" and took exit no. 9 as you can see here below...


But before we left voor Hongdae from Myeongdong, we found this large Line Friends store. There we browsed around and took some pictures with the characters of Line...


Lilia took a picture with Bunny that's called Cone XD


Next it was time to take a picture with bear Brown
And even before the Line store, we had an early lunch at the McDonalds. There we had the local burger of South Korea, which was the Bulgogi burger...


But now back to Hongdae, this place is where we've been before. It's a place with al kinds of small stores, cafe's and restaurants. The weather was really warm compared to yesterday. The sky was sunny and clear...





There was some kind of drill at the time we were in Hongdae. We heard the airsirens going off really loud. But it didn't affect people and they were keep doing their business. Even when fighter planes flew over the area... It was a kind of intense feeling because we didn't knew what actually was going on...


The sirenes went off a couple of times with fighter jets flying all over the place. Then it was pretty quiet. No more sirens of jets... So it appears that the drill was over. Then it was back with the focus on walking around Hongdae...


We wanted to go to the Hello Kitty Cafe which should be located here. What I actually mean by "should" is that it isn't here anymore. But it might be relocated into the Myeongdong District, because there has been one that has openend recently... We also wanted to check out this pretty nice and awesome store called 1300K which has a lot of stuff like stationairy, figures, Ghibli stuff and more... But even this store has gone... But we still had a good time walking around there, and had a small stop at the Baskin Robbin's. There we had some ice cream (Cotton Candy & Captain America flavour)



Then we headed of towards Seoul Station. 
There we went to Lotte Mart to browse around the place...



Then we took a little break downstairs at Seoul Station at another Baskin Robbin's. We stopped there because Lilia wanted to try out the Cotton Candy Milkshake which seems very popular in South Korea. We wanted to try it out but it keeps being sold out everytime we want it. But this time we were lucky to found it where it still was in stock XD


And then it was of to Yongsan for a quick walk around the i'Park mall and have some dinner there at a japanese restaurant. There we had some sushi, udon noodles, salad and cutlett. It was really yummy to the max and then it was back home to our hotel..


When we got back to our district, we bought some drinks, snacks and breakfast for tomorrow at 7Eleven and at GS25. Then it was time to head to bed for our next day here in Seoul. With this we say to you all Good Night!!! XD

From LC & CL

maandag 16 mei 2016

Day 08: Enter-6 Malls at Wangsimni

Today on our 8th day in Seoul, we wanted to take it easy. It was because the weather was forcasted with heavy rain all day long. When we got up in the morning, the weather was looking good with nog rain in sight. But it was very clouded, but very warm. But just to be sure we deceided to go to a place that is indoor and within reach by the subway tunnel system...


So went to Wangsimni station and took the No.05 exit to go the Enter-6 mall. We've been there also last time as you can read in our previous blogs from a few days ago. There we walked around a bit and ended up at the e-Mart and had a quick lunch snack at this little bakery place called Paris Baguette...


After grabbin' the Floorguide map of the Enter-6 Fashion mall, we read that there was another Enter-6 mall near us. It was located 300 meters further down the street and is called the Enter-6 Park Avenue. We wanted to check the place out because it has something to do with MARVEL comics...


As we arrived at the Mall, we saw a very big billboard with Marvel Comics characters on it. It appears that this mall has a Marvel themed style as for the promotion of the movie Captain America: Civil War.


They even had a pop-up stored for there Marvel themed mall which is called "MARVEL Collection" and is temporarilly. As you can see you are welcomed by an Iron Man 1/1 scale statue with eyes and an arc-reactor that lights up.


This Marvel Collection store has many things you can buy. They have a lot of merchandising like T-Shirts, Caps, Pillows, Lego's, stationaries and an impressive collection of Hot Toys stuff. They put up an area in the store to display their Hot Toys collection with diorama's as you can see here below...



Lilia took a picture with Ultron and Ironman in the Artist Mix style figures. They are somewhat like the style of figures between the Cosbabies and regular figures.



The set up of the Hot Toys section was pretty impressive, where you can see some scenes of the Age of Ultron movie. They even had some figures of Spider-man and Guardians of the Galaxy...



