Connie blogs it!

I ♥ Eusoff!

2010-06-04T17:35:00.012+08:00

Went for the Eusoff Exposure Camp - Camp Yellow Fever last week and I loved it TTM!!!
Lots of my firsts during this camp. Hope it doesn't sound wrong, lol. First time seeing Eusoff(before that, I had no idea how it looks like or where it is located), first time seeing FASS in person(I told my Dad that he must had drove the wrong way because the FASS shown in the brochures is new! Lol), first time eating in NUS canteens, first time seeing 'clubbing' in a different light(LOL), first time playing the dirtiest(literally) game ever with fruits and juice raining down on us, first time knowing how shaving cream feels or smells like(and first time having shaving cream stuck in my ear), first time cooking(and was taught by a guy?!?! I seriously fail as a girl.), first time taking the NUS campus shuttle buses, first time swimming or playing in the pool with people other than my very close friends(yes, I used to be very self-conscious), first time sitting and squeezing with 13 other people at the back of a small van, first time knowing that frisbee is actually a sport(all along, I thought it was just a game you play at the beach), first time staying over in a hall/hostel, first time sleeping with a roomie, first-time having late night suppers(suppers yes, but not that late), first time eating butter chicken(but it was hell good!), first time singing in a performance(okay, I sang together with the rest but yeah, I've never sang in a performance before. But then again, the number of performances I had took part in my entire life can be counted on one hand), first time playing midnight volleyball at like 1-3am, first time having HTHTs from 4-7am(and I finally knew for the first time, what HTHT is!) and first time not sleeping at all(but I eventually zonked out on the lounge's chair in the morning, CMI la. Lol).
Thank you so much, Eusoff, EyePower, Mesoff, OGLs and seniors for all the firsts! You guys are a wonderful bunch, I had such a great time with you all! Everyone was just so nice, funny and friendly, that it makes making new friends and fitting in so much more easier. Definitely, one of my best camps to date! ^^
Anyway, all the photos(except the last few) are all koped from Melvin, so yeah, credits goes to him! =)

Designing the flag, most of it was done by Si Han, the artist. Hahaha.

Mesoff & EyePower flags

EYEPOWER!!!

Lunch at FASS canteen

Games

Gang Yi's leg very long ah

The Clubbing Game!!! Omg thanks to Theo, we'll never see clubbing in the same light again! It was so freaking funny!!! =D

The seniors smart, hiding at one corner of the badminton court so that they won't get caught.

Literally the dirtiest game ever.

See the watermelon, orange and papaya pieces on our hair and clothes? Fruity shampoo. Look at Hao Ran trying to squeeze/drip the fruit juice from his hair in the 1st photo. LOL.

Fruity Fun! Hahaha!

At the supermarket, buying food to cook

Cooking in the kitchen

Everyone helping out with something

The steamed tofu with minced pork on it is damn nice!!! The veggies, not so...because is I cook one(and Chien Wei even had to teach me how to cook! I major fail.) Lol.

The cheese bacon and mushroom at the bottom right is also damn nice! All the food are Si Han's & Lina's recipes, only both of them out of the entire OG knows how to cook. So the rest of us just followed their instructions. Hahaha.

The judges(seniors) testing the food

Start of scavenger hunt at night. Take photos with everything, everyone. Lol.

Late night supper at Ameen's. Butter chicken ♥!!!

Breakfast on the 2nd morning, prata & milk tea! Renji doesn't look awake yet.

At the pool! Pool games was super fun!!! Freshies owned seniors! Hahaha.

Squeezing into the back of the van with the entire OG - 14 people! Like illegal immigrants. Hahaha. Omg, damn hot & stuffy, like sauna, we were all perspiring like crazy! We didn't dare talk alot cos scared the air used up. Lol. We rode the van twice, both times driven by Renji. Luckily we got to hitch a ride or else definitely can't get back to hall and then to West Coast Park on time. Thanks Renji!

At West Coast Park, learning how to play frisbee AS A SPORT. The weather was scorching hot, made our sunburns from swimming even worse.

Nice!

Our OGLs and programmers! ^^

Long walk back to NUS

Brainstorming for the OG performance

BBQ!

Don't Forget the Lyrics was major funny! The forfeits and Theo 'clubbing' Ivan was just freaking hilarious!!! Never seen a funnier Don't Forget the Lyrics than this.

Now photos from my own camera:

My roommate, Wan Ting, and our room

'Best roomie ever' helping me to tidy up my dirty laundry! =D

Eusoff corridors & surroundings

The mirror in each room is so useful. Hahaha.

Me, Si Han & Wan Ting in Si Han's room

I think this was during our brainstorming for the performance? Kenneth & Hao Ran act cute! Hao Ran said they ARE CUTE, not ACT CUTE. Righttt. =X

More brainstorming

Camwhoring while brainstorming

Wan Ting, unglam!

Colouring our letters.

情歌王子 thinking hard for the lyrics

Written by Tay Hao Ran. Sung by EyePower. Lead singer Tay Hao Ran. Music by Lim Gangyi, Kusanagorm Zo and Ng Si Han. Arrangement by Valencia Anne Lim and Lina Heng.

Stop and Stare,
I wanna go to Eusoff and stay there.
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared,
But Eusoff's where we wanna be, oh.

Stop and Stare,
You start to wonder why you're here not there.
And you'd give anything to get in, yeah
Eusoff's is what you really need.

Stop and stare,
The whole three days show that the seniors care.
Where can we get good ones, they're so rare,
And they are who we wanna be.
Eusoff hall please accept me!

LOL, I got everything above from Si Han!

Preparing for the performance

Rehearsing for performance

Toilet mirror also very useful.

Late night supper at Ameen's again! =D

Packing up

Shirleen zonked out

In Yueying's & Shirleen's room

At breakfast on 3rd day morning

Shanmin's 19th - We had joy, we had fun, we had picnic in the sun!

2010-05-18T21:17:00.011+08:00

Last Sunday, we went celebrated Shanmin's birthday. We had a picnic on Siloso Beach in Sentosa. It was so fun, girls we need to do this more often! We got almost everything from Giant and Cold Storage in Vivo. Nevertheless, food was still good. We had chips, Ritz crackers with Salmon Spread, a whole Barbecued Black Pepper Chicken, Sushi, Danshui Fish Crackers which Shanmin brought back from Taiwan, Loacker Chocolate Wafers, straight-cut and criss-cross fries from Carl's Jr.

We ate so much that I felt so bloated after that. So we digested our food by sitting there bay-watching(applies to Shanmin & Kristy only because they were so interested in this guy who had Y-shaped forest of hair on his back. Hahaha! But Shanmin was right, there was actually no 'bay' to watch) and playing Uno & Daidi. Lol. We decided to skip dinner since we were all still so bloated and played until around 8pm. It got so dark that I could hardly see what cards I was throwing out.

Then we decided to go back to Vivo to have desserts instead. So we took the tram back to the Beach Station and then the monorail back to Vivo. We went to the National Geographic Cafe. It pretty cool because everything looked so vintage - the furniture, the crockery(teapots), the surroundings. Desserts was great. We had Earl Grey Tea, Fruit Tissana Tea and Chocolate Fondue shared among ourselves while Tracy had a Tuna Sandwich.

We left pretty late. While on the train, this weird guy came up to us and asked Kristy if the picnic basket she was holding contained a dog. He asked 'What's in your basket? Is it a dog?' I swear it's a pick-up line, the worst one ever. I mean, who in the right mind would put a dog in there? And when Kristy showed him that there was only food in the basket, he went on to ask us loads of other questions, like which JCs were we from(to which we just replied 'different JCs'), which secondary schools were we from(when he heard that we were from AHS, he was like 'Oh, I used to be from there, ages ago.' Oh, really?), where we just came back from, where we live, blah blah blah. Creepy stalker, was it in his business to know the answers to these personal questions? We just alighted at Kembangan with Shanmin and Kristy although that was not Tracy's or my station. Waited for another train to bring us back to Simei, beat being stuck in the same train with that creepy stalker. Lol.

Food!

Eat...

and eat...

and eat!

Shanmin's Monkey Airplane mini fan

No idea what I was doing in the top photo, playing an invisible piano?

Can't see my cards clearly in the dark, took a long time to put them in order.

Shanmin and her model shots(except the last photo). Look at her strut down the runway. Okay, in the last photo, she was trying to take off her slipper and throw it at Kristy who made fun of her. Unglam Shanmin.

Lol @ Kristy's shirt

On the monorail back to Vivo

At the National Geographic Cafe

That's Kristy's hubby in the Nat Geo magazine because they have 夫妻相! Hahaha

Chocolate Fondue, Fruit Tissana Tea, Earl Grey Tea & Tuna Sandwich

Kristy and her chocolate-stained teeth

Dilemma

2010-05-13T18:56:00.007+08:00

If you haven't already know, yes, I got accepted into NUS FASS(intending to major in Economics) & NTU Economics. I just got back from SMU Business interview, and I think I should just get ready to strike SMU off my list. I totally screwed up the interview. I barely spoke and it didn't help that I was the only girl among the 9 or 10 bald army guys. It turned out that a few of them came from international schools(I found out because the article we discussed about was coincidentally, foreigners in international schools and local schools) and some even stayed abroad for a couple of years. Yeah, so you know how international schools' students are, they aren't afraid to speak their mind, they can talk on and on, they speak fluently, with an accent even. In short, I think my chances are very slim.

Not that I'm very affected by this interview I screwed up. My heart is pretty much set on NUS, 70% for NUS, you can say. I agreed to the SMU interview because I wanted to see if I could make it. If I miraculously get accepted by SMU business, I said if, then I think I would still be in a dilemma. 70% NUS and 30% SMU instead of 30% NTU. Currently, for me, the pros of SMU are only 2 things - it is a business course and it is nearer to my house. I mean, it's still far from my house but nearer as compared to NUS and NTU. Whereas, everything else I like is at NUS. The curriculum flexibility, the sports(specifically floorball), the language courses, the exchange programmes and the halls(if I can convince my mom to let me stay in one). The cons of NUS? Distance from my house, if I fail to convince my mom. I really can't imagine travelling that far from my house and back every single day, especially when you're so tired after a long day at school or worse, after a day that ends with training. =(

Whatever it is, I'll probably wait till the end of next week before I accept NUS' offer. If I don't get a letter from SMU by then, I'll go to the nearest photo ID booth to have my photo taken so that I can paste it in the NUS student pass application form and bring the form personally down to NUS to submit. Lol. =P

Orchard with Ah Cat, Korean food, Marina Bay Sands, Japanese food

2010-05-02T17:49:00.005+08:00

Orchard with Ah Cat

Famous Chicken Cutlet with Nachos Sauce at Ah Cat's school!

Seoul Yummy at Novena Square 2

Side dishes

Soondooboo Jjigae with Seafood

Beef Bibimbap

Samgyetang(Korean Ginseng Chicken)

Curry Cutlet rice

Strawberry & Kiwi Bingsoo

Fruity Bingsoo

Marina Bay Sands

Impressive architecture

Watami Restaurant at ION

Wafu Hitokuchi Steak

Seafood Doria

Ishiyaki Bibimbap

Fried Onion Rings

Hot Choco Brownie

Strawberry Daifuku

Choco Banana Parfait

Tracy's 19th - Karaoke, Katong Laksa, Parkway, Ramyeon & Movie@Kristy's!

2010-04-05T15:43:00.004+08:00

Yesterday was Tracy's early birthday celebration! Happy Birthday Tracy!!! ^^

We went Teo Heng for karaoke for 3 hours and sang to our hearts' content. Okay, maybe not to our hearts' content because Kristy & Yingiet came later and we wanted to stay longer, but too bad the rooms were all fully booked. =( Girls, let's go Teo Heng again real soon! And Yingiet, I don't care, the next time we go, you must sing!!!

Tracy's Phantom of the Opera + Kristy's & Tracy's rendition of Lady Gaga's Bad Romance & Poker Face = Totally epic! We were laughing so hard. Seriously, Phantom of the Opera should only be for opera singers. Lol. The last few verses were practically killers. =D

Was this Phantom of the Opera or Bad Romance? Can't remember, but this was really funny!

After we were done with singing, we went for a late lunch at Katong Laksa.

Katong Laksa

Rojak. I find this really good, one of the best rojaks I've ever eaten.

Katong

Walked over to Parkway after lunch to hang around and think of what to do next...

Parkway

Testing out the shutter speed of my camera, trying to 'freeze' water.

KOI Bubble Teas. I initially wanted to get both KOI and Old Chang Kee but didn't in the end because I was so full from the lunch that I felt like I could puke if I eat any more.

We soon got bored of walking around Parkway aimlessly and took a bus to Kristy's place. At first, we wanted to have dinner at Royals Cafe but it was too crowded and didn't have a table for us, so we decided to buy some food & snacks back to Kristy's and eat while we watch the movie Meet the Parents.

Jalan Tua Kong, the neighbourhood I used to live in.

Kimchi Ramyeon!

This is delicious!

Meet the Parents

Mango ice-cream which Kristy's sis made!

Popcorns Kristy made! What's a movie without popcorns?

I bought this because I'm a fan of milk tea and I was so surprised they had it in Green Tea flavour. Plus Green Milk Tea is one of my favourites when I buy Bubble Tea. Lol. Anyway, this is good too! I would choose this over the original flavour.

Singapore, Parkway, East Coast Park, Wacko, Changi Airport! ♥

2010-03-26T20:17:00.018+08:00

Last Sunday, we brought Japanese university students around. Too bad it was only for a short 5 hours because I really enjoyed myself. Initially, I thought it was going to be awkward because I speak zero Japanese and I don't know much about the Japanese culture either. Was really worried that we would have no common conversation topics. But it turned out that wasn't the case. The Japanese students were really nice and friendly, and I learned quite abit about Japan. Now I'm so interested in Japan, its language and culture. Japan's definitely at the top of my list of travel destinations, no more Korea. I want to go Japan, LIKE NOW!!! =D

Anyway, after we met the Japanese students, we brought them around Parkway for awhile. The girls did some shopping, while the guys, well, I don't think the guys shopped that much. I'm not sure about the other guys who were with Kristy, Tracy and Shanmin but at least that's the case for my buddies, Hiroya and Daichi, both of whom are guys. We went to the CD shop in Borders, then to the Timezone arcade where they played this crocodile game in which the crocodiles starting coming out of their 'caves' and you're supposed to whack them. They told me that it's a very popular game among Japanese elementary students or middle-schoolers and that they also used to play it almost everyday after school when they were at that age. I was pretty surprised because in Singapore, as long as you're in your uniform, you can't enter an arcade. I guess it's different over there.

After the game, we ended up drinking Iced Chocolate in the food court. And after that, we met up with Kristy, Tracy and Shanmin who were also with their buddies, and then headed off to East Coast Park.

Alright, let the photos do the talking!

Shanmin & Kristy with the girls

The sky looked threatening

Tracy attempting a Sir Stamford Raffles but Kristy isn't letting her.

The next Sir Stamford Raffles statue after Victoria Theatre's & Boat Quay's! Hahaha. I saw in some of the Japanese students' Facebook albums that they had visited the statue while they were here. And guess what, I realized that I've never seen the statue in the entire 19 years of my life, and I call myself a Singaporean. -.- I'm such a failure as a Singaporean.

Tracy, Kaori & Nozomi

Playing Wacko!

Group photo

After East Coast Park, we each brought our buddies back to our houses. The theme for the short 5-hour tour was 'Local', so everything had to be as local as possible, not your usual tourist attractions. No Merlion, no Sentosa, no Integrated Resorts, no Universal Studios, no Orchard Road, no Zoo or Birdpark but local food like Ice Kachang, Rojak, etc, places where the locals go like Parkway, East Coast Park, hawker centres, foodcourts and the neighbourhoods, SBS bus rides and our houses for a glimpse of a typical Singaporean family life. I was pretty worried at first that it would be boring for the Japanese students, because really, there's nothing interesting about my family. I think it's just like any other family in the world. But I guess my worries were unfounded when my buddies started chatting with my parents. =)

Daichi & Hiroya with my parents

Hiroya & Daichi

Us at dinner at Siam Kitchen

Shanmin wanted to say something, but I snapped a photo before she did. Hahaha.

Me with my buddies!

Shanmin with her buddies!

From top left in clockwise: Nobu, Shanmin, Maaya & Akiko

Shanmin & Maaya

Akiko & Shanmin

Nobo & Shanmin

Me with my buddies & Shanmin's buddies

Me & Maaya

Me & Akiko

Me & Nobu

Shanmin and her buddies with her Dad!

Shanmin & Daichi

Hiroya, Daichi & Akiko

Gen, Nozomi, Satoko & Kaori. Just before they boarded the bus to their hotel.

On Tuesday, we got little gifts for the Japanese students and went to send them off at the airport.

Me, Maaya, Shanmin & Akiko

Tracy, Satoko, Kristy, Nozomi & Kaori

Me & Ryuta

Me & Gen

Vicky & Shanmin

Me & Kaori. I find Kaori so pretty!!! I think she looks like Erika Sawajiri from One Litre of Tears! =)

Kaori & Shanmin

Gen & Shanmin

Shanmin & Ryuta

Shanmin & Nozomi

Nozomi & I

The girls insisted on getting a Pandan Swiss Roll to celebrate my birthday. Aahhh, it was so embarrassing! I mean, I was really happy that the Japanese students celebrated for me, but we were supposed to send them off, not celebrate my birthday! Hahaha. Anyway, thanks so much to the Japanese students & the girls for the birthday song and all the wishes! Really appreciated them very much! And thanks Ryuta & Gen for wishing me all the best for my university interviews! ^^

Nozomi with her pandan cake

Nozomi & Ryuta

Nobu, Akiko & Maaya

Maaya & Shanmin

Akiko & Shanmin

Ryuta

Ryuta looking so surprised at the cake. =D

Nozomi

Maaya, Kristy & Akiko

Vicky!

Me & Ms Yoko

Tracy & Ms Yoko

After that, we made our way to Terminal 3. By the way, sorry about the blurred photos because I was using the Programmed mode and the shutter speed was alittle too slow.

Tracy & Onion. LOL! Don't kill me, Tracy!

This is what paparazzi shots do to us. Tracy & Shanmin were each holding a camera and taking shots at the same time. We didn't know which camera to look at!

We were both looking at different cameras

Finally, a decent photos after so many attempts. Lol.

Here are more photos from Kristy:

Kristy, Vicky, Gen & Ryuta

Kristy, Tracy & their buddies on the bus

Kaori & Tracy

Ryuta, Gen, Vicky & Kristy

Left to right: Nobu, Akiko, Vicky, Nozomi, Kristy, Maaya , Ryuta & Gen

Vicky & Kristy

Kaori, Nozomi, Maaya, Shanmin, Kristy, Akiko

Ryuta & Gen

On the bus back to Kristy's house

Kristy's & Tracy's buddies at Kristy's house for BBQ!

Setting up the fire...

Smoky!!!

Nozomi, Satoko, Kaori & Ryuta barbecuing chicken wings!

Kristy & Nozomi

Kristy & Satoko. And Kaori! =P

Kristy & Kaori

Kristy & Ryuta. Kristy's favourite photo! Hahaha.

Kristy & Gen

Vicky & Kristy

Tracy & Nozomi Shot 1. Tracy's chicken wing is covering Nozomi's face. Retake!

Tracy & Nozomi Shot 2. Better, but now with ashes from the BBQ! Lol.

