Korea, Take III: Hello to Seoul! (6/21)

 It was pouring like crazy at the airport, but thankfully our flights, although a tad turbulent, were neither cancelled nor delayed. Soon, we were back in Korea, and boy was it nice to see open space again! Japan is so thoroughly developed that it began to feel a bit claustrophobic, but the first five minutes on the road from the airport to Seoul were just the tonic I needed.

Rainy day for travel

First sights of Korea-- open space!!!

Never saw anything like this in Japan-- everything seemed occupied, developed

Downtown Seoul, outside our hotel

We checked into our hotel, dropped off our belongings, grabbed a bite to eat, and then hit the road for the National Museum of Korea! We traveled via the impressive Seoul subway system, but missing a train and getting off at the wrong stop meant we had to take an exhaustively long walk to get to the museum, leaving all of us thoroughly drained (as if a day of international travel hadn't been tiring enough!)

Approaching the museum-- it was a massive complex!

Inside the lobby

Bushed

The museum itself was exceedingly impressive, containing artifacts dating back to the 5th century BC and beyond. This is actually one of the only pictures I captured at the museum-- my phone was low on both battery and storage space. Nevertheless, they're some of the oldest artifacts in the collection.

Hand-crafted ceramic figurines from the 5th century

From my journal:

The National Museum of Korea was not awesome enough to overcome my fatigue from a 6am wakeup and a day of travel. I was very impressed with how great the english translations were-- I found myself getting frustrated when some cool things had no english to explain them, only to reflect that a Korean in an American museum would have an infinitely more frustrating experience. I have nothing to complain about-- I had it good. 

The museum seemed very proud of itself--huge structures, fancy displays, etc. It was cool to see things Dr. Yi had taught us about, but I definitely preferred the way she embedded her lessons in relevant contexts to make them more than just historical trivia-- the museum couldn't compare on that front.

The trip from the museum back to the hotel went a lot easier, and we were given the rest of the evening off. I grabbed a bite to eat and poked around the downtown area near the hotel, catching some live music and finding an interesting American-themed vintage store. There's a lot going on in downtown Seoul!

The view from my hotel room

More Seoul

Live music every night!

Inside American Vintage Cowboy