After checking out the MARVEL collection store we walked around the mall to check out the stores. Because this mall is pretty new, not all of the stores has openend up yet. But we saw some stores and they were pretty nice. They even had an Anime Figure store on the upper floor across the MARVEL collection store... 


Later on we came across a photo zone of "Descendants of the Sun" drama, which apparently had used this mall as a filming location. Lilia took her picture with Soong Jong-ki as the famous poster of the series. On the lower level there was the food area with lots of restaurants to choose from. They had all kinds of food like, Italian, Indian, Chinese, Korean, Japanese and more. While walking around some to check out what we are going to eat later on, we saw the Ironman Hulkbuster armor from the Age of Ultron movie... 



But wait... 
Look who we also saw here at the Park Avenue Enter-6 mall...

It's Spider-man on the wall (The Amazing Spider-man 2 suit)


The mall has been done greatly by using Marvel stuff all around the place. There are even some people who dressed up as famous Marvel characters for you to take a picture with them. But there are even Photo zones where you can take picutes with the Marvel Characters...


Kurisu in between Team Iron-man and Team Captain America... 
Which side will he choose...?


We checked out how the weather was outside, and it was pouring rain... a lot...
So we decided to wait it out by having an early dinner here at the mall. So we went back downstairs to look around what to eat...


There we saw a small fishtank and a beautiful sakura tree...


We even came across some gashapon (capsule toys) machines 
on the 1st floor near a bookshop.


There Lilia found a machine where you can get miniatures of the Fuji Instax camera's. So bought one and it was the white version of it... 


There were even more Photo zones, and this time we found one 
where you can take one with animals.


We finally found a place where we wanted to eat. It was hard because there was too much to choose from. So we decided to eat at Hakoya...



While ordering an eating here, Iron-man kept an eye out and protecting us within his Hulkbuster armor as you can see... Thanks Mr. Stark for letting us eat in peace XD



After our dinner it was still raining heavily, so Kurisu decided to get an umbrella near the mall so we could go back to Dongdaemun. It was really windy and raining hard outside. But still with having this weather we decided to go to the Hyundai department store near us hotel to go for ice cream...


Arriving at the deparment store, we went downstairs to the food area. There we scored some Banana Ice Cream at the Yellow Cafe. It was really yummy and it gave us some brain freeze...


With having Ice Cream as desert, we end our 8th day here in Seoul. See you with our next blog everybody. And for now it's good night to you all!!! XD

Greetz from LC & CL

zondag 15 mei 2016

Day 7: Descendants of the Sun Drama Ost Concert

Today we started slower than usual. We slept in and made the blog of day 6.
We noticed right away that it's a saturday... because it was really crowded today.
Our trip today is to Kyung Hee University.

Therefore we needed to take the subway line 4 to Dongdaemun.. It's one stop from where we take the subway. Our closest subwaystation is Dongdaemun History & Culture Park.
From Dongdaemun we had to take the subway line 1 to Hoegi Station.


We passed right by the restaurant where they shooted the popular Kdrama serie ' Descendants of the Sun'. Because today we are going to attend the 'Descendants of the Sun Drama Ost Concert'.
We are fans of the female singer Lyn (린) and on April the 29th she posted on Facebook about this concert. We were able to get tickets to that concert that takes place at Kyung Hee University. Going to the Kyung Hee University wasn't a problem, but where the concert building ' Grand Peace Hall' is, was a bit of a mission.
But finally we found it.


We had to go up... it is a steep hill and so hot today, but we made it.  


At a vendor we can get our tickets. A bit of info about the kdrama serie 'Descendants of the Sun', is that the series aired on the 24th of February. In no time the series had became a really big hit... Not only in South Korea, but also in whole asia. It became a hype through social media. The series is about a love story between the captain of special forces (played by Song Joong Ki) and a doctor (played by Song Hye-Kyo). And yes, they are both good-looking.. that also helped a lot. The series has lots of action, but also it's funny and romantic... not only by the main couple, but also thanks to the supporting cast.


Back to our day... At the location we had to get our tickets for the concert. As you can see in the picture on the left they sell merchandise of the show and on the right is where we got our tickets.


The Kyung Hee University Grand Peace Hall is a really big building... It's design looks really amazing and beautiful, but it also gives you somehow a romantic feeling...


A beautiful flower is blooming so bright at the site. Along our way we saw a streetfood vendor. Because we have to wait for an hour to get inside the building, we decided to get something to eat. 