Tracy & Satoko

Burning

Tracy & Kaori

Tracy & Gen

Kristy captioned this as 'Greedy Beano!' Hahaha!

Vicky eating chicken wing & Tracy

Tracy & Ryuta

Tracy & Kristy

Group photo of Kristy, Tracy, all of their buddies and oh, Beano!

On the bus from Kristy's to Parkway

Kaori, Satoko, Tracy, Nozomi & Vicky

Ryuta attempting the 'Ms Yoko stare'. LOL. Apparently the Japanese students told Kristy that Ms Yoko, one of the people in charge of their itinerary, was scary(or was it funny?) because she has this stare. Hahaha!

This is so funny!!! All 3 of them doing the Ms Yoko stare! Hahaha. =DDD

Tracy at Terminal 1's Popeyes, hard at work!

Kristy with the beautiful photoframes she decorated for the Japanese students!

And Tracy with her decorated photoframes!

Kristy's & Tracy's photoframes were so beautiful! My photoframes look so insincere next to theirs. Lol. Honestly, I can never draw like that. I gave my buddies photoframes too, but undecorated. I just don't have any artistic flair.

Shanmin with the wallet-sized photos she made for the Japanese students! My photoframes also looked so insincere next to her photos, because she photoshopped them herself and laminated them! And thanks Shanmin for giving me some of the photos to give my buddies. The story went like this, I went to the photo shop at the last minute to print the photos, only to find that the machine couldn't read the format of my photos, so I couldn't print them. Luckily, Shanmin gave me some of her photos to put into my buddies' photoframes. =)

Kristy's photoframe for Ryuta!

For Kaori!

For Gen!

For Nozomi!

For Satoko!

For Vicky!

Tracy & Ryuta

Tracy & Gen

Kristy & Gen

Kristy & Ryuta

Kristy & Nozomi

Tracy & Nozomi

Kaori & Kristy

Tracy & Kaori

Thank you guys so much for the celebration! =D

Ryuta to the rescue with his lighter! =P

Vicky & Kristy

Tracy & Vicky

Maaya, Kristy & Akiko

Ms Yoko & Kristy

Ms Yoko & Shanmin

Us at Terminal 1

In the skytrain

Kristy! =P

At Terminal 3

WAHAHAHA!!!

Kristy hugging Tracy! LOL!!! =DDD Kristy & I are so gonna get killed over this. =X

Another paparazzi shot

What was I doing?!?!?

Crowne Plaza Hotel

Tracy?!?!

回头一笑, FAIL! Hahaha.

Lol, all unprepared!

=D

In the MRT

It's been almost a week now, but I still miss the Japanese students! =(
Thank you guys so much for the wonderful time! ありがとう。^^ And may we meet again~! =D

I need a Japanese crash course

2010-03-20T22:49:00.005+08:00

Like now!!! I've a job tomorrow to bring Japanese students around, and I'm bringing them to my house too! I can't speak Japanese to save my life, not even do a simple introduction in it! If they were Korean students instead, probably no problem, I can speak enough Korean to communicate. =)

Gosh, freaking out now! I really regretted not taking Japanese as a 3rd language in secondary school! Too late to ask my half-Japanese cousin to teach me, I suppose he does know abit of Japanese?

Tortie in my room

2010-03-19T22:00:00.003+08:00

Korea December Vacation 2009

2010-03-08T17:57:00.027+08:00

Finally, my Korea trip photos! You thought I was never going to do it, didn't you? Haha. Apologies for keeping you guys waiting. It took me a long time to get the photos collaged, uploaded and ordered according to time the picture was taken on.

Anyway, here it goes...

******

Day 1

Our flight to Korea was at night, 10.40pm to be exact. We took 2 cabs to the airport because there are 5 members in my family. You can guess the fare. About $14 for each cab. And my house is only a 5 minutes' drive away from the airport! Even with booking fare & peak hour charges, isn't that a tad too much? Goes to show how expensive cab fares in Singapore are!

Anyway, we reached the airport at 7pm, met the rest of our tour group and checked in our luggage together.

At the Terminal 2

Waiting to check in our luggage
After checking in, we went off for dinner at the Ah Wang Cafe, to have our last meal of local food since we will probably be eating kimchi for a week. Lol.

I got that half-cut gloves the night before and I thought it was pretty with blue shimmery stuff on it, so I decided to wear it for fun. No, I was not going to wear that when I'm in Korea, my fingers would freeze and drop off.

Okay, the baked rice isn't exactly 'local food', but I was craving for cheese baked rice. At least the Nasi Gorengs & the Ngoh Hiang are local.

Ice lemon tea, Kopi peng, Teh peng, Bandung. Local drinks.
We checked in at around 9pm. There was still time before boarding so we walked around the departure area.

In the departure area

They even have Xbox! Great for people like my bro. Haha.

Time to board!

Yep, we were flying with Asiana Airlines. And yes, it's a Korean airline. The service was great. The food was great too, too bad I didn't want anymore food(yes, they gave dinner/supper!) because I was too full from the cheese baked rice earlier, but my Dad gave me a cake from his tray and it tasted really good. There was in-flight entertainment - movies, variety shows, video games and music. But what's the best thing about travelling with a Korean airline? Beautiful air stewardesses unnies! I swear they're super beautiful! Some were even prettier than female idols that I see in the Korean entertainment scene. Eye candy much!

What's another great thing about travelling with a Korean airline? That's right, they give you lots of Korean entertainment on their in-flight entertainment system! (But they also give you loads of US entertainment too.) I watched 2 Days 1 Night, all the US gag shows(Just For Laughs, America's Funniest Videos, and a few more with something along the lines of 'funniest videos', I can't really remember) and a couple of Korean movies. At like 2am, I still refused to sleep! Lol.

One thing I really like about their in-flight entertainment system is that, the movies or shows are not scheduled to play at a particular time, meaning that you can select a movie to watch at any time without having to worry about missing the movie, and I can also pause, play, replay or fast forward as I like. When I traveled with Cathay Pacific, their movies or shows are scheduled to play at a particular time on a particular channel. For example, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is scheduled to play at 11pm, but if I realised, at 11.30pm, that the movie is already showing, then I can only watch the remaining half of the movie. I can't pause, fast forward, replay or do any of those things to re-watch the beginning of the movie. But on Asiana Airlines, I can pause the movie when I'm eating my meals or watch the movie at any time I like.

They also have albums released by Korean singers. Over 100 albums to be exact, arranged according to the date it was released. Guess which songs I listened to?

Abracadabra, Again & Again, Tell Me Your Wish, Sorry Sorry. Hahaha!

Their music section also includes lullabies for sleeping. Hmm, not exactly lullabies but I don't know what you call that. Soothing music for sleeping? Nice melodies and may sometimes have elements like sound of the waves. Yeah, I slept to the music because they're so soothing!

Day 2

We landed at Korea's Incheon International Airport at 6am Korean time (which is 5am Singapore time). The immigration queue was kind of long, probably due to the fact that most flights from Singapore & Hong Kong arrived around that time. We were stucked in the queue for about half an hour but it was okay when you get to watch 2PM's Corby phones CF again & again(pun not intended) on the plasma TV in front. The immigration officer was very friendly, he smiled and greeted each passenger with 'Annyeong Haseyo'. My impression of immigration officers is that they're strict and serious because they can't afford to make any mistake. But that Korean immigration officer proved me wrong. And mind you, it was 6am in the morning, if it was me working those hours, I'll probably be sulking away. Lol.

Just woke up! Still groggy from the lack of sleep.

We finally checked out, got our baggage and met our tour guide (who was a great Korean lady who can speak Chinese better than you and me, and she looks nothing like her age). Then, what's the next most important thing? Yeah, that's right, breakfast! We walked around the airport looking for a place that served breakfast. Not much luck, since it was 6 plus in the morning and no stores are opened that early. The only places opened were this cafe that served bibimbap and the likes, and McDonald's. It was too early for rice, so we opt for Macs. Apparently most of the passengers who just arrived went for the same thing too. The queue was looonggg. When it was eventually my Dad's turn, despite using English, he had trouble telling the lady that she gave him 2 less Hashbrowns. It was kind of expected since English is not widely used in Korea. It wasn't much of a problem for us because we were travelling as a tour group, so many of the things were pretty much planned for us. Like, we didn't have to order food for most of our meals, we didn't have to ask for directions to get to places, we didn't have to take a cab and tell the cab-driver where we want to go. But for people who are planning to do free & easy in Korea, learn some basic Korean phrases or get a phrasebook if possible! Otherwise, it may be difficult to get around.

Anyway, in the end, my Dad decided to forget about it since it wasn't really a good idea to eat Hashbrowns in that kind of dry weather anyway unless we were planning to kill our throats. Out of the 3 Hashbrowns we were given, only one was eaten, by my sis.

Macs breakfast

After breakfast, we went to change into our winter clothings, met our tour guide again, got on the tour bus and left the airport. We were heading to Everland Theme Park which is located in Yongin about 40km south of Seoul. We had to travel an hour out of Seoul to reach Everland. Well, we didn't exactly traveled out of Seoul, more like traveled past Seoul, because we were coming from Incheon(which is pretty close to Seoul) and there's an expressway linking Incheon to Yongin.

Last picture before we zonked out on the bus

We reached Everland around 9 or 10am. There was already so many people there, waiting for the gates to open. It was really cold, my nose started to become runny once I stepped out of the coach and I could see fog coming out of my mouth as I talked.

We first followed the tour guide to this safari attraction called Safari World. First, we had to take a chairlift down to the area where the attraction is. It was freaking scary, I was scared stiff. Probably because of the height. Lol. I have no fear of heights but I hate looking right down to the ground when I'm at somewhere at high up. It makes me feel as if I'm going to go crashing down to ground. I love roller-coasters and Gyro Drops but I hate taking the chairlift. Weird, aren't I?

Map of Everland. As you can see, it's really huge!

Taking the chairlifts. Look at my face, totally rigid. Lol. These pictures were taken by the photographer. Yeah, there's a photographer following every tour group.

Don't mind the weird magazine cover and wordings because like I said, these photos(those with words & images added on) were taken by the photographer. And their company edited it before selling them to us. It wasn't cheap though, 90,000₩ (S$110) for 16 photos complied into a booklet.

While waiting for our turn at Safari World. It was so cold even though I was wearing 4 layers. I refused to talk during the entire queue to conserve my energy. Honestly, I didn't even feel like talking when my nose was dripping like a water tap.

When it was our turn, we got onto a bus together with the rest of our tour group and the bus would bring us around the safari. It was like a real safari, with lots of lions, tigers, white tigers and bears just moving around our vehicle. I was totally amazed, because I've not been to a safari before. Night Safari doesn't count, they don't even have animals moving about freely (thank goodness they don't, I wouldn't want lions and tigers walking with me).

The Safari World also has this species which is a mix of a lion and a tiger. I'm not kidding! It's the offspring of a lion and a tiger. It's called a Liger. It has a face that resembles that of a lion and stripes on its body, similar to that of a tiger. You'll later see what I mean in one of the photos. And also, the Liger is sterile. Like what we learnt in the Evolution chapter of Biology, reduced hybrid fertility - the offspring is unable to reproduce. Just like the mule(offspring of a horse and a donkey). This is why Ligers are rare. Everytime you want to get a baby Liger, you have to go back to crossing the lion with the tiger. And that's very difficult because you know lions and tigers do not live together as a family. So usually when people want baby Ligers, they do it the IVF way. But that's done with the intervention of Man. The Liger in the Safari World was claimed to be conceived naturally. Apparently, the lions and tigers there are one big family. Haha!

Male lions

Lionesses (Female lions, in case you're wondering.)

I don't know what they're doing. Hehehe. =P

White tigers. So cute...from far. Bet they'll become nasty if anyone takes a step closer.

You know they say white tigers are rare? But I saw loads of them over there, lazing around.

Now you must be wondering why all the lions and tigers are sitting on rocks. The reason is, the rocks are fitted with heaters. In the cold winter, the animals will prefer sitting on them, which is good because one, the animals will not freeze to death, and two, visitors will have a clear view of them as they're seated on top of the rocks.

A Liger

Another photo of the handsome Liger.
Then we saw bears too, loads of them. The bears are so smart! When the our safari bus was approaching, they immediately know that there was food to eat, and they just walked by the side of the road and followed our bus. They knew that they had to do some tricks or stunts(some could even sort-of wave their hands/paws, as if they're saying 'Annyeong!') before the ranger would throw food to them. The thing is, each of the bears knows exactly what tricks it is supposed to do and where it's supposed to be positioned throughout the safari without the help of a keeper or a trainer beside it. There was also no chains, nothing. They were free to move about. And the bears had manners as well, they were taught not to eat the food until the bus leaves. Imagine how much willpower it must have taken to resist from the temptation!

Bear-bears

Top: One of the tricks, to sit and flash. Haha.Bottom: Trying to resist the temptation of picking up the food and eating it

Right: Another trick, to stand up and be as tall as the bus. Yes, it was almost as tall as the bus.

Zao-geng already! Hahaha!

We also went to Zootopia, a something like a stimulator ride. But I still think the one in HK Disneyland is the best.

After the Safari World attraction, we went for lunch at one of the restaurants. The food looked great. Unfortunately, I was having severe gastric pains that I didn't feel like eating much, I didn't even feel like walking to the counter to order my food. My Mum even had to help me order my Pork Cutlet Udon which I ended up eating only a few strands of udon.

Top left-hand: Pork Cutlet UdonBottom right-hand: Bibimbap Fried Rice or Kimchi Fried Rice or something like that, can't really remember.

After lunch, it was 3 hours of free & easy time at the theme park.

As you can see, the scenery of the theme park is gorgeous! Looks as if we were in the Alps instead.

This is actually what Everland is famous for. The T Express.

T Express is the steepest wooden roller coaster in the world at 77 degrees! It is also the world's 6th longest wooden roller coaster, and first & largest wooden roller coaster in Korea. In addition, it has the highest altitude, fastest speed and longest roller coaster attraction time in Asia. Wow, right? I'm usually a roller coaster person, but because it was wooden, I was scared and decided to give it a miss. =X Hahaha. And also because there were lots of people in the queue, which snaked all the way to another attraction!

You can almost see the entire roller coaster track here.

While waiting for our turn at the Haunted Mansion ride

Still within the Haunted Mansion.

The Haunted Mansion ride was awesome! I've never taken such a ride in any of the theme parks I've been to. It's like we were sitting in the house, then the house turned 360 degrees. But I could feel that the turn wasn't exactly 360, probably less than 90 degrees or so. My Dad says it's an illusion that makes people feel as though the house is turning one full round. I still don't know how it works.

Petting zoo. They have loads of animals there!

Racoons. They have this tightrope that the racoons can go across which was pretty cool because the rope just hangs above the area where we walk, so the racoons can just jump off the rope and escape, but I don't know why they don't do that.

Wallabies & kangaroos

Squirrels! They're the cutest things ever. Look at them nibbling the carrots & cucumbers!

Top left-hand: PenguinsTop right-hand: SealBottom: Tigers!

Polar bears. They had a vending machine allows visitors to buy food to feed the polar bears. My sis bought one, but I forgot what was food that the polar bears ate.

We took the chairlifts to the upper parts of the theme park.

Bottom middle: My sis and I took the Viking. The best Viking I've ever taken. It's higher and more thrilling than all the Vikings I had taken before.Bottom right-hand: My Dad played 'pop the balloons' and won us a wrist-rest. Lol. Yeah, he's good at target games. I remember when I first went to Escape Theme Park when I was younger, he played the water gun target game and won alot, my sis and I lugged home a soft toy each.

My Dad dragged us onto the Ferris Wheel. I don't really like being stuck in a small enclosed space and waiting for the capsule to complete one round. But you know, S'pore Flyer cost $30 per pax. Here, it's free!

View of the theme park from the top of the Ferris Wheel. The capsule's glass panels are blue, so that's why the pictures turned out blue.

In the capsule while waiting for it to touch ground

This reminds me of HK Disneyland. Pretty, isn't it?

We left Everland at around 3pm, after spending about 6 hours at the theme park, and headed back to Seoul. Another hour of journey.

While waiting for other members of the tour group to board the bus

Taken when we were getting out of Yongin

On the way back to Seoul. Last photos before I zonked out on the bus, again.

After an hour or so, we entered Seoul and our next stop was Dongdaemun for some shopping. Dongdaemun is the largest shopping area in Seoul, there's loads of clothes over there. I'm not kidding when I say there's alot of clothes. Even though I only had time to shop at one of the buildings due to the time constraint of the tour itinerary, the entire building was nothing but clothes. Well, multiply that by about 30(there are approximately 30 shopping malls in DDM that are similar to the one I went to) and you'll roughly get how much clothes there are in Dongdaemun, and that's not counting the stores that are set up in the DDM market.

The clothes were pretty cheap even though I went to Doota(because I don't have much time to shop around) which is supposedly the most expensive mall out of all the malls in DDM. For people who have more time on hand, try to go to the cheaper malls, I don't really know the names of them, I think there's one called U:US. But even at Doota, the clothes are still cheap. Say for example, a sweater in S'pore that sets you back at least S$80 or so probably cost around 20,000-40,000₩ (S$24-36) over there. They have loads of those winter coats with cute motifs (they look they're made of wool, but they aren't) that you can't find in S'pore. In S'pore, the ugliest winter jacket costs you at least S$100. Lol.

But I didn't buy much because the clothes are all winter clothes which I have no use for once I come back to S'pore. They were really thick(unlike the ones in Taiwan which I could still buy), I would die of heat-stroke even if I wear them in an air-conditioned shopping mall in S'pore! I only bought an off-shoulder long-sleeved top(which was like the thinnest I could find), among all the clothes in the entire building! But I would very much want to go back to Seoul in June where I can shop till I drop. Imagine how much summer clothings there would be for me to buy!

Doota! This was the only building in DDM that I went to. For those who watched Hot Blood, this is also the place where 2AM & 2PM held their Hot Blood Guerilla Concert.

It was Christmas Eve, so there was a concert outside Doota. Great way to beat the winter coldness, because there were lamp-post-like heaters all around.

Doota at night. But it wasn't night yet, it was only around 6pm. The sky darkens early in winter.

Next, we went for dinner at a Samgyetang(Korean Ginseng Chicken soup) restaurant. We ate ginseng chicken of course. The ginseng chicken soup was super delicious!!! The one in S'pore's Crystal Jade Korean Restaurant can't even compare to it!
Each of us was given a bowl of ginseng chicken soup, a few side dishes like kimchi, and a few shots of ginseng sake which you can either drink just like that or pour it into the soup. People usually pour it into the soup. I poured mine in. They also gave each of us a bowl of noodles and I put it into the soup too. Lol, I shouldn't have done that because I was so bloated after drinking half of the soup, and eating a few pieces of the chicken and the glutinous rice stuffed within it that I didn't even touch the noodles! Yep, each bowl of soup contains one whole chicken(it's a small young one, I don't what's that called in English but the Chinese calls it 童子鸡 or something like that). The chicken is stuffed with rice and ginseng. So, you're bound to feel full even if you think that it's just ginseng chicken soup.

Samgyetang

Outside the Samgyetang restaurant. Yeah, Paris Baguette is the bakery that 2PM & Kim Tae Hee did a Christmas CF for. Even bakeries have celebrities to advertise for them...the joy of living in Korea.

