We had all the intentions in the world to wake up after 3 hours sleep and visit the fish markets but instead we slept in and ate spam and eggs.

Tonight was the VLUF party and i refused to miss another one this time round in Korea so i dragged Jerry back to mine to get ready and meet up with Rach.

It was themed ‘Halloween’ and spent about half an hour tossing up whether to do heavy brutal makeup and passed on it in the end.

We headed to Seungsu station and walked a short hop down to the warehouse.
Thank GOSH we passed on the makeup side… No one had done anything.

Cheap booze and food, perfect! Two flights of music and art. It was rad!

After having a run in with a few interesting gentlemen, Jerry and i bailed back to Hongdae for Karaoke. We had the soju confiscated off us while we sang but that didn’t stop the classics coming out.

Singing My Heart Will Go On - Celine Dion with a safari visual. I felt it was fitting…

Jerry’s karaoke pose, whilst singing ‘Dick In A Box’ <3

Cute paintings on the wall!

After an hour we headed back to my noisy apartment and crashed. 

After spending the morning moving new apartments, I was able to finally catch up with Tina, my sister’s very talented friend who is an illustrator in Seoul. I posted about her work before but she goes by OkayTina and has done huge work for Samsung, KakaoTalk, Levi’s and more!

Look here: http://www.okaytina.com/

The nicest girl ever! We spent the day eating food, talking, giggling and exploring Sinsa-dong for a new wallet as i lost mine in London.

We went to ‘School Food’ and sweet baby Jesus, the food was incredible. The kimbap was wrapped in thin egg and it was dokk carbonara with glass noodles…
UGHHHHH SALIVATING! 

Obvious mirror photo.

The cafe was absolutely lovely, called Oui BeneBene around the back of Sinsa.
Gorgeous decor and cute features like this little paper towel vending roll.

After we went our own separate ways, i hopped the train to Cheolsan to meet up with Jerry for drinking games at his fellow teacher’s house with some of the other people who are teaching English in Seoul.

We made the trek up the EPIC hill to her house after a nice Korean shop owner helped us double bag our over flowing grape baggie.

Spent the night hanging out basically with the housemate’s puppy and playing Apples to Apples.

Then we jumped a taxi and headed back to Jerry’s to crash and the taxi driver thought we were intending to visit a motel…

If only he knew the actual truth… 
But Jerry and i thought it was funny…

I finally made it into Chandeokgung Palace and it was beautiful!
I found out a family friend of ours passed away so it was exactly what i needed to escape things. 

The joesen dynasty had surveillance… wow.

So much detail!

Gyeongbokgung Palace was amazing too! Photos are below:

This guy was attempting to climb the tree.. 

Our hilarious guide leading us to the secret garden of the palace.

The pond that leads up to the officials housing.

It was such a precious way to spend the day and i was about to make it even better by having BBQ with Rachy.

I then passed by Sean’s cafe and we had beer and chicken.

Such a great day.

Today i just hung out in Hongdae. I went to visit a little art space but as i turned up they were moving out of the office space so i let them be.

Cute little mural while exploring

This dog was amazing. I was walking down one of the back streets on the way home and these two pups came out to say hello. The lab then proceeded to run in circles around me smiling with his eyes. Barked a few times and then ran back to the cafe. The temptation to steal him was full on…

Couples rings FTW

I had intended to visit this guy’s corner shop in April but never made it in time. He has this little space right on the corner of two shops just up from Sean’s cafe and uses the freshest ingredients. It’s called Hand-in-Hand Burger. Now after hearing the word ‘hand’ i figured they must be tiny burgers so i ordered two. When i saw the patties go down and they were the same size as my hand i realised i had made an epic mistake. Never again.

Then i strolled home.

Here are the streets in Hongdae during early Autumn:

Below are some super cute new shop signs i hadn’t seen last time:

I went home for a few hours, then brought Sean and ice cream and hung out in the cafe attempting to study my Korean.

and so we meet again…

Today i decided to head back to Cheonggyecheong stream to see what it was like during autumn.

I took an incredibly wrong turn and ended up on a street that was obviously a ‘tradies’ street. The shops all sold parts for plumbers, builder and renovators but most of all there were oodles of shops that sold LED lights and signs!

It was nice to see that there are actually carp that they’ve introduced into the stream!

After wandering around and getting lost trying to find wifi, i had a burrito and headed back to Hongdae for drinks with Jerry at Vinyl bar.

So cheap and so good, whilst jazz music played in the background. Really rad place to visit. Definite must!

Then i walked Jerry back to the station and ate these eggy croissant tasting things again. Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh so gooooood!

I hardly did anything today.
I think i slept in til 3pm (woops) so went and found something to eat and got my nails done while waiting to meet Jerry for dinner.

Then Jerry went home so i visited Sean and accompanied him to dinner and these 24/7 markets in Dongdaemeun (i think..)
SO MANY TOURIST BUSES! 

This is Sean

Then we went Halloween shopping for the cafe’s decoration at 3am.
Such weird experiences.
Then crashed when i got home! 

I have slept in again but decided to visit Changdeokgung Palace so jumped a train to Jongno but alas it was closed. So i decided to wander around and explore the back streets a bit more and found this cute sight of two Korean women who were sitting and painting in the shade.

The railing details at the station.

After strolling around i came home to Hongdae and had Machos.

Then visited Sean at his cafe and headed home to sleep. 
All these late nights are proving to throw my body clock out of whack.  

I woke up late with a swollen bung eye and decided to alert Jerry by sending him a horrific photo of my inner eye. 

After he nursed me back to health over the phone with a photo play by play, we met up and visited Times Square; a huge shopping centre in Yeongdeungpo.

I love waking up in this apartment. Fingers crossed i get somewhere this decent next year…

Brand spankin’ new work out machines untouched by ahjamas.. 
You could almost feel the excitement they felt as they walked past 

We went a little mental in Kyobo book store and bought a load of trinkets.

Beautiful type treatment again!

While having lunch we found this bookshelf that was part of the interior design but due to the lack of English, they chose to put THAT book up there?!

The came home and ate onigiri and drank lemonade. 

My cute little apartment. Most comfortable bed, ever.

Hongdae

Cute little pink airconditioner box outside a fortune reader’s shop

Absolutely adore the handwriting!

Amazing type treatment, AGAIN!

Samcheong (Outside the Kukje Gallery which was closed, again!)

This was insane! The works looked like red filtered collaged photos but were painted. So beautiful!

This was amazing too! All stitched tattoo inspired pieces.

People make little stone towers and make wishes along the hiking walls

The side walks are so colourful!

First time and last time i will ever use the functions on these. 
The level of violation i felt…
I thought i was being impregnanted.

Yido’s cafe and showroom. Most beautiful pottery!

On our way to Yeouido’s Han fireworks festival and was faced by THIS at the station..

The crowds

The honorary life saving green mat

nananananananananananPOLICETRAINNNNNNNNNNNN!

I made it to Seoul safely and woke up super early, but i forgot how wonderful this place is. 

While i’m tying this i can hear a cafe downstairs playing smooth music while children chat to their mums in the garden beneath me and the wind blowing through the trees. 

Too perfect.
Off to a fireworks festival by the Han River tonight, just uploading photos from the UK.
Feels so right here. 

Writing from somewhere you’re finally at feels amazing.