We choose the fish cake soup. It was really delicious.



We enjoyed the food and we decided to wait around the building, by checking the merchandise and waiting to go inside.


When we walked inside concert building, a big posterwall is displaying in front of us. Everybody was talking pictures and selfies. It sure was pretty crowded....


We went to the first floor and search for our seats. The numbers of the seats are displayed on the back of the chair. Which isn't quite handy... because it's difficult to find your seats. But we found it quickly by checking out the map in front of the entrance...


The first one to perform was MC the Max with the song 'The wind beneath your Wings' (그대, 바람이 되어) When they are singing the song you see the music video on the background. 


After they sang their song of the soundtrack they also sang a song of their own.


I haven't read that there will not only be songs of the soundtrack they are going to perform, but they also held interviews with the actors of the series.
The first ones are known for 'Songdak' couple. FIY: Fans gives couples in Kdrama serie a nickname when they are fans of the couple. It's just what they do here.. It doesn't have to be for kdrama serie also for variety shows and other ways of coupling.


Lee Seung Jun who plays Doctor Song Sang-Hyun


Seo Jung Yeon as doctor Ha Ja-Ae.

They got interviewed about their characters and they showed the top 5 best moments in the drama between this couple. After each moment they got asked by the interviewer what they would do in that situation. It's too bad they didn't had english translation for these. It's kind of hard to understand what they were answering. 

The last thing before the end of the interview actor Lee Seung Jun was asked to play out a scene called "Wine kiss"... In the series the main couple Song Joong ki & Song Hye Kyo shared a kiss.... A women from the audience was picked out to do that. It was funny.

After the interview SG Wannebe (SG 워너비) performed with the song 'Let's fall in Love. The staff of the concert suddenly were busy telling people to not take pictures. It's kind of weird...


After that Mad Clown and Kim Na Young sang Come Again (다시 너를) of the soundtrack.


Then Lyn came on stage with her song 'With you' for the soundtrack.


After the song the interviewer came on stage with Mad Clown & Kim Na Young.
It's custom that they always introduce themselves to the audience. Every artists at the entertainment business does that in Korea. Even when they are already famous. That's their formality.


Then the other couple came: Guwon couple. The crowd went wild, because they are the second lead couple.



Kim Ji Won as Army Doctor Yoon Myeong-Joo


Jin Goo as Sergeant Seo Dae-Young



Also with them they showed the best top 5 drama moments. Asking what they would do in that situation and how they felt about to act that scene. In the beginning of the concert people could write something for the actors... what they want to know or ask. Because of the time only 2-3 things on the board was picked out. One of the question was to hold a staring game with the actor Jin Goo. It was funny, because the girl was so nervous to see him upfront and she also got a hug which made a lot of women fans jealous. That girl was so overwhelmed that she stubbled back to her seat.


The last song is also the main song of the soundtrack. That song 'You are my Everything' sang by Gummy.


Then after the song... the concert has ended. Lilia was really happy to finally see Lyn live.
The concert was 3 hours long. Becuase of the interviews it was so long. Not all songs where performed at the concert. A few singers made a video message saying they were sorry they couldn't be there. Also the main characters weren't there... if they were there... the ticket price would be much higher and more difficult to buy. It would be sold out in 5 minutes. Even so, It still was a great concert.
 Because it was already 6pm,  we were really hungry and we decided to go to Kyobo Bookstore in Gwangwhamun for some spaghetti.



Lilia had the carbonara spaghetti.


Kurisu had the pork-cutlet with tomato sauce spaghetti.
It was an eventful day. We got really tired.. Some grocery shopping and then we went home to the hotel.


Lilia got some DOTS merchandise ^^


Today in Seoul they broadcasting a new Kdrama serie where Lilia is interested in.
She quickly changed into her PJ's and got ready to watch it. It's a new SBS weekend drama called 'Beautiful Gong Shim' with A pink Min Ah and Namgung Min.

On Asianwiki the story: 
Love story of two sisters and two men. The older sister has everything, including a beautiful appearance, and the younger sister only has a warm heart. One of the men lives on a rooftop apartment and the other man comes from a wealthy family.

That was our day today. Goodnight and sweet dreams.

LC&CL