After dinner, we headed to the hotel which was about a 15 minutes' drive away. We were staying in Lotte Seoul Hotel which is a 6-star hotel in Jung-gu. Our tour package gave us very good hotels, we stayed in 6-star hotels on 4 out of our 6 nights there while the other 2 nights were spent in 5-star hotels.
Jung-gu is the heart of Seoul, translate Jung-gu into Chinese and you get 中区 which means Central District. Coincidentally, Hanja for Jung-gu is also 中区. Hmm, how do I explain what's Hanja? Just like the Japanese who have Hiragana, Katakana systems and Kanji which consists of Chinese characters, the Koreans also have Hangeul and Hanja. Hangeul is the type of Korean characters and language usually used in Korea now, that we don't understand unless we have learnt the Korean language. Koreans also have Hanja which consists of Chinese characters borrowed from Chinese and incorporated into the Korean language with Korean pronunciation. Hanja is not that commonly used in the daily lives of Koreans now, but it's sometimes still used to write personal names on official documents, in print media and at historic sites.
Okay, enough explanation about Hanja. As I was saying, Jung-gu is the central district of Seoul, it also where shopping malls, historic sites such as the palaces and gates(Namdaemun, 南大门 which is something like a fortress gate), landmarks such as the N Seoul Tower on Namsan mountain(where Goo Jun Pyo in BOF waited for Jandi on a freezing winter night and they took the Namsan cable car), and some of the government buildings could be found.
Lotte Seoul Hotel was like just a street across from Myeongdong(which is near Namdaemun). So after checking in and putting our luggage in our rooms, we took an underpass across to Myeongdong. More shopping!

Interior of our hotel

Beautiful!

Our rooms

View from our rooms

The toilet has an automated toilet bowl complete with a heater for the seat cover! No more shock from the coldness when my skin touches the seat. Hahaha.

There was free cookies in a stocking in every room because it was Christmas Eve!

Myeongdong was super crowded, not sure if it was because that night was Christmas Eve or it's just as crowded every night. But it was really great to be spending Christmas Eve in Myeongdong because whether it was the atmosphere or the Christmas lights, Singapore's Orchard Road was nowhere near it. When I saw the Christmas lightings stretching from Myeongdong area to our hotel to Cheonggyecheon Stream area, I was like 'Goodness, and they made so much hype about Orchard Road?' I swear, Orchard Road cannot compare to what I saw in Seoul. In Orchard Road, they decorated only the top of the trees with some lights, but in Seoul, they decorated the entire tree with lights. And there were so many trees lining the streets! Imagine how much money they must have spent on those Christmas lights! And you know, earlier in December, I went to Orchard Road and saw those sticks (that have lights coming down which looks like falling snowflakes) on the trees, I was like 'Wow, so pretty!' But guess what, I saw even more of them on the trees in Myeongdong, except they looked even more realistic, they really looked like falling snowflakes.

One thing though, Christmas in Korea is a couple's holiday, not a family one. It's like Valentine's Day. The restaurants and cafes were packed with lovey-dovey couples taking selcas(short for self-camera, meaning self-photos) on their phones/cameras, or even as far as wearing matching outfits and gloves that have 2 openings for 2 hands. I've seen lots of couples the entire day, at Everland and now at Myeongdong. But if you're one who's easily annoyed by couples being lovey-dovey with each other or if there are only so many girlfriends' pouty cutey blowfish faces and boyfriends' "ahhh, kieopda!!"(So cute!) moments you can take, I advise you to stay home or stay in your hotel for that matter. Lol.

Anyway, Myeongdong was really big. It was easy to get lost, especially when it was so crowded. Myeongdong was really fun, there was so much to see and so much to buy at Myeongdong. Myeongdong is also where most youngsters go to, probably because they sell stuffs that cater to teenagers. The prices are pretty affordable too. But I've been told not to buy stuffs that are from foreign brands, brands like Levi's, Calvin Klein, etc. They tend to be more expensive than that in S'pore because Korea imposes high tariffs on imported goods. In contrast, most of the Made in Korea stuffs are much cheaper than what we would get in S'pore, which explains why Korean cosmetics are cheaper there. That being said, my sister, however, got a pair of Vans for only about S$45, which is much cheaper than in S'pore. So, I don't think all foreign brands are necessarily more expensive. I would say that you have to try to see for yourself.

While in Korea, we had also been warned by the tour guide not to buy LV, Chanel, Dior or any of those branded stuffs there, it's not worth it because they're about 25-30% more expensive than in S'pore or any other countries, due to the high tariffs. And usually when you buy branded goods, you pay by credit card because I'm pretty sure you don't go shopping with a suitcase of bills. Paying by credit card is no-no in Korea, because they don't convert directly from Korean Won to Sing Dollars. They convert from Won to USD to SGD. And you know, exchange rates for credit cards(or most money changers) usually put you at the losing end because they know that you don't have enough cash money to pay for your purchases, that's why you're resorting to using credit card or changing more money. So if the exchange rate make you lose about 3% each time they convert, that means you lose 6% right away when you use credit card. 6% plus the 30% from the tariffs, say if you get a branded bag there that cost about S$3k, you probably can get it for about S$2k in S'pore, with S$1k left over to get a small branded purse or something. So, if you can help it, try not to pay by credit card for any of your purchases, always use cash money. And try to change enough Korean won to last throughout your trip.

Lotte Young Plaza and Lotte Shopping Mall which are just next to our hotel. Even the lights on the exteriors of the shopping malls own Ion Orchard's. Lol.

Myeongdong
I realised alot of bakeries including Dunkin' Donuts & Paris Baguette set up booths outside their stores to sell Christmas cakes on Christmas Eve. Those cakes were really popular and were selling like hot cakes over there, I saw alot of Koreans buying and carrying them home. Apparently, cakes are like a must for celebrating Christmas Eve over there. Those cakes weren't log cakes, they were just small cakes that were very beautifully decorated, like those that 2PM and Kim Tae Hee advertised for Paris Baguette. The cakes were so cute and pretty that I initially wanted to get one so that my family could celebrate with a cake, but later decided not to since eating a cake in the hotel room would be messy. Plus, by the time we got back to the hotel, it would already be around 1am.

So many food choices! TGIF, Outback Steakhouse, etc. I'd have loved to eat there but I ate dinner already. And oh, the Outback Steakhouse there is really a house! As in, the building in which the restaurant's in is shaped like a house.

BreadTalk. So surprised there was a Singapore brand there. I even saw a Rotiboy shop in another part of Myeongdong! Too bad nobody eats Rotiboy anymore in Singapore.

Samsung even has its own fashion line.

Bought this cuttlefish crackers from a roadside stall for 3000₩ (S$3.60). Super nice!
The stall was managed by two youngsters who looked like students. They were pretty nice, and tried to accommodate me when they knew I wasn't local. When I was buying the crackers, I asked 'Eolmaneyo?' (How much?) with my limited accented Korean, because I've heard that Koreans usually aren't used to hearing English, and even if they do understand and know how to reply in English, they usually just reply back in Korean (let's just say it has something to do with the Korean pride). So, I was trying to strain my ear and expecting to hear something like 'Sam cheon won' or 'Sa cheon won', but the guy told me 'Three thousand won'. At first I thought I heard wrongly, but he repeated it. Nice of him to use English so that I could understand. =)
Anyway, the stall also sold cuttlefish that were pressed using a machine so that they become flat and crispy like crackers. I think we can get that in Chinatown in S'pore, I remember getting one a few years back. But it was S$12. Now that I compare it with the Myeongdong one which costs only 4000₩ (S$4.80), I think it was such a rip-off. Lol.

My Bro got himself a Kebab Wrap

You can see how crowded it is

Another Dunkin' Donuts! Four stories high! Dunkin' Donuts is seriously popular in Korea, because everywhere I went, I saw Dunkin' Donuts, and most of them have multiple levels. There must have been like 5 Dunkin' Donuts outlets in Myeongdong alone!

Bottom right-hand: Nature Republic. Endorsed by Rain.

This was the area in Myeongdong where lots of people were giving free hugs.
Some of them were dressed in cute animal costumes better known as Kigurumi pyjamas. Yes, they're pyjamas that originated from Japan but they look nothing like pyjamas because they're so cute! They're pretty popular in Korea; DBSK wore them in Balloons MV, SHINee wore them in Hello Baby, Mir and Cheondoong wore them. But they aren't cheap, I checked online, they cost about S$80 each. Imo, 80 bucks for a pyjamas is a tad too expensive.

Here's Cheondoong wearing a Giraffe Kigurumi pyjamas if you want to know how they look like.

And here's SHINee in Hello Baby wearing Kigurumi pyjamas.
When we were coming out of Calvin Klein, this girl approached me, I saw that she was one of those giving free hugs. Well, people who know me knows that I don't hug others, I usually don't. But since it was Christmas and all, I decided to give her a hug. All in the Christmas spirit.! Then this guy in Kigurumi pyjamas(can't remember if it was a dinosaur or a frog), whom I think was the girl's friend, saw her thanking me. He came over and started talking to me in Korean, without realising that I didn't understand much of what he was saying. He only realised it when I was struggling to tell him 'Hanguk saram ahni-eh-yo'(I'm not Korean), he then switched to English. Even though it was not perfect, but I could understand him. He asked me how long I've been in Korea, complimented me and stuffs. Nice guy, honestly, I was quite surprised by this pleasant encounter because I've heard stories of how some Koreans avoid talking to foreigners because of the language barrier. But of course, there are also a few of them who are curious about foreigners and don't mind speaking to them in English. The girl and her friend was one of the few. =)
So yeah, Myeongdong's really a happening place. I'm not sure if those people gave free hugs just because it was Christmas Eve or they do the same thing every night. But one thing is for sure, the people there welcome these hugs. I saw that most of the Koreans, who walked past the area, hugged the free-hugs-givers when they were approached. And there were lots of free-hugs-givers! Imagine being hugged like at least 5 times before you can get past the area. Lol. But nobody tried to avoid them or anything. I can't say the same for Singapore though. When a Free Hugs Campaign was held in Orchard Road in 2008, the response was so poor, I believe you can still find a video of it on Youtube. Most of the people just walked past and ignored the free-hugs-givers. Some Singaporeans even had the nerve to go onto some forums, and said that they should send pretty girls and handsome guys so that people would want to hug them. They didn't even understand the message behind the campaigns and worse, some guys who were saying that they would only hug pretty girls, started exchanging information on the timings that a pretty free-hugs-giver will appear so that they could go and hug the girl. What the hell, ugly Singaporeans! Anyway, back to Myeongdong...

You see celebrity endorsement everywhere. I mean literally everywhere.Left: Wonder Girls for Vita500Right: AJ(Paran/BEAST, I don't know why he's in 2 groups) for BSX

Left: Kim Hyun Joong for Tony MolyRight: 2PM for Anycall Corby

You must have noticed from the photos by now that Myeongdong has alot Korean brand cosmetics shops. The Face Shop, Etude House, Missha, Tony Moly, Baviphat, Skin Food, Innisfree and many many more. If you're into Korean cosmetics, I recommend that you buy alot and stock up. Because most of the products there are cheaper than Singapore's by about 3 times or even more. Plus, they throw in lots of freebies(travel-sized bottles or sample packets of their new products) when you buy their products. You don't get that in Singapore.

Even before you enter the shop, you're just walking along the streets, they will shove freebies(boxes of cotton pads, the boxes have pictures of celebrities endorsing their products) to you, expecting you to take them. Within a night, my Mum got like 4 boxes of them, 2 from Tony Moly with Kim Hyun Joong's face on it, 2 boxes from Etude House with Lee Min Ho's and Park Shin Hye's faces on it. Lol. But a word of caution though, when you accept the freebies from the salesgirls, they will pull you into their shops and start recommending products to you. That's why most Koreans don't accept the freebies, but I doubt that will be the case in Singapore if they start giving out freebies here. Haha. For Singaporeans visiting Korea, like my Mum, I don't think shoving freebies and then dragging you into the store is necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I think it's more of a good thing because most Singaporeans visit Korea with the intent of buying loads of Korean cosmetics back, so why not just take the freebies they give you? But sadly, my Mum threw away 3 out of the 4 boxes of cotton pads she got once we got back to the hotel because she thought they take up too much space in the luggage. Lol. If I had brought them back, I bet I can sell them online for 5 bucks each and there will still be some Lee Min Ho-crazy or Kim Hyun Joong-crazy fans who will buy from me. Hehehe.

Anyway, after walking for a long time, my Dad, Bro and I wanted to have Starbucks and just chill while waiting for my Mum & Sis to finish their shopping. We walked into a 5-storey Starbucks in Myeongdong, went from the 1st level to the 5th(yeah, cafes & fast food chains usually have multiple levels), we couldn't even find a table! That was how crowded it was. Too bad it was full house or else drinking Starbucks in Myeongdong would be a whole new experience because if you get a window seat and look down, you'll see lots of people thronging through the street. Pretty cool, we don't have that in Singapore. I don't think we have a 2-storey Starbucks, do we?

So no Starbucks, we settled for Cola from Burger King. Lol. When you're thirsty, any drink will do. Lol. You must be thinking that we're crazy for drinking iced Cola in such freezing weather. But that's what makes it fun. Hehe. No big deal, we ate ice-cream on even colder days during our trip.

And oh, I was surprised that the Burger King was just a counter by itself, there was no tables, no seats nothing. So it's pretty much 'buy and takeaway'. Extreme, isn't it? Some fast food chains are like 5-storey high, but some are just holes in a building. Lol.

After finishing our Colas, we walked back to the area near our hotel to see the Christmas lights, and because we wanted to go to Cheonggyecheon Stream which is another Christmas hotspot just 500m ahead of our hotel. I did some research prior to leaving for Korea, that's why I knew where to go.

In front of Lotte Shopping Mall

Here's what I was talking about earlier. They decorate trees & structures entirely in Christmas lights.

Gorgeous!

And beside Lotte Shopping Mall is Lotte Star Avenue. There are 2 Lotte 'areas' in Seoul. Lotte Seoul Hotel and Shopping Mall, what you're seeing now, is in Jung-gu. There's another shopping mall, hotel and theme park in Jamsil, Songpa-gu which I went to on my second-last day in Korea. They're called Lotte World Shopping Mall, Lotte World Hotel and Lotte World Theme Park respectively. The star avenue in Lotte World Shopping Mall is also known as Lotte World Star Avenue. So the words 'Seoul' and 'World' make a large difference, using the wrong one may bring you to the other end of Seoul.
The concept of Lotte Star Avenue(or both Lotte Star Avenues, for that matter) is kind of similar to Hong Kong's Star Avenue. Both center around celebrities. The only difference is, Lotte Star Avenues don't have celebrities' handprints and signatures on the floor. In fact, the only handprint and signature I saw was Rain's, but it wasn't on the floor, it was on a pillar. The Star Avenue is basically a hall that has alot of huge billboards containing huge life-sized posters of the celebrities. The billboards contain mechanisms that enable the posters to be rotated every few minutes so that you can take photos with different celebrities or the same celebrities with different poses. Awesome place! If you were hoping to meet celebrities but didn't get to do so, here's the place to 'meet' them! Although it doesn't seem as good as the real deal, taking photos with the posters as memorabilia isn't that bad. Plus, even if you get to meet celebrities, most of time, you aren't allowed to take photos with them. So nobody will believe you'd met them anyway. Hahaha.
My only complaint? The lights in the hall are too dim and the ones from the posters are too bright, so when you stand next to the posters, you just turn out in the photos as black shadows next to the posters. LOL.
I don't know if it was because I was there too late at night and they've already closed for the day, but I only saw posters, no celebrities belongings or stuffs. Even though I didn't visit Star Avenue at Lotte World, I believe that there's much more things to see and do over there, because it has celebrities-related things on display. Plus, there are more celebrities endorsing the one at Lotte World, including Song Seung-heon(from Autumn In My Heart, Summer Scent & East of Eden) and Park Yong Ha (the handsome director in On Air). So I would recommend going to Lotte World Star Avenue.

Lotte Start Avenue

DBSK, Ji Sung, Rain, Choi Ji Woo

Ji Sung, DBSK, Big Bang

Yeah, Lotte is super rich, in fact it's one of the largest conglomerates in Korea. It can afford to have celebrities endorsing for their Lotte Duty Free shop. Having DBSK & Rain alone to endorse is no small sum, not to mention there are other famous celebrities like Big Bang and Choi Ji Woo.

Here's what I was talking about, the lights. I'm just a black shadow next to Yunho in the 1st picture. Lol. The 2nd picture is slightly better.

Top: Aaahhhh!!! A black ghost next to Rain!Bottom: Another shadow next to Rain & Ji Sung

Rain's handprint is big! Woohoo, I indirectly touched Rain's hand!!! (and the hands of a million other people, -.-)

DBSK

My Dad's more handsome(but shorter) than Rain! Hehehe. That's a life-sized cardboard figurine of Rain on the right so, yeah, my Dad's so much shorter than him. And in case you're wondering, no, my Dad's not a fan of Rain.

In front of our hotel

Actually I made a mistake while walking to the Cheonggyecheon Stream. We were supposed to just walk straight ahead from our hotel for less than 5 minutes, and we would come to the stream. But we walked to the left of our hotel and made a huge detour. Nevertheless, we did end up at the stream eventually. Even though it was cold, there were more things to see on our detour.

We saw this design festival, it was very crowded too. The laser light beams are cool, they're so powerful that they just shot right into the sky.

At the design festival

Cheonggyecheon Stream. It was beautiful!

I initially wanted to go down and walk the stretch of the stream. But see the mobs of people? They wanted to walk the stretch of the stream too. Hahaha. I decided not to go down in the end.

There were horse carriages on the roads of both sides of Cheonggyecheon Stream too! Haha, that's my Dad with one of the horses.
After that, we returned to the hotel at around 12am+ to retire for the night.

Day 3

Morning call was at 6am, we needed to assemble in the hotel lobby at 7am. But we set our handphone alarms to 5.30am because it seriously took us more than 15 minutes to put on that many layers of clothes.
We were leaving the hotel to have breakfast elsewhere. Most, if not all, tour groups in Korea do not have breakfast at the hotels. Probably because it's cheaper to have breakfast at some restaurants that the tour agencies are affiliated with. So that morning, we had breakfast at this Chinese restaurant about half an hour drive away. It's owned by a Taiwanese so the food, of course, was Taiwanese. Taiwanese porridge, fried rice, some stir-fried veggies, 茶叶蛋(tea eggs), 豆浆油条(soya bean & you tiao or fried bread sticks) and 肉包(Meat-filled buns). It was buffet-styled, the food was not bad, but I don't really have much of an appetite at breakfasts. Even at home, I almost never finish breakfasts which are just single slices of peanut butter bread & Milo. I think everyone welcomed the Chinese breakfast, especially having arrived in Korea for only 2 days, we weren't totally accustomed to Korean food yet.

Top: Random photo of The Westin Chosun Hotel, which was another hotel next to ours.
Bottom: What I had for breakfast. It wasn't alot since half of the plate was veggies. But this, is already considered alot in my definition of breakfast. Lol.

Driving past Hangang (Han River or in Hanja/Chinese, 汉江)

We headed to the east of Seoul and then out of Seoul. We were going to Mount Seorak which is about 3 hours+ away in Sokcho, Gangwon-do. I fell asleep before we were even out of Seoul. The next thing I knew, I woke up about an hour later shivering like crazy. I had to put on my winter jacket(I was holding it in my hands all the while because I thought it would be stuffy wearing it), my gloves, scarf and earmuffs. Despite being wrapped up like a dumpling, I was still shivering away. And the thing is, I was inside a bus! I was supposed to be feeling warm and cozy! Imagine how cold it would be outside!

