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So we spent our last day alone in Korea napping most of the morning.
I slept last night, a whopping 12 hours, in a row! Lauren slept too, but only from 8pm - 3am. My
“wander-lust” as Lauren calls it, but really let’s call it what it is - boredom, immediately kicked in so
I wandered down to Itewon on the search for a decent cup of coffee. Lauren napped. Then I came
back, Dunkin Donuts cup and bag in hand, took my meds for my back and napped, content from my
coffee conquest. As you gather, we haven’t completely adjusted to the time difference yet and have
stopped fighting the sleep urges and started rolling with them. When we are sleepy, we sleep, and we
are a bit surprised that we are sleeping as much as we are through most of the night. We are still
waking up ridiculously early in the morning, but overall, getting more sleep then we were earlier in the
week. Too bad we can’t bank some of this for future use because something tells me the next few
weeks are going to be rough as Ellie adjusts to us and the time difference.
After lunchtime we managed to rally and found the energy to leave the hotel to explore some of the
local markets such as Namdaemun and Myeong-dong. I’ve seen both of these areas before, but I still
cannot believe how every available space is packed with merchandise for retail. The pictures don’t
really do it justice, so I’ll do my best to try to describe some of what we saw.
#1 - The outdoor shopping areas - The only thing I can compare it to is a giant flea market only with
1000 times more merchandise for sale, crammed in every nook and crany of the streets and alley-
ways. It extends below ground as well and what I can only compare to an area that could otherwise be
used for subway lines - are more stalls and stores and it seems to go well beyond what the eye can
see…I am convinced it would take days to explore the whole area.
#2 - The indoor shopping areas - From the outside it looks like any other department store but inside
is a whole different story. The merchandise is organized type: household, children’s clothes, etc. and
usually one type will occupy an entire floor if not multiple floors. Each brand or style has its own little
stall that is probably 6’ x 6’ and each stall has its own salesperson (all women). Each stall is heaped
with whatever wares are being sold there and there is NO open space. The walls are jammed with
merchandise as is the very limited counter space. And the merchandise is not displayed nicely but is
stacked tall. They seem more concerned about availability than presentation. There are big garbage
bags in front of the stalls stuffed full with more inventory.
We purchased a little dress for Ellie from one of the stalls and the woman did not have her size in the
stack on display. So, she started to climb up the wall of shelves behind her, disappeared through the
ceiling and came down a couple minutes later with the size we requested. Yes, they even have storage
above these areas.
I’m guessing on any given floor, there might be 300+ stalls each with its own sales person. I’m blown
away by this model. How does the salesperson make money? Is there that much foot traffic driving
sales? Does the sales person get paid by the hour or make commission on what they sell? Do they rent
the space and then keep the proceeds? The model just doesn’t make sense to me and I can’t believe
the sales people are making much money if any at all.
The amount of stuff (and I’m being nice here because a lot of it is crap) is just mind blowing. The
question I keep asking myself is who are these people buying all of this stuff on a Wednesday
afternoon? To my knowledge, Seoul is not a huge tourist shopping destination, or is it? And they don’t
seem concerned about shop lifting at all. It is so crowded with customers that you can barely
navigate the aisles, it would be very easy to do and I actually found myself going out of my way to
make sure they realized I have the merchandise and intend to pay for it, but I seemed to be the only
one concerned.
Anyway, one more comment and I’ll leave it alone, but Americans are always characterized as huge
consumers. Based on these huge markets and the crowds that I’ve seen, American’s are meager
compared to the Koreans.
As we exited the shopping area, we stumbled upon this young man (~20 years old) who was preparing
for a stage performance - on the street. The fact that he had a stage led me to believe it was more
of a production than just a street musician and I assumed he was an up and coming artist and they
were trying to provide exposure - much like we do at the malls in the US. So, Lauren and I stopped to
listen and then he soon started to…..what is the word I want to use here? “Sing” doesn’t really
describe what he was doing. He sounded more like a cat in heat as he attempted to sing the Rod
Stewart song “Have I told you lately that I love you”. We recognized the song because of the
prerecorded music he used but also because we could understand at least the chorus - and then he
seemed to slip into some other language that didn’t sound Korean to us. My only guess is he was
singing in multiple languages to capture a larger audience? Wow, he really IS talented! Honestly, it
was so bad and yet he was giving it his all, totally oblivious to how stereotypically bad it really was.
We had to leave because we were finding it more comical then entertaining and didn’t want to insult
him.
As we were walking away, a little old Korean man approached us. Of course we were weary at first,
most Koreans here just ignore us, and no one talks to us, but he seemed overly eager to engage with
us, what did he want? But in the end we think was just a nice 71 year old man looking to practice his
English and proudly share a bit of history. He spent most of the time telling us about the history of
the Bank of Korea, which was across the street from where we were standing. What we think he said,
was that the Japanese built it over 100 years ago when they occupied Korea and at the time it was
the biggest building in Seoul. He also spoke quite a bit about what it was like in Seoul during the
Korean War and ultimately how even though the bank was damaged during the fighting, it was still
standing and was the tallest in the city until the modern buildings took over. He also told us about his
family and grandchildren and how proud he is that he goes to work every day, he has food to eat (“fat
belly”) and a place to sleep that‘s not outside on the ground. He was a pretty neat old guy and we wish
we got a picture of/with him…but after about 10 minutes he said his farewells, shook our hands,
bowed and headed off across the street.
And with that, our recap of a very lazy, leisurely day in Seoul. Tomorrow will be a different story
though. We can’t wait to see Ellie and this time we won't have to say goodbye!
1:00 won’t come fast enough!
(AGAIN, WE WILL POST TODAY'S PICTURES WHEN WE RETURN TO THE STATES)
Sammy's day began at 7:15am with another surprise from Mommy & Daddy. I have been telling Sam
he gets special surprises and treats just during the time Mommy & Daddy are away and Nona is here
with him.
Our morning was spent waiting for the GE repairman …to come sometime between 8-12 noon.
While we waited Sam spent time playing on the computer -- the gingerbread man game… many, many
times. Then he helped Nona fill baskets with baby toys for Ellie, each toy was pre-tested by Sammy
before being added to the basket. He was a great help reorganizing the kitchen cabinets to store
Ellie’s bottles etc.
Finally a call at 11:30, GE guy is on his way….from Baltimore, Md. Wait the Angel house is in Virginia.
Told me he was on his way would find us on his GPS. One hour later a second a call to tell me he can’t
find us on the Maryland map and gee wiz he has the latest GPS system available. The location
confusion -- the zip code was recorded as 21094 instead of 20194 on the confirmation of service
email. He said he would call again when he figured something out. I gave up waiting for phone calls
and the GE repairman at 1:45pm and left the house.
Sammy managed a power nap on the way home from Miss Beth’s (a 5minute drive) it took his Nona a
good half hour to get him moving again...It’s now 9:30pm he has tried to escape twice --wish me luck.
I believe this round will go to Sammy!
Love,
Nona
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