These past two weeks have been some of my favorite times in Korea this far because I got to spend them with my mom! My mom arrived two Friday's ago after a very tiresome and traffic filled night (two hours late!) but she made it and settled into our cozy apartment quite nicely.
On Saturday afternoon, after my mom enjoyed a nice, long heavy sleep we decided that we wanted to go to Seoul and do some exploring. We hopped on the bus and decided the first thing we should do was of course get fish pedicures. Now, when Barry and I went to do this we happened to get stuck with the little baby fish but this past time with my mom we looked down in the water and saw the biggest fish alive. So, we stuck our feet in the water and felt as 50 fish tried to eat our feet. My mom and I joked that their Thanksgiving dinner came early that year.
After our feet were as smooth as could be, we hopped in a cab to explore Gwangjang market, a food market and one of Lonely Planet's top picks in Korea. We walked around the market viewing all the colorful foods, we finally settled on a nice bi bim bap for a little snack.
As all of you know, my mom is a vegetarian and Korea is not exactly a vegetarian friendly place as almost every Korean meal I have eaten includes some sort of meat. But, with a population of 10 million people, there are bound to be vegetarians. After googling extensively we found a vegetarian Buddhist restaurant in a very artsy area of Seoul called Insa-Dong. It boasts a 20 course meal with a live performance at 8pm. We all agreed the food was a little boring, but the Korean traditional performance was great. It included 5 or 6 short performances with drums and traditional masks and clothes. They even called me on stage to participate and when they wouldn't take no for an answer I found myself on stage shaking a drum to traditional Korean music.
The next day after a good night sleep and feeling refreshed, my mom and I wanted to do a little more exploring in Seoul. We started off in Gyeonbokgung where we explored the Gyeongbokgung palace. This palace used to be the main palace in Seoul until the Japanese government destroyed it in the 19th century. It is the largest of the five palaces scattered around Seoul. It was first built in 1394 by the Joseon Dynasty but rebuilt in 1867. The name of this palace translated to English means " Palace of Shining Happiness" Which lived up to it's name-my mom and I were so happy to be together let alone exploring a palace together!
Next, we went on to explore Damdaemun Market, a market that was constructed in the 14th century and served as the Great Eastern Gate of the Seoul fortress. This market was unbelievably massive. We walked for two hours and I don't think we saw even half of it. We both picked up some odds and ends, the market consisted of mostly clothes and shoes-incredibly cheap prices. After sitting down on the curb and deciding we didn't want to get up again, it was time to get in a taxi and meet Barry for dinner.
I had heard of this restaurant from a couple people called Zelen's, so I figured when my mom was here we should of course go to the Zelen's restaurant! It was Bulgarian and absolutely delicious! We even took a picture of Rachel who was standing in the middle of the restaurant.
Look out for part 2 of Mom in Korea which includes show and tell and Halloween at Bambini, a trip to the Spa, and some more odds and ends!
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