Apparently, we had just entered Gangwon-do. Water droplets had condensed on the entire window that I couldn't even see the outside, I had to wipe them off with a tissue. When I finally saw the outside, it was almost entirely white! And it was beautiful! Snow on a Christmas morning, definitely a white Christmas. ^^ Well, it wasn't snowing, but I think it snowed earlier in the morning or the night before.

The guide told us that Gangwon-do has the lowest temperature in winter(average of -17°C but can reach as low as -30°C) among all the 'dos' in Korea. In case you're wondering, Korea has 9 'do'(道/provinces) - Gyeonggi-do(where Seoul is), Gangwon-do, Chungcheongbuk-do, Chungcheongnam-do, Gyeongsangbuk-do, Gyeongsangnam-do, Jeollabuk-do, Jeollanam-do and Jeju-do(where Jeju Island is). In each 'do', you have different 'si' (市/cities), like Seoul-si(pronounced as Seoul-shi, si is pronounced as shi), Incheon-si, Busan-si, etc. In each 'si', you have different 'gu'(区/districts). In each 'gu', you have different 'dong'(洞/neighbourhoods). And in each 'dong', you have different 'ro'(路/roads or streets). I put the Chinese translation before the English because it's easier to remember and understand because of the similarities between the Korean and Chinese pronounciation. Recap, entire South Korea > do (道/province) > si (市/city) > gu (区/district) > dong (洞/neighbourhood) > ro (路/road or street). So if you're writing to a penpal living in Myeongdong, Jung-gu, the address on the envelope would look something like this: South Korea, Seoul-si, Jung-gu, Myeong-dong, Eulji-ro, 1234 Beonji(meaning building no. or lot no.), 5J(floor no. & apartment no.). Note that it's written from 'big' to 'small', which is the reverse of writing a US address where you go from 'small' to 'big'. And yes, it is important to write the entire address as it is because say if you left out Seoul-si, the poor postman wouldn't know where to deliver the letter because Jung-gu merely means Central District. There are a total of 6 Central Districts or Jung-gus(in Seoul, Busan, Incheon, Daejeon, Daegu and Ulsan) in the entire South Korea.

That's a really long explanation about the do, si, gu, dong, etc. Lol. After about one and a half hours on the road, we came to Hwayang-Gang Land rest-stop. Took a toilet break, bought some more junk food from the convenience store there and 2 barbecued squids for 3000₩ (S$3.60) each. The barbecued squids were delicious! Cheap too, we can never get squids in Singapore for that cheap.

The rest-stop

Barbecued squids

Odette, which I got from the convenience shop. This is super good! It's cheap too, about S$4 for a box.

Go So Mi biscuits. This is nice too. It's even cheaper, only 1000₩ (S$1.20) for a box which consists 2 packets(on the left).

Crushed pear drink. Very refreshing! And Primo is another sweet biscuit. Also around 33000₩ (S$4) per box. Both Odette and Primo are great for desserts. For those who are conscious about their weight I guess, a biscuit for dessert is definitely not enough for me, I'll probably have to finish the whole box before I consider it a dessert. Lol.
After we were done with buying and eating, we were back on the road again. Another hour and a half to go before we reached the restaurant where we would have our lunch.

Taken while on the bus. It was so cold that the rivers were frozen.

It was so beautiful outside that I just kept snapping pictures.

I like this photo alot. I think it's nice!

Top left-hand: We passed by this small town which I had no idea what's it called. But the town was simple yet beautiful

Windmills!

Here I am, wrapped up like a dumpling

I've never watched either drama before. It's funny how I can read the drama title in Korean(it says Ja Myeong Go) but not the other drama title in Chinese(all I know is 大 something, I don't know how to pronounce the last 2 characters). Lol. 2 years without Chinese lessons has really taken a toll on my Chinese.

After an hour and a half, we finally arrived at the restaurant where we were going to have our lunch. Lunch was Soondooboo Jjigae(Soft Tofu Stew). Dooboo means tofu.

The Soondooboo Jjigae was delicious, the tofu was so soft that they kind of just disintegrate into tiny pieces in the stew. So when you're drinking the soup, you suck up the tofu as well. Lol.

The outside of the restaurant

Soondooboo Jjigae. It's usually made spicy, but I guess they made it non-spicy this time so that the children would have no problem eating it.

The side dishes. I love the pickled seaweeds, fried fish and egg skin/beancurd skin (I don't know if they're egg or beancurd or neither)!

After we were done with lunch, there was a fruit truck outside the restaurant. We bought 2 boxes of strawberries. They looked so huge(the picture doesn't do them justice. They were twice the size of the Korean strawberries that I get at Fairprice), red and sweet, yeah, we could taste that it was sweet just by looking. They cost 10,000₩ (S$12) per box. They're not really expensive because the ones I got in Taiwan were about the same price. People who visit these countries should really try their strawberries because they're so good that you probably won't buy any more strawberries in S'pore.

Surroundings of the restaurant. Really quiet and pretty.

Eating strawberries on the bus

Half an hour later, we arrived at Mount Seorak National Park. Mount Seorak(also known as Seoraksan) is the 3rd highest mountain in South Korea and the highest mountain in the Taebaek mountain range. The guide told us that Seoraksan can be written in Hanja/Chinese as 雪岳山 or 雪嶽山. The first, I think, it just means snow-covered mountain. But the second, when directly translated, means 'snow hell mountain'. Sorry, if it doesn't make any sense because there's no way to translate 雪嶽山 into English. It's just describing a snow-covered mountain as hell. The reason for the second way of writing had to do with Korean History. I don't know the exact story, History was never my thing so I wasn't paying attention to the guide.

The inner part of Mount Seorak is out-of-bound to the public because it has loads of Korean Ginsengs growing in it and is protected by the Korean Government or Military or something like that. Again, I wasn't pay much attention to the guide. So anyway, the public can only visit the outer part of Mount Seorak, which was where we went.

The entire park was really beautiful! We walked around the ground level of the park before taking a cable car, the cheater-bug method, up to the top of Mount Seorak. There were other hardcore mountain hikers, fully geared in their equipment, who took the hard way up. I don't know how they managed to reach the peak. I really can't imagine anyone reaching even half the height of Mount Seorak, because it's so tall and steep! Even though we took a cable car up, we still needed to climb for some distance(plus our trail was a comfortable one made for visitors who don't hike) before reaching the peak, correction, we didn't reach the peak because it was impossible to do so. We reached somewhere near the peak.

I like this photo too.

Entering the national park

A group photo

There's a Buddhist temple called Sinheungsa on the ground level of the park. The guide told us that a scene in My Name is Kim Sam Soon was filmed here, but I had no recollection of that scene. Probably because I watched it too long ago.

The temple is located in the inner areas of the park. But it has a Bronze Buddha statue near the entrance of the park. According to the guide, the Buddha statue is the largest 'sitting' Buddha statue in Korea. I'm not a Buddhist so I don't know, but I think there's many kinds of Buddha statues.

Bronze Buddha of Sinheungsa

Sinheungsa

The compounds of Sinheungsa

Photos with the tour leader & guide

The park's beautiful, isn't it?

That's the cable for the cable car. It goes to the top of the mountain. Amazing, right? I wonder how they constructed the cable car station on the mountain.

After we were done with exploring the ground level of the park, we waited at the cable car station for our ride. We had to wait until around 4.15pm because that was the time printed on our tickets.

While waiting, we got some food to eat. As if it wasn't cold enough, I got a cup of Mini-melts(they're called 'dipping dots' there) for 2000₩ (S$2.40). I think it's pretty cheap. The flavours were all written in Korean, luckily I could read Hangeul to order a cup of Rainbow-flavoured Mini-melts. The Mini-melts were so cold that the moment I put them in my mouth, they just stick to the lips, the tongue, and the sides and roof of my mouth. And when I tried to 'peel' them off, I felt as though part of my skin came off together with the Mini-melts. I've to admit that eating Mini-melts over there can be quite a painful experience. Not to mention that I was shivering from the cold after finishing that cup. Lol.

Mini-melts & Gim(seaweed)

When it was time, we hopped onto the cable car. There are a total of 2 cable cars in the entire system. But each cable car is quite big and can take 50 people each time. The view from the cable car was really breath-taking! The following photos were all taken while the cable car was ascending to the top of the mountain.

The view's totally awesome!

The ride lasted about 10 minutes. When we got out of the cable car station to continue climbing up to the peak of the mountain, I swear, it was so freaking cold that I've never felt this cold in my entire life. I think it must had been at least -20°C. Every breath of cold air was like a stab on my nose and it started dripping. And the wind was so strong that I was so afraid that I would be blown away! It's not very often(never, actually) a person my size would have the chance to say that he would be blown away by the wind. So, you can imagine how strong the wind was. I kept wrapping my scarf round my neck even though I thought I was going to be strangled to death by my own scarf, because I was afraid that my scarf would be blown off. Lol.

We started climbing up the trail to the peak. Even though this was the most comfortable trail made for visitors who do not hike, it was no easy feat at all! I wonder how those hardcore hikers were doing with their hardcore trails... Lol. With that kind of coldness and my hair slapping my eyes and face due to the wind(I wasn't wearing a beanie), it was difficult to see where I was going or where the next step was. Then, it started snowing, which made things worse. I mean, it's a good thing that it was snowing because it just make the entire experience even more beautiful but it also made the climbing more difficult.

Soon, before I was even halfway through the trail, I was panting like a dog, snot was dripping down my nose, the ends of my scarf was flying all over the place, my hair was all over my face, I was Sadako on Mount Seorak. What an unglam sight. I finally got to the peak after spending 20 minutes or more on the trail. The guide reached the peak earlier than I did and she's 40, while I'm 18! Felt so ashamed of my own fitness.

Anyway, the view at the peak was beautiful(I used that alot, don't I? Lol)! I know I said the ground level of the park was beautiful, the view from the cable car was beautiful and now the peak. I mean, every part of the park is beautiful in it's own way. Like, you can't see the close-up of the peak from the ground level and vice-versa. And with the snowing, it was indeed a white Christmas! ^^

The peak!

Sorry, for so many pictures of the same mountain. It was so beautiful(and I spent nearly half an hour on the trail) that I felt that I had to snap a few more photos.

I risked my life to allow the photographer to take this photo of me. One more step back, and I would have fallen off the cliff.

My parents. It was so cold that everyone in the picture(even those in the background) had some sort of headgear on.

The flash was alittle too bright. But you can see specks of snow. =D

On my way back down from the peak to the cable car station

We took the last cable car down to ground level. It was getting quite dark even though it was only around 6pm. We boarded the bus and headed for dinner at a restaurant about half an hour away. Dinner was Barbecued Pork and Squid. All the meals we had in Korea were delicious, but this meal has got to be one of the best. I like pork and squid, so a pork and squid combo was just <3!

Barbequed Pork and Squid, side dishes, Seaweed soup

The restaurant is a traditional 'sit-on-the-floor style' one

I tried a shot of Soju, but I really didn't like it. I don't understand why in Korean dramas, the actors or actresses keep gulping it down like water. Honestly, it tastes exactly like the alcohol we used in the Chemistry lab, not that I've tasted the ones in the labs before, but yeah, it just tastes, looks and smells like that.

Soju is wine that is made from rice, potato, wheat, barley, or tapioca. Usually has 20% to 45% alcohol content, depending on the type. The one I drank was around 19%, so it wasn't strong, but I just didn't like it. In case you didn't know, soju or most Korean alcohol are dirt-cheap over there. Like the bottle of soju I drank from, it cost only 1900₩ (S$2.30). Because it's from the restaurant, it's slightly more expensive(but it's still freaking cheap), if you get it at a supermarket or convenience store, it only costs about 1000₩ (S$1.20). Darn, back in Singapore, I can't even get a teh-peng with that kind of price at a coffee shop. And when I came back to Singapore, I went to Sol-mart(it's a Korean supermarket), the bottle of soju cost S$15, thanks to Singapore's heavy sin tax. I heard that if you try getting a bottle of soju in a Korean restaurant in Singapore, it costs at least S$30. Wow, that's totally marked up by 13 times. Anyway, the cheap alcohols in Korea explains why most Koreans drink, and why Korean dramas always have their characters drinking at roadside stalls. Lol.

It's the same case with cigarettes. A pack of cigarettes in Korea only cost about 3000₩ (S$3.60)? That's like 4 times cheaper than in Singapore. The imported ones are slightly more expensive, but it's still dirt-cheap cheap compared to Singapore. And that's why most Korean guys smoke, including some teenagers. Male celebrities smoke too. By celebrities, I don't mean the male idols/singers from idol groups because they're forbidden from smoking by their companies, but I mean celebrities who don't sing for a career, more specifically, the actors. Lee Minho, Jang Keun Suk, and alot more others, they all smoke. But here's something interesting, Korean girls don't smoke, or I should say that there are very few(and I mean really few) girls who smoke. In Singapore, if you're a girl and you smokes, nobody will even bat an eyelid. But if you're a girl in Korea and tries to smoke, everyone(both guys and girls) who walk past will give you dirty looks. It's sort-of a taboo for girls to smoke over there.

My face's alittle red from the soju. I don't know why I'm tilting my head like that, am I drunk? No no, it can't be, it was only a shot. Hahaha! And yeah, I wore the earmuffs even when I was eating.

After dinner, there was a truck selling crackers and snacks outside the restaurant. I got the seaweed crackers(above) for about 4000₩ ($4.80). It's the best crackers/chips I've ever eaten! But I don't know what's it called. =(

After dinner, we headed to the Kensington Flora Hotel which was an hour's drive away. It started to get really cold, even though we were inside the bus. By the time we reached the hotel, it was snowing rather heavily outside. White Christmas once more. When we got down from the bus, it was like a repeat of Mount Seorak. Lol. The snow, the strong cold winds...my hands were freezing. When we got into the hotel lobby, I just stuck myself in front of the fireplace while we were waiting for our room keys. Lol.

Kensington Flora Hotel is a 5-star hotel, but of course, being a hotel in the countryside, you can't expect it to be the same as a 5-star hotel in the city. It wasn't too shabby, in fact, I was pretty impressed because it was better than all the 10 hotels I've stayed in in Taiwan.

Hotel lobby

Merry Christmas!

Fireplace

Our hotel room. It's an ondol-style room. An ondol is underfloor heating, meaning that there's heat coming from the floor. You can just sleep on the floor because it's warm. That's what Koreans living in ondol-style apartments do. But I still prefer to sleep on a bed. Lol.

After putting the luggage in our room, we went down to the convenience store on the ground floor of the hotel. That's what I love about some hotels in Korea, they have convenience stores within them or nearby so that guests can buy food, snacks, gifts, toiletries, etc. That's what we do almost every night - supper, cup noodles, chocolates, biscuits, sweets, peanuts, milk, coffee, alcohol. No wonder I gained so much weight after returning from Korea. Haha.

The store has a large variety of everything that it looked like a mini-supermarket.

Some of the stuffs we got. The banana milk was so good that I bought that almost every night. Yeah, it's the banana milk which Yoogeun drank in Hello Baby, even kids love it, that's how good it was. I drank a strawberry one on one night, but I still prefer banana. It's fresh, as in they only sell the ones made on that day itself. And cheap, only 1000₩ (S$1.20) each. So yeah, I recommend anyone who's visiting Korea to go into any one of convenience stores and grab a bottle of those milk.
That night, I stayed up pretty late and watched Jang Keun Suk's interview on a programme called Christmas Party Style or something like that. =D

Day 4Morning call was at 6.30am. My sis and I woke up to snow on our balcony! Did the usual things, brushed teeth, got dressed and took our luggage down to the tour bus.

It was freaking cold outside, because it snowed last night. I didn't know about this, but our guide told us that whenever it snows, the next day will be very colder, even colder than the day before because when the snow melts, the cold air is 'concentrated' at the ground level rather than 'dispersed' into the atmosphere. I guess it made sense, like how hot air rises and cold air sinks.
After putting our luggage on the bus, we went for breakfast in the hotel. The reason why breakfast was in the hotel and not elsewhere because I don't think there was another restaurant within 5 miles radius of the hotel. We were in the middle of endless mountains and forests. Lol. Oh, I ate quite alot for breakfast because the food was good. There were some American-style breakfast like sausages, bacons, sunny-side-up eggs, fries. And I love the porridge best, it was so sweet and nice!
Anyway, I'm terribly sorry guys, I took quite a number of photos but there won't be many photos on this Day 4 account because I accidentally deleted most of the Day 4 photos. I was so heartbroken because we went skiing on Day 4, so there were lots of photos of us skiing and of the ski resort! Even if we return to Korea in future, I don't think we'll be going back to YongPyong Ski Resort because it's just too out of the way (2 hours away from Seoul), plus we don't really ski that much either, we only went for the experience. So I guess the photos at YongPyong would be lost forever. =(
And here's what happened, after I returned to Singapore, I tried to transfered the photos from my Dad's laptop to my thumbdrive. Stupid me decided to 'cut & paste' instead of the 'copy & paste' that I usually do. Halfway through the pasting, I realised that there was an overlap of some files, and stupid me decided to click cancel. >.<
Fortunately I still have some pictures that I can write this travel account with, but they aren't the ones I took with my camera. They are taken by the photographer, complied into the photograph booklet we bought and I scanned them into the computer. Again, the photos were edited by the photographer so pardon the weird English wordings.
After a lifetime of words, let's continue with the travel account. So, after breakfast, we hopped onto the bus and went to this ski equipment rental shop which was around 15 minutes away. We got our ski jackets, ski pants, ski gloves, ski goggles, snow sledges. We rented the snow sledges for 10,000₩ (S$12) each, we rented 2 of it, while the rest were all free and included in our tour package. Here's how we wear our ski equipment, we all go into this room(girls to one room, guys to another), everybody stripped right down to our thermal wear, and put on the ski jackets and pants. If you're thinking that it would be cold and are deciding to wear another layer like your jeans and sweater, please don't. That was what I was apprehensive about at first, because 2 layers(thermals+ski jacket) doesn't sound warm at all. But I just listened to the guide and wore only my thermals and the ski suit. It turned out that the ski suit was a superb insulating piece of clothing! I was so surprised at how warm it was(it wasn't the warm sort that makes you perspire buckets of sweat, but it blocks out all cold winds). I wore just that and my thermals for the entire day at the ski resort, my body didn't feel cold at all, not even when the temperature dropped to around -10°C at the ski resort. What actually happens if you wear an additional layer instead of just thermals and ski suit is that, all that layers would obstruct your movements while you're skiing and you end not just looking clumsy, but also being clumsy. You keep falling, and after you fall, you can't get up because all that clothes are preventing you from doing so. You wouldn't have fun skiing at all, you'll just sit at a corner looking like a grumpy dumpling.
By the way, the ski equipment rental shop is not located in the ski resort, it's just along one of the roads leading to the ski resort. I saw many of such rental shops along the roads, I guess it's cheaper to rent those equipment at these shops than at the ski resort itself. But what I do not understand is, how do these shops survive? There was really many of these shops, probably around 50 of them, all renting about the same things. Each shop has at least a hundred ski jackets, a hundred ski pants, a hundred ski gloves, a hundred ski gloves, a hundred ski goggles, a hundred snow sledges, a hundred skis and another hundred snowboards. And ski equipment aren't cheap, a jacket cost an average of S$150 and a pair of skis cost like a thousand. When I got to the ski resort, I realised that most of the Korean families there are frequent skiers and own their own ski equipment, including their skis and snowboards. So other than tourists who rent from the rental shops, I doubt there are anyone else who rent from them. How do the shops survive when they hardly have any business, save for the few tourists?
Anyway, after getting all our skiing equipment, we went for lunch at a restaurant about an hour away. Steamboat and Saba fish. I don't know how they cooked it, but it was the best Saba I'd ever eaten in my whole life! The entire plate was wiped clean at the end of the lunch. After lunch, we head to YongPyong Ski Resort which was pretty nearby.
We didn't check in first, but instead, we went to take the Gondola(or cable car) to the peak of the ski mountain. Unlike most of the Koreans who had their skis with them and took the Gondola so that they could ski down from the ride, we did not have our skis with us and took the ride for the fun of it, just to admire the ski slopes. The Gondola ride last about 20 minutes because the peak was really high up. Most the skiers who goes up to the peak are the pro skiers. With such a high peak and steep slopes, anyone who's not a pro would probably just fall or roll to his death. Lol. Anyway, the scenery from the cable car was really gorgeous! You can see almost the entire ski resort and its different ski slopes, it was just simply beautiful! It's such a pity that the photos were deleted because I really snapped alot of photos. =(

Dad & Mum. This was taken by my tour leader, she sent the photo to us.

We shared the Gondola with this Korean businessman who was there to ski. He does business overseas, so his English was perfect. My family and the tour leader chatted with him, his name is Mr Chung. And it turned out that he had stayed in Singapore for a period of time. He was nice, yes I'm very grateful that all the people I met on this trip were really nice people. I had yet to meet any unpleasant people, not that I want to meet any anyway. Mr Chung saw that I was snapping pictures of the awesome scenery, but because the windows were kind of dirty from the snow, the photos didn't turn out very clear. He told me that I could actually pushed down the windows(which I had no idea of) so that I would have better pictures, and helped me pushed them down. Before he left, he wished us a happy and safe trip. When I went to Taiwan, the strangers who sat at the next table did the same too. Nobody ever does that in Singapore. That's why I'm really impressed by how nice the Koreans and Taiwanese are.
Anyway, when we reached the peak of the mountain, it's called Dragon Peak by the way, I went to the area where all the pro skiers were getting ready to ski down the mountain. The cold was no joke! I think it was around -15°C or even colder at the top of the mountain. I know I said the ski suit was warm and all, but my face wasn't covered, I felt like my face cracked the moment I stepped out there! And I've to say that the ski gloves weren't warm at all, my hands were freezing even in the Gondola on the way up. I thought my fingers were going to freeze and drop off. If you have your own woollen gloves or those made of similar material, I would recommend you to wear them and then wear the ski gloves over them. I forgot and left my own gloves on the bus instead of bringing them with me.
The winds on top of the mountain were so strong that when I stepped out in the open, I couldn't breathe at all, I was just being suffocated by the wind. You might think that this is ridiculous, I'm making this up, but I'm not. When I faced the direction the wind was coming from, it was like the wind was trying to force air up my nose but because the wind was too strong, the air just 'escapes' away because it can't be forced so quickly into 2 small nostrils. I could breathe much better when I turned to the other direction with my back against the wind.
After a few minutes in the open, I couldn't stand it any further and went back indoor to the Gondola station. I wonder how those pro skiers can endure the cold and suffocation? Oh yes, Dragon Peak was a filming location for a scene in Winter Sonata. There was a number of Bae Yong Joon and Choi Ji Woo posters in the station. I've never watched Winter Sonata before so I had no idea then, but after googling to find some images to show you guys a picture of the Gondola station, I realised that Winter Sonata was not only filmed at Dragon Peak, but also at many locations in YongPyong! And one of them was the hotel I stayed at in YongPyong! YongPyong's really huge, it has 5 different condominiums, a hotel, a hostel, 31 ski slopes(!!!) and a golf course, plus other amenities like swimming pools, shopping plazas.
Anyway, I found this chart on the VisitKorea website which pretty much summarizes all the Winter Sonata filming locations in YongPyong:

We took the Gondola back down to ground level, went to the shopping plaza to buy some sort of ski masks to cover part of our faces since our faces were already freezing even before we started skiing, I don't know what would happen when we actually ski. The masks weren't really expensive, only 10,000₩ (S$12) each. I picked one with pretty flowers motifs. The masks covers the lower part of our faces, so it kinda made us look like bandits. Lol. So, there was only use for it at the ski resort. Wearing it in Seoul would well...attract loads of attention. Haha!
After that, we went onto the bus to get to Dragon Valley Hotel, that was how big YongPyong was that we actually needed to take a bus ride from one part to another. Checked into the hotel, put our stuffs in our room, rented our skis and went skiing. Actually, there was an introductory lesson before we started skiing. Yeah, learned some basics and we were off! Haha.

Group photo at YongPyong

Sis and Mum

Dad

Sis

Bro

Me! I think you can see the mask that I'd gotten in this picture.

Hmm, how shall I say it? After skiing for nearly 2 hours, I conclude that skiing's not my thing, give me ice-skating any day. The ski boots were very heavy and so tight around my calves area that I felt so restricted, I could hardly move freely. Okay, I know my calves are fat, and I know that's the way the ski boots should be worn so that the boots are not loose and I won't sway left or right while I skiing, but really, skiing is too tiring for me. Honestly, skiing is easy, much easier than ice-skating because you don't have to worry about maintaining your balance since your feet are flat on the ground and the basics are just knowing which position to poke your ski sticks, pushing yourself forward with the sticks, how to get up after falling, and of course, braking/stopping. But if you aren't a pro, it takes way too much time and energy to go up even a small slope in those tight and heavy boots, only to ski down the slope in a matter of seconds. If you're a pro, you kind of have it easier because you have the Gondola or the ski chairlift to bring you to the top of the slope, but like I said earlier, those slopes really dangerous and are definitely not for everyone.

I gave up after 2 hours at skiing, my hands were really freezing by now, I couldn't really feel my own fingers anymore. Was so worried that I would get frostbites. Lol. Fortunately I didn't.

I met another nice Korean while skiing. There was this little girl who was also skiing and she knocked into me from behind. I didn't see her at all so there was no way I could have avoided her unless I had eyes at the back of my head. I lost my balance and fell onto my butt. Her mum quickly came over and started apologizing profusely 'Choesong hamnida, choesong hamnida.'(Sorry). I, in turn, was saying 'Gwaenchanayo, gwaenchanayo'(It's ok, it's ok) profusely. I mean, everyone falls while skiing, plus the girl was really young, probably around 5, she was also a beginner and definitely didn't mean to knock into me if she could help it, she also fell down too. I tried to get up using what the instructor taught but I couldn't, I didn't have that much strength! I was supposed to push the ground with my right hand and push myself to the left so that I could stand up on my skis. Apparently, the instructor's methods weren't working and my butt was still on the ground, I couldn't get up! The little girl's mum saw that I was struggling to get up, she held me from under my shoulders and helped me up. I was like 'Kamsahamnida!'(Thank you). Such a nice lady! ^^

After deciding not skiing, I went back to the locker area to get my shoes. It was so difficult to walk with the ski boots on, I think I took like 15 minutes just to get to the lockers. Upon reaching, I realised that the keys were with my Mum and I didn't know where she was. So I just sat there and waited and waited and waited. I was feeling incredibly cold, my hands were still freezing even though I was already indoors. The heater weren't helping at all. I think I waited for nearly 2 hours before my Mum and Sis came back. By then, I had already caught a cold and was feeling feverish. -.-

After my entire family came back from skiing, we returned our skis and went for dinner at this Japanese Ramen Restaurant called Hatoya. It's located in the shopping plaza. After my Dad, bro and I decided on our orders, I turned to the waiter, wanting to say 'Hatoya Ramen sam-gae juseyo'(Please give me 3 Hatoya Ramen. I don't think 'gae'/个 is the correct unit for bowls of ramen, but my Korean isn't fantastic. It does sound alittle weird but I think Koreans will get what you mean, just like when you say 三个拉面 in S'pore, lol). I ended up stuttering 'Uhhh...uh..', not because I was struggling with my Korean but because I was stunned by how much he looked like the younger version of Lee Minho! I'm not kidding, I initially thought Lee Minho came to YongPyong to work. Lol.

Okay, the food was...I don't know, I barely ate one-third of my ramen because of my throat which felt like sandpaper. But my family all finished their ramen so I'm guessing it was not bad. It wasn't expensive either, 10,000₩ (S$12) for a bowl. After dinner, we walked back to the hotel. By then I was running a high fever, and my limbs and joints were aching(I don't know about you guys, but this always happen to me when I've a fever). I was shivering (it was even colder now that the sun had set) and could hardly walk straight on the way back, I think I was swaying left and right like a drunkard. Got back to my room, told my family to count me out of their snow-sledging. Yeah, they were planning to go back to the ski slopes, this time with snow sledges instead of skis. I kind of regretted not joining them in their snow-sledging because it's much more fun than skiing. Like, you don't have to learn to snow-sledge in order to snow-sledge, you just sit on it, sledge down the slope and have a time of your life! But I knew myself well enough to know that I was in no condition to go snow-sledging.

So I popped 2 Panadol Flu-max and another 2 anti-inflammatory tablets, and went to take a nap. Those pills worked wonders! I woke up about an hour later (actually I was woken up by the loud music blasting outside), feeling like I didn't have a fever or cold in the first place!

My family soon came from their snow-sledging and I guess everyone was starting to feel hungry already, we went to the convenience store which was just across the hotel lobby to get suppers/snacks. While coming back from the convenience store, I saw this poster in the hotel lobby:

I was like 'OMG OMG OMG!!! MBLAQ and f(x) are here?!?! WHAT TIME IS IT NOW???', almost screaming at my sis. Lol. She told me it was already 10pm+. But the poster said the concert started at 9pm! So apparently, the music which woke me up from my nap was from MTV The M Winter Special Concert. >.<

To my surprise, there weren't many fans, the audience was pretty small, considering that there's MBLAQ, f(x) and Ivy among the performers. I guess because it was YongPyong, 200km away from Seoul, countryside and all. Those people my sis saw queuing earlier were actually queuing for seats, but those who came later could just stand around and watch without much obstruction. My sis and I braved the -13°C cold, and stood together with the other skiers. I took two fancams, one for each group. But halfway through MBLAQ's performance, my hand started to shake, I didn't know if it was because of the cold or because my hands were getting tired from holding the camera up. Lol. My nice sis took the camera from me and helped me film the rest of the performance. So the fancams you're seeing below wouldn't have been possible if not for my sis. ^^

MBLAQ - G.O.O.D Luv

f(x) - Chu~♡

Look at what MBLAQ was wearing in the -13°C cold, it must had been freezing for them! After the concert ended, almost everyone scrambled indoors where it was warmer. I kind of regretted not hanging around after the concert so that I could go up to MBLAQ or f(x) to get a close-up fancam of them. Hahaha.

Anyway, my sis and I returned back to our room after that and ate our supper. Kimbap! It was only 1000₩ (S$1.20) for an entire roll of kimbap! My sis also got a small version of those Korean mayonnaise for 700₩ (80 cents)? Freaking cheap. Kimbap + mayo is just love! ^^ And of course, we bought milk too.

The Starbucks Seattle Latte was only about 3200₩ (S$3.80) from the convenience store.Last photo: I decided to buy strawberry milk made by a different company, it's the carton one. About 800₩ (S$1), slightly cheaper than the one in yakult-like container which was 1000₩ (S$1.20)
It's written 'Seo-ool ooyoo'(Seoul Milk) on the carton. When you're in Seoul and the neighbouring provinces, it's Seoul Milk. But when I got to Jeju, it's called 'Jeju ooyoo'(Jeju Milk), probably because the milk was obtain from the cows on Jeju Island. Lol. Hmm, I still prefer the banana milk in the yakult-like container! =P

Day 5

Early morning call again. Packed and went out to the lobby at 7am. It was -15.7°C outside, probably one of my coldest days there.

-15.7°C at YongPyong

It was pretty cold when we walked to the restaurant on the another part of YongPyong for breakfast, but I guess the beautiful empty ski slopes at dawn made up for it. It's not always that you get to see the slopes empty. =)

Concert venue for MTV The M Winter Special Concert last night

Top left-hand: So cold that even the stream was frozen

Last: My breakfast. There was yogurt!

After breakfast, we boarded the bus and headed back to Seoul.

Here's the Hello Kitty phone charm which I got for only 1000₩ (S$1.20) from the Gachapon (the toy vending machine in which you put your coin and turn the crank to get a toy capsule)

Bye YongPyong!

What else could I do on the bus other than to catch up on my beauty sleep? I only slept an average of 5 hours every night there, blame it on the TV! Lol.

About an hour into my sleep/our journey back to Seoul, we came to this rest stop. It was one of the nicest rest stops I had ever seen. The toilets were like 'whoa, is this even a toilet?' They had restaurants and food stalls. The architecture was just awesome. Totally impressed by what I saw. I never knew a rest stop could look this amazing.

Rest stop

My Dad got this from the rest stop. 4 for 1600₩ (S$2). I've no idea what they're called, but it's hot pancakes with lotus paste filling or something and they are really good!

See the Hangang? Yeah, we finally reached Seoul after another hour.

We reached Itaewon-dong, Yongsan-gu at around 11am, supposedly for lunch but since it was alittle too early for lunch, we had some free and easy time. Itaewon is a popular place in Seoul for foreigners and US Military personnel(because of the US Army base in Yongsan), and I do believe that Itaewon has one of the highest number of foreigners living in an area. Most of the shops here have signs written in English and some of these shops are actually owned by foreigners.

Itaewon has 2 different sets of Hanja interpretation, 梨泰院 and 异胎院. The latter references the 1592-98 Japanese invasion where the Japanese army occupied Seoul and raped the Buddhist nuns residing in Unjeong-sa temple in Hwanghak-dong(current Itaewon area). Some of the nuns became pregnant and built a tent house where they later gave birth to the children. People started calling the place 异胎院, 异 means different or foreign and 胎 means pregnancy. So 异胎院 means a place for bearing foreign children. But since the name brings up a sad past, it's generally not used now. It is said that someone planted a pear(梨) tree in that area many years ago and it grew very well, so the name 梨泰院 is used instead.

Itaewon is a good place to go to if you're looking for bars, nightclubs, restaurants serving foreign cuisine or just looking for a place where you can be exposed to the Korean culture but at the same time, be in a English-speaking environment. But I wouldn't say that you would be 'immersed' in the Korean culture, if you would like to do that, I would suggest that you visit other neighbourhoods besides Itaewon. Imo, it's kind of difficult to learn more about a culture when you're in an environment which is similar to what you have back home.

Although I didn't visit Itaewon in the night, but I've heard that while Itaewon does have a vibrant nightlife scene, it can sometimes get rather 'complicated' at night. Fights among drunk foreigners, wasted people on the streets and prostitution, mostly by Russian prostitutes. That's why some Koreans regard the area as a no-go. There's a red light district in Itaewon called Hooker Hill. And there are 'happy ending' barber shops where men can actually get haircuts and also something more substantial. Lol. Kind of like those massage parlors in S'pore's Geylang except that you get a haircut instead of a massage. Haha.

But I guess if you're just there for the international cuisine, there shouldn't be a problem. Just be careful not to be ripped off. Because many tourists and foreigners visit Itaewon, sometimes the prices may be jacked up ridiculously. But do note that foreign cuisine may sometimes be alittle more expensive than what you have back home, that's pretty normal, not a rip-off.

Itaewon

Flags of different countries lining the streets of Itaewon

With my bro

Itaewon subway station

I just love how the cafes in Korea are! If I wasn't with a tour group, I would definitely order a coffee in one of those cafes and spend my entire day lazing around, doing some reading or drawing.

Nichkhun's poster

Khunnie for Amazing Thailand!

Slabs containing information of different countries on the sidewalks

After spending about half an hour walking the streets of Itaewon, we went for lunch at 11.30am at a restaurant, also in Itaewon. The reason for the early lunch is that we had a flight to catch in the early afternoon. Lunch was Dwaeji Bulgogi(Grilled Pork BBQ). Another great lunch! Best of all, there was free flow of grilled pork! You must have guessed by now that I love grilled or BBQ food. Hahaha!

We finished everything, and even got second helpings.

That's the way I wrap my grilled pork in veggies together with rice, kimchi, seaweed, some sauce. Tastes really good!

From the window of the restaurant, the typical Korean neighbourhood apartment you see in Korean dramas.

After lunch, we headed to Gimpo International Airport, which was half an hour away, to catch a 2.10pm flight to Jeju Island.

Hangang

And more of Hangang

One of Korea's tallest buildings, 63 Building on Yeouido. As the name suggests, there are 63 storeys. It's not really tall, in current standards. There are still some Korean skyscrapers which are taller than it. And there had been proposals for Korea to build the world's second tallest building soon, after Dubai's Burj Khalifa.

KBS Hall

Hangang again. There are 27 of those bridges across the river.

Gimpo International Airport

Gimpo International Airport is more for domestic flights and flights to Osaka, Tokyo, Shanghai and a few other areas nearer to Korea while Incheon International Airport is for the rest of the international flights.

SS501 for Korea Airports Corporation. Do you even need celebrities for airport corporations?

SNSD and Big Bang for Cyon (LG)

Top: Kim Ha Neul for some credit cardBottom: 2PM for Anycall (Samsung) Corby

Just look at how many celebrities endorsements there are at the airport alone!

Our flight was at first delayed by 30 minutes because the previous flight landed late and then by another 30 minutes because it started snowing quite heavily. We only landed in Jeju at around 4pm. We would have arrived in Jeju at around 3pm if not for the delay since a flight from Seoul to Jeju is only a short 50 minutes. I fell asleep throughout the flight, the next thing I knew was my mom waking me up.

Jeju's landscape, taken just before landing.

It was raining when we got out of the plane. There was no covered walkway connecting the plane to the airport, we had to take a short bus ride.

Lee Minho for Dunkin' Donuts

2PM and Kim Tae Hee for Paris Baguette. Celebrities' endorsements even at Jeju Airport!

Jeju International Airport

Yakgwa(Korean Traditional Honey Cookies) which I got from a convenience store for only 500₩ (S$0.60). Cheap, but I didn't find it particularly nice. It's very hard(I thought my tooth was going to fall out from eating it) and too sweet. I don't know, maybe because I'm not used to eating it.

After getting out of Jeju Airport, we took the bus to our first attraction on Jeju, the Mysterious Road(also known as Dokkaebi Road or Ghost Road), which was about 15 minutes away. As the name suggests, there's something paranormal about the road. Our bus stopped on the road and the bus began to go uphill when the engine was switched off. It was so scary!

A story has it that a newly-married couple went on a honeymoon in Jeju (in case you did not know, Jeju's a honeymoon island for many Korean couples). While driving at night, the wife suddenly had to use a toilet urgently, so the husband stopped the car next to the toilet and got off the car to accompany his wife. When the wife came out from the toilet, both the husband and wife found that their car had disappeared. It wasn't next to the toilet anymore, and they finally found their car far ahead on the road. They were so scared, I mean cars don't move by themselves when the engines are switched off, do they? The couple fled in their car and since then, the road was named Mysterious Road or Ghost Road.

Sorry, I couldn't take a photo of the road because everyone, being curious, scared and all, was standing up on the bus. But I found a photo and a Youtube video that will allow you to see why there's something supernatural about Mysterious Road.

The road is going uphill

Nah, I was just kidding about the supernatural part. The vehicle really did move when the engine was switched off, but it actually moved downhill instead of uphill. What we saw was just an illusion. Due to the lack of a true horizon, subconsciously our judgement of a slope is misled by the false horizon in that area, that's why we were tricked in believing that it's an uphill ahead.

We headed to Yongduam(Dragon Head Rock) next. Yong means dragon, du means head, am means rock, so Yongduam literally means Dragon Head Rock. Yongduam's an unusual basalt rock formation from a volcanic eruption 2 million years ago in the shape of a dragon head. Legend has it that an envoy sent by the Dragon King to gather the elixir of life on Mt. Halla(Hallasan), was shot down by the angry guardian spirit of Hallasan. The fleeing dragon fell into the sea and turned into rock with his head still surging towards the sky.

Some souvenir shops outside the Yongduam

Dol hareubang
Dol means stone, hareubang is a Jeju dialect word for grandfather. Grandfather in standard Korean is called harabeoji. So there's some similarities. The Dol hareubangs are found nearly everywhere on Jeju, They are considered to be gods offering both protection and fertility, and were placed outside of gates for protection against demons travelling between realities. I think it means that they protect against evil spirits or something like that. The above 2 stone statues are actually 2 different Dol hareubangs. Yeah, they have different names(sorry, I can't remember them) and different roles. Notice the hands of both Dol hareubangs are placed differently. The one on the right has his right hand placed higher while the one on the left has his left hand placed higher. According to the guide, if you want wisdom, touch the one with his right hand placed higher up, but I can't remember where the guide said to touch. Lol. The one with his left hand placed higher offers fertility. If you want a baby boy, touch the nose and if you want a baby girl, touch the ears. Everyone wants a son and nobody wants a daughter, judging from how black the nose is and how clean the ears are. Hahaha. Apparently, the preference for sons is still strong. The Dol hareubang's stomach is black too, but I can't remember what does touching of the stomach offers? Lol. Probably health or wealth. Anyway, back to Yongduam.

Dragon Head Rock. The building behind kinda spoils the photo. The rock doesn't look totally like a dragon head, but I guess imagination is needed in order to appreciate the rock.

It was cold even though it was only 5°C because of the strong winds along the coast.

The waves were beautiful, so I decided to take some videos(below). Sorry for the poor sound quality though, those were the sound of the strong winds.

龙头岩(Yongduam)

A ground split open by volcanic eruptions. Jeju's a volcanic island so basaltic rocks are very common on the island.

Ate this seaweed crackers we bought 2 days ago. Freaking good!

After Yongduam, we went to this underground shopping mall, don't know what's the name of it. The shopping mall was great, cheap and wide variety, like a mini-Dongdaemun. if only they sold summer clothes. =(

We passed by this temple(is 亭 a temple or a palace? I don't know) while walking to the underground shopping mall.

Entrance of the underground shopping mall. Looks shady right? Haha, but it's not, just that there weren't enough lights near the entrance.

You can't see it clearly in this photo, but there were more than 200 shops I think.

After shopping, we went for dinner at a restaurant about 15 minutes away. Dinner that night was Black Pig Meat. Heuk Dwaeji(Black Pig) is found on Jeju, so black pork is eaten very often. The one we ate that night was just cooked and sliced, but we did try grilled black pork for lunch the next day. Black pork isn't really black though, it just look like regular pork. But imo, it's slightly tougher than ordinary pork.

Black pork

Hangeul words on the ceiling of the restuarant

After dinner, we went to watch Nanta, a Korean non-verbal comedy performance. It was shown in Singapore a few years back but the tickets were hell expensive. S$200+ for one. It's cheaper to catch it in Korea, 40,000₩ (S$50) each.

Nanta integrates dance, acapella singing, martial arts, acrobatics, pantomime, traditional Korean Samul Nori music performed with improvised instruments like cutting boards, kitchen knives, water canisters, all into one performance. I haven't watched alot of performances before, but it was the best performance I've ever watched. Love it! I'm so impressed at the performers, they were so talented! No, that's an understatement, they're outstanding all-rounded entertainers. Imagine mastering every aspect that I've mentioned above! Plus they use real knives and food, so there's dangerous knife-work involved. If they weren't careful, they could have easily chopped of their own fingers during their performances or practices.

Nanta performs nearly everyday, so I can imagine that the performers does nothing but training, training and more training. It must have taken lots of hardwork and talent in order to pass the auditions for Nanta.

For those who would like to catch Nanta, but won't be in Jeju, there's also Nanta performances at 3 other locations in Seoul - Myeongdong, Gangbuk Jeong Dong and Gangnam.

Ticket

Photography and video-recording aren't allowed during the performance, so these was all I took before the performance started.

We headed to the hotel after the performance ended. The hotel was about an hour's drive away. While on the road, it started snowing heavily. The roads were snow-filled and slippery. But bus driver ajusshi was driving with such speed that it scared the hell out of us. To make matter worse, a car which was travelling next to our bus at about the same speed suddenly skidded and crashed into the forest. It was nothing serious, it just veered off the tracks and went into the grasses. Lol. But I don't think it would be the same for a bus if it skidded. I guess we were really fortunate that nothing happen, thank goodness.

While on the journey to the hotel, the guide got news from her colleague with another tour group that we were really fortunate that our flight to Jeju earlier in the afternoon was shifted forward. Okay, actually our flight was scheduled to be at 4.30pm, but my guide called the airline to ask if they could shift our tour group to an earlier flight if there were seats available. The reason for doing that is so that we would have enough time to visit all the attractions on Jeju, otherwise we probably would have rush throughout our itinerary on Jeju or worse, miss out on some attractions. So that's why our flight was shifted to 2.10pm. But remember I said that even our flight at 2.10pm was delayed by an hour because of the snow? It turned out that our flight was the last that was allowed to take off because the snow got worse and they delayed all other flights by another 5 hours. Had we been on the later flight, we would probably reach the hotel at only 12midnight, without the Dragon Head Rock attraction, underground shopping mall, dinner and Nanta.

We reached the hotel at around 10.30pm and checked in. Our hotel was Lotte Hotel Jeju, another 6-star hotel. It's located at nearly the most southern tip of Jeju, which means the most southern tip of Korea since Jeju is the southern-most part of Korea. We would be staying at the same hotel for 2 nights. The hotel's amazing, it's super huge, has a casino, a super duper nice swimming pool(but it was too cold to be swimming), ice-skating rink, windmills, etc. Yes, windmills, you aren't seeing wrongly! In fact, Lotte Hotel Jeju was one of the filming sites for the Korean drama, All In. My guide told us that Song Hye Gyo and Lee Byung Hun kissed in the drama in front of the windmills. Lol. I didn't watch that drama so I don't know.

It was pretty late then, so I didn't go out to explore the hotel, but more photos of it the next day!

Rain for Lotte Duty Free Shop

Other celebrities also for Lotte Duty Free

My(and my sis') room

Windmills! The view from my room's balcony.

I was just complaining to my Mum the day before that I ran out of cotton wool to apply my toner. Then there's like an entire bottle of cotton wool sitting on top of the basin. Lol, I can like make cotton wool mask all over my face and still have more than half the bottle left. And oh, they gave Aigner Eau De Parfum shampoo, conditioner, shower gel and skin lotion for toiletries. So we all smelled damn nice after shower. Lol.

There's 9 different kinds of pillows for guests to choose from. There's the Chrysanthemum pillow, Buckwheat pillow, Jade pillow, etc. And yep, they're all free, you don't have to pay to enjoy them. I guess Lotte really takes sleep seriously.

Day 6

My sis and I meant to wake up at 6am because the guide told us that we should go down to have a look at the morning scenery and the beach because it was really beautiful. But we ended up snoozing the alarm and only woke up at 6.45am! Lol. We quickly got dressed and went outside. True enough, the scenery was indeed beautiful! Let the pictures speak for themselves:

The windmills looked different in the day

The house up there is a villa belonging to Lotte Hotel Jeju. Bet the room rate for a night is exorbitant!

In case you're wondering why it looks more like autumn despite it being winter and all, Jeju's nearer to the equator(I know it's still pretty far, but nearer in a sense) and therefore is warmer and more humid than Seoul or the entire Korean peninsula for that matter. For the 2 days we were there, the temperature never drop below zero.

Ahead is the beach. But we didn't venture down to the beach because we didn't have much time left.

Love the above 2 photos!

Gathered at the hotel lobby at around 7.30am, and then we headed out for breakfast - abalone porridge! Yeah, they got too many abalones on Jeju Island that they can afford to shred up abalones and mix them in porridge. Lol.

The abalones are shred up into really tiny pieces that you can't even see them in the porridge. That's the way abalone porridge is prepared, so don't expect to see one whole piece of abalone when you're eating the porridge! Haha. Yep, the porridge tasted really great because it was sweet, something like what my Mum always prepare when I was younger. I mean, she didn't put in abalone, but it just tastes like it.

The restaurant where we had our breakfast.

Side dishes + abalone porridge

The porridge tastes even better with seaweed!

After we got out of the restaurant, it started snowing. Not sure if you can see the snowflakes in this picture.

We headed to our first attraction of the day - Jusang Jeollidae. They are like rock columns on the shore formed by waves crashing on the rocks. Hmm, I think they looked alright, not really amazing. I guess I don't know how to appreciate the beauty of rocks Haha.

We got off the bus from this carpark and walked in. See that building in the photo? That's the Jeju Internation Convention Centre, another filming site for All In. It was used as an office for Lee Byung Hun's character in the drama.

The Jusang Jeollidae

My bro & I

I like this! Took this behind our bus, before we boarded the bus.

Dad bought these Jeju tangerines(or mandarin oranges) from the ajummas selling them outside the attraction. Very cheap, 1000₩ (S$1.20) for 9. That's only 13 cents for one. Anyone who visit Jeju must try them! They're really sweet, easy-to-peel and seedless!

Bought these chocolates from the convenience store 3 days ago I think. Cost only about 1200₩ (S$1.50) for a box of 8, really cheap and they taste like Merci chocolates. I bought a few more before I returned to S'pore.

We left Jusang Jeollidae and went to Cheonjeyeon Waterfall next. It is a three-tier waterfall. But the one we visited was the second-tier I think.

Cheonjeyeon, as you can see from the photo below, is called 天帝渊 in Chinese, which means Pond of the Heaven's Emperor. The Korean legend has it that nymphs would descend from the heavens at night and bathe in the waterfall's pond.

The waterfall, I must say, is beautiful. The surroundings were so peaceful, I wouldn't mind camping there. And yes, I can appreciate the beauty of waterfalls. Hahaha.

Cheonjeyeon Waterfall

See the long flight of stairs? That's what we had climb up after visiting the waterfall. I was panting heavily after I finally reached the top. I don't think I would ever visit the third-tier of the waterfall. Lol.

Remember I said that in the legend, nymphs would come down to Cheonjeyeon Waterfall? There's an arch bridge called Seonimgyo Bridge with 7 nymphs carved on each side over the waterfall. The nymphs symbolize the descent of 7 beautiful nymphs from heaven at night.

The view from the bridge is simply breathtaking! It didn't matter which side of the bridge you faced, both sides was just as awesome!

Seonimgyo Bridge

I was alittle scared because the bridge was erm...so high up, so I held out my camera and took these.

Can you see the ocean?

We crossed the bridge and came to this park on the other side where there was this Fountain of Five Blessings.
There's 5 different animals statues on the fountain, each symbolizes a different blessing. The tortoise symbolizes longevity, boar symbolizes wealth, dragon symbolizes honor(I think it means glory here), mandarin duck symbolizes love and carp symbolizes sons. You are to pick a blessing of your choice, stand in front of the animal and throw coins into the lucky bag in the center. It is said that if the coin lands in the lucky bag, you'll receive the blessing.

More Dol hareubangs

Next we went to Jeju Folk Village which has more than 100 traditional houses and over 8000 pieces of folk articles displayed. The Jeju Folk Village was also one of the filming sites for Dae Jang Geum(大长今/Jewel in the Palace), the part where Dae Jang Geum was exiled to Jeju as a slave. Our guide(it's a different one from our tour guide) for our tour around the folk village was a humorous petite old lady who actually acted in Dae Jang Geum...for 2 seconds. Hahaha, that's why she's called the 两秒钟明星(2-second movie star). Lol.

Before starting the short tour around the folk village, the guide introduced us to Jeju Pure Honey and Jeju Ohmija Tea(五味子茶/maximowiczia chinensis fruit tea, the English name's long, but it's a kind of herbal berry). They cost 35,000₩ (S$42) for each bottle(a bottle of honey is 1.2kg while a bottle of Ohmija Tea is 1kg), pretty cheap as compared to the honey we got from Bangkok. So we bought 6 bottles of honey and 10 bottles of Ohmija Tea. My Dad was planning to give some of the Ohmija Tea to his workers as souvenir gifts. Because they're practical and good for the health, I would say that the honey and the Ohmija Tea are ideal gifts for family and friends.

Look at how much the people in my tour group bought! This wasn't all, there was another cart of these.

My sis drew and wrote on our box for easier recognition once it flown back to S'pore. Lol.

Jeju Folk Village

Black pig. I was going to eat his friends for lunch later. Lol.

Display of some hanboks in a traditional village house

Dae Jang Geum poster/statue?

Here's a photo with the 2-second movie star! She's so funny and cute!

After we were done with the folk village, we went for lunch half an hour away I think. Grilled Black Pork! Yum yum, I'm so sorry Mr Black Piggy. Again, since it was a tour group lunch, there was free flow of pork. It was so good that my family got third helpings. Hahaha. Told ya I like barbecued stuffs.

Grilled Black Pork(black pig meat) with loads of garlic

With bus driver ajusshi. Notice he looks kind of Chinese, his features I mean.
Our guide told us the Jeju Koreans look Chinese while Koreans on the main Korean peninsula bear some resemblance to Mongolians. It all goes back to history. I can't really remember, but the guide said that Korean peninsula was invaded by Genghis Khan's son, Ogedei Khan & his Mongol army, way back in history. There's two school of thoughts for the ancestry of the Jeju Koreans. The 3 most common family names in Jeju are Ko(高), Yang(良) and Pu(夫), all of which are pretty similar to Chinese family names as opposed to the family names Kim, Park, Lee, etc on the Korean Peninsula. According to a legend, the three men who ascended from a cave on Jeju Island’s Mount Halla (Hallasan) were the founders of Ko, Yang and Pu clans. On the other hand, some believed that the founding ancestors of clans in Jeju were Chinese who stayed there after escorting King's Kongmin future queen to Korea.
Anyway, after lunch, we went to a tangerine farm where we paid an entrance fee of 2000₩ (S$2.40) each to pluck Jeju tangerines and have our fill of them. Plucking and eating the tangerines for all you want on-the-spot is fine, but you aren't allowed pluck and takeaway. I doubt anyone can eat 20 tangerines at one go so I would say, visit the tangerine farm if you want to experience the fun of plucking the fruits, otherwise, it's more worthwhile to buy the tangerines from fruit-sellers.

Windmills!

Tangerine farm

A store outside the farm selling tangerines and Jeju chocolates. 10,000₩ (S$12) for a pack of 4 boxes. We bought 2 packs containing tangerine chocolates, green tea chocolates, cactus chocolates & pineapple chocolates, and a box of another type of cactus chocolates. Hmm, the chocolates tasted okay, not really fantastic unless you, like my parents, are a fan of not-so-sweet chocolates. I would rather buy Cadbury, lol.

A box of Jeju tangerine chocolates and how it looks like in its individual package

Next, we went to Seongsan Ilchubong (Sunrise Peak), an UNESCO Natural World Heritage site. Even though its called Sunrise Peak, I think we were there just in time for sunset. Lol. Sunrise Peak is so called because as the easternmost tip of Jeju Island, this area is the first to greet each day's new sun. And at the top of Sunrise Peak is a large volcanic crater. Don't worry, I think the volcano's dormant or extinct. Beware, the following section that you're about to see is extremely image-heavy because the Sunrise Peak was so beautiful that I couldn't stop snapping pictures and panoramas.

Climbing half an hour's worth of stairs was no joke! I was panting heavily and snot was running down my nose, I think this happens when you're trying to breath deeply and heavily, but all you're breathing in is cold air. -.- Even though I was already drained of energy by the time I reached the peak, it was really gorgeous, I had never seen anything like this. Both the views from the bottom of the cliff and from the peak were just as beautiful. You'll agree with me after seeing the photos below.

Jeju taxi

Sunrise Peak

The crater

I'm at the peak!

From the peak!

Love this panorama. The guy just happened to be there when this was shot, but that's what makes this photo even better!

Sorry, the above panoramas are kind of small because they consist of many photos linked together

UNESCO Natural World Heritage site

After we descended from Sunrise Peak, we went to the shops nearby to get some Jeju souvenirs, more specifically, Dol Hareubangs keychains. They were so cute! You'll see them later in the photos that I took of my purchases after returning back to S'pore.

We took an hour's bus ride to the Teddy Bear Museum on the southern part of Jeju, back where our hotel was. In fact the Teddy Bear Museum was only 5 minutes away from our hotel. As the name suggests, Teddy Bear Museum is full of...teddy bears! Teddy Bear Museum is also home to the world's smallest bears and the world's most expensive bear, all of which you'll see later in the photos.

And those who had watched Goong will find the museum rather familiar. That's because Shin Chae-gyung(Yoon Eun Hye's character) visited the museum in the drama. The museum even had a section for the Goong bears, if anyone remembers, they were the beautiful bears that were shown at the end of each Goong episode.

Entrance of Teddy Bear Museum

Even the carpet has a teddy bear on it

Mohammed Ali

There were lots of these cabinets full of bears

1st: Prince Charles & Princess Diana's wedding
2nd: Michael Jordan
3rd: Mother Teresa
4th: The Beatles

Left: My Fair LadyRight: Elvis Presley

1st & 2nd: Superman3rd: Tarzan4th: Marilyn Monroe5th: Bombing of Pearl Habour

1st & 2nd: Albert Einstein3rd: Titanic (You jump, I jump. Lol)4th: Neil Armstrong, first person to set foot on the Moon5th: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

So cute!

Charlie Chaplin

Qing Emperor's Terracotta warriors

Bears

And more bears!

Disneyland

This is so sweet & cute!

Goong bears

Goong's Shin bear

Look at the number of minature bears!

King Sejong, Gandhi & I-dunno-who

World's smallest bear at the size of 4.5mm

World's most expensive bear at 229,783,793₩ (S$280,000)!!! I can buy a 4-room flat with that kind of money. Lucky bear, decked in LV from head to toe(okay, paws, no toes) - suitcase, hat, coat and belt. I suppose the turtleneck and shorts on the right are LV too?

Huuuge bear! I can't even wrap my arms around his tummy!
We went for a huge seafood dinner at a restaurant just next to our hotel. We paid about S$30 per person which was really cheap, considering the amount of food that was served. There was so much food that there wasn't enough space on the table to place them, and the waitresses had to try keep combining some of the seafood together and removing plates so that there's space for the dishes. The seafood over there in Korea is quite different from what we have in S'pore where we usually eat seafood cooked and drenched in sauces or gravies, whereas most of the seafood there are eaten raw/sashimi-style.

Raw seafood

Sashimi and abalone porridge

One whole abalone for each of us. It's grilled! Again, there's too much abalones on Jeju that they even have the luxury of grilling them.

This, is the most disgusting thing I ever ate, so of course I had to take a picture of it! It's some kind of shellfish but I don't know what's it called. And it's raw! See the green thingy? I think it's shellfish shit. =X Yeah, I ate it, it didn't taste good, but it didn't taste particularly bad either. In fact, it didn't have much taste, except for being rubbery, and a weird taste when I came to the green part. I swear I'll never eat this again! Lol.

One whole platter of sashimi. I don't know what's the type of fish used. By the time we came to this dish, we couldn't eat much anymore. It was pretty wasteful because we only ate like 1/8 of the sashimi on it.

Soju

You know that Koreans cross their legs when they sit on the floor? I tried, but I gave up after like 15 minutes, my legs became numb and I had no choice but to sit unglamly like this. Lol.

Photos outside the restaurantLeft: Photo of a Haenyeo(Female divers in Jeju). It's a pity that I haven't got a chance to meet Haenyeos during the trip, I would definitely love to learn more about their way of life. For those who don't know, these female divers dive without much sophisicated equipment and no oxygen tanks(which means holding their breath underwater for like 3 minutes or even more) to gather seafood usually for sale. Definitely a dangerous job.Right: Lee Byung-hun & Song Hye Gyo in All In

2002 World Cup in Seogwipo, Jeju

After dinner, we rushed back to our hotel next-door, just in time to catch the daily 8pm Volcano Fountain Show at the hotel. I couldn't see much because they were lots of people there, but I would say the show was pretty impressive due its use of fire and laser lights.

After the show, we walked around in the hotel's garden and shopped at the souvenir shop in one of those windmills. I actually took some photos of the garden and windmills at night, but I don't know why they had disappeared from my folder, I can't seem to find them anywhere.

Anyway, we went to the hotel's casino next where I was denied entry because I was underage. I was 18 at that time. =( I had to be 20 in Korean/Chinese age or 19 in American age in order to be a legal adult in Korea. I was just 2 days shy of being 20 in Korean age(because the new year was just 2 days away)! It may sound confusing, Korean age, Chinese age, American age and what-nots, since we don't really use Chinese age these days. But as long as you have had your 19th birthday, you're legal. Same thing goes for clubbing, you've to be 19 to enter.

So while my parents were viewing the casino, I went around the hotel compounds taking pictures. After they were done with the casino, we went out to the convenience store next to our hotel to buy more snacks. I did say I visit the convenience store almost every night while I was there right? Hahaha. Bought ice-cream too! If I didn't remember wrongly, they were only 500₩(S$0.60) each, freaking cheap!

Below are some photos I took when my parents were in the casino:

Hotel lobby & casino

Hotel at night

Korean banknotes. 10000₩ = S$12. 1000₩ = S$1.20

Day 7
Rise and shine at around 6.30am. Left the hotel at around 7.30am for breakfast, Chinese food, in Jeju-si, nearly an hour's drive away. Took a couple of photos of Jeju's beautiful morning scenery while on the bus.

All these were taken on the bus

Chinese breakfast. Really, despite being a Chinese, I have no idea what constitutes a Chinese breakfast because breakfast at my house is just slices of bread & cakes. I've never had a Chinese breakfast at home either. Lol. Imo, veggies, rice, congee, buns, dumplings are kind of too heavy for breakfast. They look more like my lunch or dinner instead.

After the heavy breakfast, we headed to the Jeju airport where we would catch our 10.55am flight back to Gimpo.

Left: SNSD for some bank. Goodness, even banks have celebrities to endorse for them!

Right: SS501 for Korea Airport Corporation.

That's what I was saying, celebrities' endorsements are literally everywhere in Korea!

My boarding pass

After an hour's flight, we landed safely in Gimpo and made our way back to Seoul where we would begin the day's activities.

At the Gimpo Airport, Kim Yuna for a bank.

I think it was snowing in Gimpo & Seoul earlier in the morning or the day before

Nice capture of the Hangang

We went for lunch somewhere in Seoul, I don't know where exactly we were. Lol. Lunch was duck soup with lots of herbal stuffs, not sure what the dish is called, I think it's Oritang? The soup was good! We had Bibimbap with Fish Roe, this is hell good! Best Bibimbap I've ever eaten, wish I can get this in S'pore because I don't really like the usual Bibimbap with the raw veggies. Anyway, there were other side dishes as well, like the squid, fish, vermicelli, mochi, etc. The squid was good too!

Bibimbap with Fish Roe. So good that I licked everything clean, save for that speck of fish roe there.

Oritang

Mochi. This is nice too!

Me eating a squid leg! Lol.

The souvenir gift truck outside the restaurant. I bought lots of souvenirs from the ajusshi, like 30 bucks worth of keychains? Hahaha. You must be thinking what am I going to do with that many keychains? I gave them away. Lol.

Next, we went to make Kimchi! Haha, it was easy, probably because the chilli paste was ready-made. Doubt it would be this easy if we were to start from scratch. Lol.

Here's how my kimchi turned out

Kimchi-making lesson

My family at making kimchi

After the hands-on with kimchi-making, we got dressed in hanboks and took photos! Loads of colourful hanboks to choose from!

I chose this hanbok. It's really pretty, the entire hanbok was embroidered with intricate flower designs. But too bad it doesn't look that flattering on me.

The hanbok made me look fatter than I already am. =(

Me with my Mum

The embroidery on the hanbok

I saw these poster just outside the kimchi-making building. Are those really Song Seung Hun and Kwon Sang Woo's signatures at the bottom?

A picture with Dae Jang Geum's poster

Next we went to this building which sold Korean Ginsengs. Only a photo of the building because photography wasn't allowed within the building.

We went to this Beauty Academy where we did facials. The males in our tour group did too. Hahaha. After our facials, we went to The Face Shop just across the street and it was shopping time!!! Lol. Bought quite a few items because they were hell cheap as compared to S'pore.

Sorry to have scared you there

The Face Shop just across the road. I happened to see the Kim Bum poster outside the shop and snapped a picture.

Dinner was steam chicken or something near Jamsil area, in a building on a street filled with noraebangs(Karaoke rooms). Didn't eat much because I didn't like the food. I ate a few piece of the chicken, then that was it, I was done with dinner.

Steam chicken

The entire street was filled with noraebangs, there was even one at the basement of the building we ate at.

After dinner, we went to Lotte World Themepark!!! It was just 5 minutes away from the restaurant. Lotte World consists of an indoor themepark, outdoor themepark, shopping malls and a hotel(Lotte World Hotel, the other Lotte hotel in Seoul). And yes, Lotte World is also the same themepark which MBLAQ visited with T-ara in Idol Army, and both Nichkhun and Taecyeon visited with their girlfriends in Mnet Scandal.

And because it was winter, we visited only the indoor themepark.

Lotte World

The hot air balloon ride which Nichkhun and his girlfriend went on in Mnet Scandal

We took this Sinhbad ride. It was really fun, and thrilling. Well, I didn't know about the thrilling part until I let go of my hands from the safety bar and the car plunged down into darkness like a roller coaster. I initially thought it was a ride for kids, plus there weren't any safety belts on the seats, so I assumed it was like a cruise-and-take-photos type of ride. I was so wrong, lol.

Some photos during the 'cruise'

Laser show

Look at the scribbling on the wall by bored people in the queue. Big Bang, 2PM, 2NE1, SHINee

2PM, Beast, MBLAQ

2PM is daebak? Erm, I'm not too sure anymore...

The next ride we took was this Egyptian ride. Not bad, except the queue was really long but the actual ride only last a few minutes.

The place where we queued at was this small narrow (and suffocating) shaft, I think it's quite similar to the real thing in the pyramids of Egypt?

Big Pharaoh head

Indoor themepark of Lotte World

Before I left Lotte World, I bought some more keychains! Lol. The keychains were so cute and cheap! I doubt I can ever get them so cheap in S'pore.

Retired for the night at COEX Intercontinental Hotel, a 6-star hotel just 10 minutes away.

The room occupied by me and my sis

Earl Grey Tea(provided free by the hotel) & Shin Ramyeon for supper

View from our hotel room

Day 8

We went for breakfast at this restaurant called Eochon somewhere in Seoul. I think it snowed earlier that morning because the sidewalks were white with snow. Breakfast was piping hot noodles, congee, buns and dumplings.

Lol @ the YAY on the ground

Breakfast

Outside the restaurant

Someone made this snowman outside the restaurant. So cute!

After breakfast, we went to this building which sold cordyceps and a kind of dietary supplement called Korean Raisin, it supposed to be good for the liver or something like that. My Dad got a box of the Korean Raisin for S$470. Imo, it wasn't cheap.

After that, we went to a jewellery shop Yeouido which sold amethyst. My family usually don't buy jewellery because really, we don't have any use for them. So we didn't get anything at the shop, except for a couple of amethyst keychains because they were quite cheap at 10000₩(S$12). I know it's too cheap for the entire keychain to be made in amethyst, but real amethyst or not, at least I have some use for them. Plus, they were really pretty, you'll see later in one of the photos.

We went to the convenience store next and bought loads of snacks to be brought over to Singapore, because it was probably the last convenience store we were going to visit before we return back to S'pore. Lol. Bought ice-cream to eat too!

This parfait only cost 1200₩(S$1.50)!

Can't remember the exact price of this, about I think it's about S$2? Still cheap, considering it's Hershey's.

Then we went to another building which had 2 entire levels selling Korean snacks and souvenirs!!! Bought alot, an entire carton in fact, and had it sealed and checked in as luggage at the airport. Lol.

The souvenir building

After the shopping, we headed back to Incheon International Airport where we would catch the 2pm flight back to S'pore.

One last photo with our guide, tour leader & photographer. I felt so sorry for the photographer because he became a photographer in order to pay his college tuition fees but left his DSLR in a cab the day before and never saw it again. Man, that's a DSLR!

The departure hall

Kimbap+Mayo & Starbucks combo = Awesome!

So yeah, we board the plane at 2pm and said goodbye to Korea! =(

Here's one of the things my Mum got from the airport with the remaining Korean Won we had left. She also got a box of Boys Over Flowers chocolates with the remaining money.

Saw this in one of the airplane magazines. Jang Keun Suk for Samsung Yepp MP3.

Airplane lunches. Chicken fillet rice & Bibimbap.

Bibimbap. This was good.

Landed at Singapore Changi Airport T2 at around 8pm. Checked out, got our luggage and bought some duty-free items. We had dinner after that, we missed Singapore food, so guess where we went for dinner? Hahaha, yep, the Ah Wang Cafe which we had our last dinner before we flew off to Korea!

Singaporean fare at Ah Wang Cafe. Nasi Goreng, Hokkien Prawn Mee, Fishball Noodle, Century Egg Congee.

Green Tea, Teh Peng, Ice Lemon Tea

At last, home sweet home!

Misc
Here are some of our purchases from Korea:

The Boshingak Bell replica which my Dad bought for about 80 bucks from the Korean souvenir shop on our last day.

Look at the boxes of stuffs we got during the trip. 3 of them were from Jeju. While the last one's from the Korean souvenir shop.

The honey & Omija tea we got from Jeju. 16 bottles in total.

Korean snacks & useless stuffs(*looks at the Spongebob stationery*) we got from the Korean souvenir shop.

Close-up of some of the snacks we got. Mostly seaweed.

Apparently, my sis was Spongebob-crazy

Some of the snacks (excluding the Jeju chocolates) I got from the convenience stores.

The Boys Over Flowers chocolates my Mum got from Incheon Airport.

The Korean Raisin dietary supplement my Dad got.

Duty-free alcohols we got from the airport. I know, my family are alcoholics. Lol.

The amethyst keychains I got from the jewellery shop for S$12 each. They could even be used as pendants.

Some of the souvenirs I got. I love how they sell these keychains in packs of 10, so I don't have to fret over what to get for friends or worry about not getting stuffs of about the same value for each of my friends.

I got the rollerblade phonecharm & glove phonecharm from Lotte World Themepark for only about 3000₩ (S$3.60) & 1500₩ (S$1.80) respectively. Pretty cheap. I can't even get anything decent from Mini Toons at that kind of price. I got the Hello Kitty keychain from the Gachapon for only 1000₩ (S$1.20)! And those are the Dol Hareubangs keychains I got from Jeju at 10 for 10000₩ (S$12). They're so cute!

Korean cosmetics I got. They were so cheap! I regretted not getting more.

BB Cream from Etude House. I think it cost me only about S$15. If I'm not wrong, it's retailing at S$30 in S'pore.

Mineral Loose Powder from The Face Shop. Got it for only S$16. When I came back and saw this in S'pore, I got a shock from the price tag. It's retailing at S$49.90 here. Look at the price difference! That's nearly 3 times the actual price! I also got a facial peeling wash from Face Shop for about S$12. That thing's really good, when you rub it on your face, all the dead skin, dirt and grime will come off as white stuffs that look like bits of white tissue paper. I saw the same peeling wash in S'pore too, it cost S$28 I think. Really, the prices of Korean cosmetics here are ridiculous.

Facial foam from Etude House. They cost about S$4 each. Really cheap too, because they're about twice the size of your regular facial foam.

A box of cotton wool, one of the freebies they give out on the streets to lure you into Etude House. Lol.
*****

I guess this is the end of my long travelog . Korea had been really awesome, it's thus far my best vacation! I would definitely love to go back this spring for the cherry blossoms, summer for the shopping or autumn for the maple leaves. ^^

CNY Visiting, VivoCity, Coach's Bday & K Session

2010-03-04T20:32:00.018+08:00

CNY Visiting
Went CNY visiting, our annual tradition, with the girls last Saturday. And had dinner at Simpang.

VivoCity

Coach's Birthday @ Cafe Cartel

K Session @ Teo Heng

It was my first time at Teo Heng, but I would have to say that I was impressed by the wide variety of songs. There were even pretty new Korean songs like Bo Peep Bo Peep, Ring Ding Dong, Heartbeat, etc. Really, I thought Korean songs were non-existent in Singapore. Lol.

I sang horribly. Cat sang really well, at some point, I couldn't tell if it was her singing or the artiste singing. I thought she had turned on the audio part, but she didn't. But I still felt pretty accomplished because I sang Oneul Haeojyeotseoyo(Broke Up Today), the song you're hearing now on my blog, with the entire lyrics in Hangul! Even though I mumbled through some parts because it was too fast for me to catch and sang nothing like Younha, but it's still quite an achievement. Proves that my Korean is improving! =D

Cat's pretty polaroid camera!

I love this polaroid! Thanks Cat for giving this to me!

My Nikon D5000 Test Shots

2010-02-22T17:07:00.010+08:00

Note: I did not edit/photoshop any of the photos because I don't know how to. I'd tried, but they turned out weird.

CNY 2010

2010-02-19T21:33:00.010+08:00

Day 1

Visited my Uncle's and Grandma's houses. Then we went to the Botanic Gardens because we had nothing better to do. Lol. Took loads of photos of flowers, plants, ducks, swans, basically nature.

After that, we went to Vivocity, supposedly to watch Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, but the seats left were only the 2nd row, even for the 10pm+ shows (it was only 5pm+ then). So we decided not to watch. Went to the arcade and played basketball instead. That's like my favourite game when I go to an arcade.

Played awhile before having dinner at some chinese herbal restaurant. Don't know what's it called. Took some photos outside while waiting for the food to arrive.

Day 2Went to my aunt's house. Lots of people were there, even cousins that I've never seen before. One of my aunts who was there has a pretty huge family, 9 children in in fact, so there are younger cousins whom I've never seen since they were born. Actually I have 2 aunts on my maternal side with 9 children each, but the other family wasn't there. So yeah, I've alot of cousins. I counted, there are 30 cousins in total, including me and my siblings, on my maternal side. I sometimes have trouble remembering my cousins' names, and for some of the younger ones, I don't even know their names. Lol.
What happens when you have a few cousins, plus the aunts and grandma sitting down to play Blackjack? That's right, mini gambling den. I never play la because one, I don't see the fun in it, and two, I always lose. When I was with the girls for the past years' CNYs, I almost never win. Luckily we were playing really small then, 10 or 20 cents. But my relatives were playing $2, even $5 I think. Imagine if banker ban-luck, that's $10 gone.
Here's something funny that happened during the visit: one of my cousins, who wasn't there yet, texted my other cousin saying that he's at Ah-gong's house. We were like 'Huh? What Ah-gong's house?' For those who don't know, my grandpa passed away 5 years ago and his house was sold after that. So technically, there's no more Ah-gong's house. That cousin texted back saying that he was at Mandai, meaning the Mandai Crematorium & Columbarium. LOL!
After the visit, we went to Marina Sq, hoping to get the tickets Percy Jackson at night, but to no avail, again. The seats were all booked, only the 1st row seats were left, which was even worse than the day before when there were still 2nd row seats. We went for dinner at Swensens' instead and then to the Hongbao River. The Hongbao River was boring, nothing much to see. Met Yingiet and her family there though.

Day 3

Went to catch Percy Jackson at Plaza Singapura in the late afternoon. Like finally! Haha, we booked the tickets online in the morning actually. Even though we booked early, only the 1st to 4th row seats were left. Of course, we took the 4th row. The movie was great. I'm a sucker for fantasy-adventure movies. Or anything that's Disney, Pixar, Harry Potter. I can't believe Logan Lerman's a 92-er! That makes me older than him. -.- I think child/teenage actors or actresses are amazing! Their acting are just awesome.

After the movie, we went for dinner at Crystal Jade which pretty much ended the day.

Day 4

Went to Vivocity, again, with Mum and Dad to have lunch. Actually, I don't know why we went out, I guess we all had nothing to do at home. Haha.

After lunch, we thought of going to Sentosa to see-see the new Resort World, but later decided against it because of the crowd. We went to Parkway instead because my dad wanted to get a DSLR.

So Dad got us this baby here, a Nikon D5000 plus AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR kit lens and AF-S DX VR Zoom-Nikkor 55-200mm f/4-5.6G IF-ED. Sorry, noob here, I had to write the full name of the lens down because I don't know which part of the name to pick so that it represents the lens. Lol. The tripod and the bag came free. The bag's nice, but it's too big! I can't carry that out! So I'm looking for a smaller and more feminine bag that I can bring out.

I know some people are going to say 'Be thankful that you even get a DSLR, you ungrateful brat!' But truth was, the D5000 wasn't what I wanted. I was eyeing the Canon 500D all along. At the store, the salesman told my Dad that the functions of D5000 & 500D are roughly the same. I could tell the salesman was a Nikon supporter. He told my dad the advantages that D5000 has over 500D but he didn't tell my dad the disadvantages! What he did say was that Canon is for vibrant pictures and Nikon is for 'natural'(dull) pictures. He didn't say dull, of course. He told us that I could always make my photos vibrant by photoshopping them. But the thing is, when I go on a trip, I take about 3000 photos in total, I don't have the time nor patience to photoshop them one-by-one and then upload them. It's going to take me years.

I did my research for 500D before, but not for D5000, so I had no idea. And when I came home and compared the 2 models online, they are so different! I was so upset. 2.7inch LCD vs 3inch LCD, 230k LCD vs 930k LCD are big differences! I don't really need a swivel LCD anyway. Plus, IMO, dull photos are a major disadvantage. I like my pictures to be poster-style or souvenir postcard-style - vibrant, colourful and bright. D5000 only allows for 5 min video-recording at 1280x720p while 500D allows for videos up to 30 min. 5 min isn't even enough to record an idol's performance! I guess I'll have to stick to my digital camera for fancams.

I've tried asking for opinions on forums, alot of people seem to tell me that Nikon's better than Canon. I don't know how true is that but of course, there's also the Canon camp of people. I guess I'll work with what I already have, learn about its features and potential, and see how it goes. If I really hate it, I might switch to Canon for my birthday next month. =P

I haven't taken alot of photos with the DSLR, but wait for them! They probably won't be 'wow!', but I'm learning. Those technical jargon still confuses me. Lol. Especially shutter-speed and aperture. Was it the higher the aperture number, the smaller the hole, the lesser the amount light enters or the higher the aperture number, the larger the hole, the greater the amount of light enters? So confusing! And I read online that if you want waterfall to look more smooth and less choppy, use slower shutter-speed. I tried that on the mini-fountain in my balcony, it turned out like a ball of lightning bolt or I-don't-know-what. Fail.

Happy Lunar New Year!

2010-02-13T23:11:00.007+08:00

Happy Chinese New Year! Hope you all had a wonderful reunion dinner! Mine was great, steamboat at home. Eating, and at the same time, running to the living room and back to watch a Big Bang before-debut video and DBSK concert. Plus, I ate till my tummy was round and bloated. Lol.

Simple yet warm

Watched Twilight on Star Movies just now. I hadn't watch nor read Twilight, call me slow. I've to admit that Edward Cullen's hot. But no, I'm no fangirl.

Anyway, have a great New Year guys. Get lots of Hongbaos, eat lots of goodies, that's like the best part of CNY. Basically, just have fun! Don't forget to down water to accompany those goodies! Falling sick during CNY is no fun. ^^

Here's another new year greeting in Chinese, 新年快乐! ^^

A little update

2010-01-26T17:25:00.013+08:00

Apologies for the lack of updates. I was preparing for SAT last week. Hmm, it was alright, but I think I screwed up the essay. Lol. I didn't have enough time and my example of Thomas Edison looked like crap, I felt like laughing at my own essay after I was done.

For those(which I don't think there are many) who are waiting for my post on my Korea trip, please wait alittle while more. I know I had said it would be up by the end of last week, but the organising of the photos and the writing took longer than I'd expected. I'm still in the midst of writing it, so please wait patiently! =)

In order not to make this a completely meaningless post, here are two pieces, both from You're Beautiful, which I played on the piano today (sorry for the minor mistakes) :

여전히 (Still)

말도 없이 (Without Words)

I know I played Without Words before, but this is the new and improved version. Haha.

I resorted to using 4shared for uploading because the usual file hosting site, Fileden, that I used was being such a pain in the neck after its recent launch of the new layout. It just refuses to let me upload audio files now. 4shared allows people to download the files, but don't download it, you don't have to. Just click the play arrow button to listen!

HP computers, FAIL!

2010-01-09T23:29:00.011+08:00

That guy's hilarious!

'I'm black. I think my blackness is interfering with the computer's ability to follow me.'
'As soon as my blackness enter the frame...I will sneak into the frame'

'As soon as White Wanda appears, the camera moves.'
'The worst part is...I bought one for Christmas...I hope my wife doesn't see this Youtube video' Poor guy!

Then there was this comment on the HP website which was addressing the issue:

ROFL @ the comment.

I didn't know there was such a face-tracking technology available on a webcam, but Hewlett-Packard really, FAIL!

*****

Yesterday, I went for, quoting Sara, the Agape training that never happened. Training was supposed to start at 9am but apparently the Valhall people screwed up everything, they weren't there to open the gates. So we went to the coffeeshop behind Valhall(I had no idea there was a coffeeshop until yesterday, lol) and waited. We waited, and waited and waited. At 11am, they still weren't there yet. So training was scraped and Coach Firdaus gave us a lift to Kallang Leisure Park. We ended up having lunch at KLP and having some quality bonding time. It was pretty awkward at first because I was one of the new ones there. Everyone talked, about floorball and some other stuffs. I admit that I still feel alittle awkward at the end, but it was better than at the beginning. At least now I know everyone alittle better and that we are all working towards more or less the same goal in floorball. ^^

Happy Birthday, Zhiying!

2010-01-07T15:39:00.011+08:00

Yesterday we celebrated Zhiying's birthday at Plaza Singapura. Happy 19th Birthday, Girl! We had lunch at Swensen's, with Yingiet joining us during her lunch break from work. We watched Sherlock Holmes after lunch. I didn't quite like it. It was so confusing, didn't really understand what was going on. After the movie, I asked the girls, "There were 2 girls right? Or was there only one?" Lol.

Anyway, let the pictures do the talking!

At Eunos MRT while waiting for the girls to finish booking their BTT

Lunch at Swensen's

Yingiet's haircut is nice!

In a matter of 4 songs(Happy Birthday to You, 祝你生日快乐, Selemat Hari Jadi, Saengil Chukkahamnida), the candles went from this to...

...this. No more candles! And it wasn't even 2 minutes! We were like omg, how did the candles melt so quickly? Lousy quality candles! Hahaha.

Our Birthday Girl, Zhiying!

Did the photos look larger than the usual ones I posted on my blog? Haha. I switched to Photobucket, and realised I can upload photos faster and larger than on Blogger. Thanks Zhiying for teaching me! I'll probably do the same for my Korea trip photos.

*****

I finally changed my blog song...to what you're currently hearing, What If by Taeyeon. Yep, Kim Taeyeon, the kid leader of SNSD. Initially, I didn't know she was the singer of this song. This song is from Hong Gil Dong OST.

And I thought the voice that sang the song was simply beautiful, little did I know that it belongs to Taeyeon! I mean when you think of SNSD, you don't think of sad love ballads, you think of girly cutesy quick songs. I searched some of Taeyeon's singing on Youtube and she sure can sing! Okay, I think I've digressed too much. Hehe. Enjoy the song! ^^

Back from Korea!

2010-01-02T19:23:00.014+08:00

I'm back from Korea!!! I had the time of my life! I thought nothing would ever beat my Taiwan vacation, but turned out that I was wrong. Korea has got to be my best vacation ever! I had so much fun over there. ^^

Did I mentioned that I got to watch MBLAQ and f(x) at MTV The M Winter Special Concert? I didn't know the concert was held at the ski resort I was staying at and I almost missed it, but thank God I rushed there in time to watch it. I was pretty sure MBLAQ and f(x) were staying at the same ski resort I was at since the concert is also held on the next day too and there's no other hotels within 10km radius. But I didn't go stalk them la. If it was 2PM, I might. Hahaha. Anyway, fancams will be up soon. They're not exactly at close-up fancams, just videos of their performances. I kind of regretted not hanging around after the concert ended so that I could have taken close-up fancams of them. Because it was so freaking cold(it was -13°C), right after the concert ended, everyone(yes, I mean almost everyone) ran back indoors where it was warm and cozy. It was like 'poof!', everyone disappeared from the concert venue. There was practically no one left. If I have stayed, I would have easily gone to the backstage area or the area next to the stage, and find myself standing next to MBLAQ or f(x). Lol.

Give me some time to write an entry about my trip and at the same time, to collate the photos I took in Korea. There are more than 2800 of them, and that's not counting the ones in the folder which I accidentally deleted(stupid me). It would take me ages to upload 2800 photos to Blogger, so I'm putting them into collages with about 4 photos in each collage. Hopefully, it will take me a shorter time than to upload 2800 photos one-by-one to Blogger.

***

Well, it's the new year. First of all, even if this may come alittle late, Happy New Year!!! A few days ago, it was the end of the year 2009 and it was major Korean Award shows overload. SBS Gayo Daejeon, SBS Yeongi Daesang, KBS Gayo Daejeon, KBS Yeongi Daesang, MBC Gayo Daejeon. 2PM appeared in almost all except for SBS Yeongi Daesang and KBS Yeongi Daesang. Plus a whole lot of other idol groups appeared too.

I watched SBS Gayo Daejeon in the hotel room in Seoul. It was live but it was freaking late. I was so tired but still stayed up to watch. That pretty much explains why my eyebags are larger than my eyes now. I stayed up to 2am almost every night to watch TV because there are idols on practically every Korean programme and advertisement(except for the news). Lol. Came back to Singapore and watched parts of other Gayos. My 3 favourite parts out of all the Gayo Daejeons and Daesang:

***

Today I went for my first Agape Floorball training of the year and man, I died. The warm-ups equates to my meaning of PT. Hahaha. And after warm-ups was PT. Died. Played 3-on-3 too. It was fun, but tiring. Looks like I gotta start training more.

On a short vacation

2009-12-23T17:23:00.007+08:00

Will be flying to Korea in about 5 hours' time. And in 12 hours, I'll be breathing the same air as 2PM, FT Island, 2NE1, Girls Generation and Jang Keun Suk. Hahaha, not that I know where they'll be. Well, except for 2PM, they'll be performing at Noise Basement in Gangnam tomorrow night for some Christmas Party. But I'm underage over there. =(

Alright, I'm not there for celebrity stalking or sighting. If I'm really lucky, I might be able to spot one or two celebrities. But I'm not counting on that. I just hope that weather won't be too cold so that I won't find myself shivering or hear my own teeth chattering while sight-seeing.

Okay, I need to go do some last minute packing and checking. Will be back on the 30th!

And before I forget, Merry Christmas in advance! ^^

Without Saying (Piano) by Me

2009-12-16T18:16:00.014+08:00

Had some time to idle around after I came home from collecting my amended testimonial in school, so as promised, I decided to record my playing Without Saying on the piano. No, it's definitely not perfect yet, I didn't have the chance to really practise it, so there are some mistakes and the tempo’s off in some parts because I was basically trying to sight-read off the sheets. Perhaps I'll upload another one when I'm better at it. Then I decided to play Inside My Heart from My Name is Kim Sam Soon OST(I know it's old but it's my fave song from the OST) and Secret Garden by...I-dunno-who, it's just a sheet without the composer's name that I got off a music sheet site because I thought the melody was nice. Lol. Apologies for the mistakes, let's just say I'm not very talented in playing the piano. Hahaha. Just click on the links to listen. ^^

Without Saying

Secret Garden

Inside My Heart
The sound quality of Iphone's voice memo is pretty good!
*****
Oh yes, something embarrassing happened on my way to school today. I was on Bus 12, sitting all the way at the back of the bus, listening to my Iphone and looking out of the window. Suddenly, at the corner of my eyes, I saw something waving, I turned around and it turned out to be this guy who was sitting 4 seats away from me and had been waving for super long, trying to get my attention because he wanted to ask for directions. And apparently, he was calling me quite loudly(that all the people on the bus turned to look at me) too but I couldn't hear him with my earphones on and continued looking out of the window. -.- When he finally got my attention, the entire bus was staring at me. Gosh, so embarrassing! Lesson learnt: never blast your music that you become oblivious to your surroundings.

Bah Kut Teh

2009-12-14T16:42:00.013+08:00

So yesterday for lunch, we went to Owen Road for traditional Bah Kut Teh. I guess it's traditional because they gave us a small chinese clay teapot and and cute little china cups to drink tea from? I don't know, I haven't eaten alot of Bah Kut Teh throughout my life. Yesterday was my second. Not sure if it's true, but from what I see, I think the Bah Kut Teh are usually sold without the tea? Anyway, the Bah Kut Teh at Owen Road is really nice, but it's pretty unhealthy to eat it frequently due to its high level of cholesterol.

After lunch, we went ION Orchard. Did some more shopping for the trip. And bought a Korean phrase book from Prologue. I definitely can't survive in Korea with my miserable broken Korean. Hahaha. Was feeling alittle hungry, bought wasabi popcorns from Cornery. Yeah, my shop. Lol.

Went to quite a number of places yesterday. After ION, it was Funan IT Mall, Chinatown, then Citysquare. Enjoyed myself alot, but I was super tired by the end of the day.

*****

I don't understand how people can play a tune 'by ear' on the piano. I was trying to search for piano sheet for Without Saying from the You're Beautiful OST, and there were some people who uploaded videos of them playing the song onto Youtube. There was this girl who played the whole song perfectly by ear, meaning, there wasn't any music sheet for her to refer to in the first place, she just came up with the notes and all just by listening to the song. And the thing is, she started playing piano for only a year?!?! I played for 12 years and I can't even differentiate one note from the other just by listening(yes I know I'm a failure), let alone, play a song by ear! I don't know but is this a gift thing? Either you have the gift for it or you don't? Then I guess I don't have it.

Fortunately, I managed to find the music sheet for the song. No need to rely on playing it by ear. And yay, I can practise for all I want, till my fingers drop off. Okay, that's gruesome. Maybe I'll record and let you guys hear the song if I perfect playing it. IF. Hahaha, that day will never come.

FML

2009-12-09T22:51:00.008+08:00

Today, I was shopping in The Face Shop when this little girl held my hand and called me 'Mommy'. FML.

Hectic weekend

2009-12-07T16:48:00.008+08:00

So on Friday, I went out with the girls. But before I met them, I had to go back to school to take my testimonial. And Mr Tong was sitting behind this glass panel in the TRC, catching people who weren't in school attire. What's new? I was going out, so obviously I wasn't in school attire. Fortunately, I met Hweeli in front of the TRC, and swopped clothes with her. It was so troublesome! And have you ever seen a student in a school skirt, table-tennis tee and heels? Well, me neither, but I was that student who walked into the TRC to get my testimonial on Friday. Darn, why can't Mr Tong just leave us alone when it's possibly the second-last day we are stepping into the school?

Anyway, the girls and I went Far East Plaza, Tangs, Wisma Atria, Ngee Ann City, then to Citylink and Marina Square. By the time we got to Taka, we were hungry and wanted to eat from the food market at the basement because there were loads of things to eat, Japanese, Korean, Chinese snacks. But there were no seats and we had to eat as we walk. So we ended up at macs. It felt so great to plop down on a chair because our legs were really killing us.

I left early in the evening, while Tracy & Yingiet continued with their shopping.

***

Yesterday morning, I went for Agape's team talk at Plaza Singapura. Yep, I'm back in Agape Floorball! I'm looking forward to playing floorball again. ^^

And thanks Teresa for introducing me the tutoring job! The pay's really good. I'm gonna take it up starting January!

Anyway, after the talk, I went to meet my family at Kallang Leisure Park. I was stuck in the rain and had no choice but to wait for the shuttle bus for nearly 40 minutes! My family was buying winter clothings, but I got nothing from Kallang Leisure Park because they didn't have any winter clothes to my liking.

Then we went to Marina Square where we got wool sweaters/cardigans. I got a black wool cardigan. Then, I saw this white winter coat which I really liked from Fox and the price was really reasonable, actually, it was quite cheap considering it's from Fox. But I didn't get it in the end because it was 100% polyester, no down at all. I asked the saleperson and he told me it's more for 5-10 degrees Celsius but if I wore more on the inside, I should be okay for 0 degrees Celsius and below. I decided not take any chances, I may be okay in Jeju-do but once I get to Seoul, Yong Pyong and Mt Seorak, it's probably going to be freezing cold. Falling ill isn't exactly the best way to enjoy your vacation. Haha.

Then we went to 313 Somerset. Wanted to get black earmuffs from Winter Time but black was out of stock. I wanted to go into Uniqlo upon seeing the colourful winter jackets, I never knew they sold winter jackets. I was trying to search for the end of the queue of people who, like me, were trying to get into Uniqlo as well. When I finally found the end of the queue, forget it man, I would probably get into Uniqlo an hour later.

So we left 313 for Tamp 1 because my mom wanted to go Universal Travelator(or Escalator. Haha, I forgot the name la) to see its winter clothes. I went to Uniqlo instead. Shiok, no queue at all! And they have the exact promotions as 313. People, if you wanna go Uniqlo, go to the one at Tamp 1, not 313 Somerset, unless you don't mind waiting for an hour to get into the store and another hour to pay for your purchases. So in the end, I got a 90% down black jacket from Uniqlo. It looks really nice(like something from SPAO, Girls Generation fans should know which shop I'm talking about), and it's freaking cheap! Only $99.90. We're talking about a 90% down here, the same jacket could easily have cost me at least $250 in other winter clothing stores. Plus, Uniqlo has a whole range of other winter clothes, including fleece jackets, parkas, turtlenecks. I got a few black turtlenecks(I think you can guess by now that my winter attire is all-black, lol), Dad got another sweater.

One interesting observation I made while I was at Uniqlo is that I noticed that the girlfriends/wives would be shopping in Uniqlo while their boyfriends/husbands would be waiting outside, lining up in a row and leaning against the railings. And the thing is, you only get to see this at Uniqlo Tamp 1. Lol.

Then we went Espirit, G2000 and Veeko to get a couple more sweaters and cardigans. Then we got 3 dancing christmas trees for free because apparently Tamp 1 was giving away a dancing christmas tree for each $100 spent. So now I have 3 dancing christmas trees at home and I don't know what to do with them. Lol. We were actually entitled to 5 christmas trees, but no thanks, 3 dancing christmas trees are enough to drive me crazy.

My sis and I got our earmuffs from Winter Time at TM. No, I didn't get the black one in the end, I got white. Haha, I decided I don't want to be dressed in all black. So my earmuffs will be white.

***

On Sunday, we went to Plaza Sing to get a few more sweaters(I seriously think that we bought too many sweaters for the trip), gloves, leg warmers, beanies and swimming caps. I got myself a black-and-white-striped knitted beanie. I'm not really fond of beanies because I think they look weird. Someone once told me that wearing a beanie is like wearing...ah, never mind, I shall not say. Hehehe.

After dinner at Plaza Sing, we headed down to People's Park Complex to finish up shopping for our trip. Thermal socks, lip balms, moisturizing lotions, etc.

So, yeah, we managed to finish our winter trip shopping over the weekend.

***

And today, I was supposed to meet Mrs Beetsma at 1pm in school to have the error in my testimonial corrected. I only woke up at 12.15pm?!?! I quickly ate my brunch and flew out of the house. Cabbed down because I was late already. The cabbie started talking to me about A Levels, what I'm going to do in life...when he heard my prelim grades, he was like so shocked. He stared at me in disbelief and said 'Serious?'. He told me that with those kind of grades, I can't get into any universities in Singapore. I don't blame him, he was just being honest. But darn, I can't help it, the whole worrying thing is coming back to me again. Maybe miracles do not exist after all. Man, I wished I never took that cab in the first place. =(

Bored

2009-11-27T19:22:00.008+08:00

The past few days had been like this: Wake up between 11am-12noon, watch HK drama serials until 2pm, lunch, practise piano, go online & maple until 7pm, dinner, shower, maple until 12midnight, sleep. Darn, I'm beginning to feel like a boy, like my bro. Except he plays dota instead of maple & he replaces the HK drama serials part with dota. I feel so unhealthy living like that. I feel like a sludge of fat, I mean I was already one in the first place, just that I feel like a bigger sludge now.

I did try to not live like a guy. Like yesterday, I was out in the afternoon shopping for winter clothes at Bugis. But when I came back at night, I started mapling again. -.-

I think it's true that people say the break after A Levels' overrated. It's not even the end of A Levels and I'm already feeling like this. Haha. I need a job, but I've no idea where to find one. And the thing is, I can only start work in January. By then, all the jobs would be snapped up by students waiting for their O or A Levels results. =(

Alright, I should take a break from Maple and go watch 下一站, 幸福. Great show, I strongly recommend it.