Seoul, Korea Trip Day 1

Hello everyone!

Gonna start on my Seoul trip, like finally! I'm still on holiday in Seoul currently, planned for a 2 weeks trip and I'm left with 4 days. Okay 3 days for meeting friends and walking around since the last day will be spent on the flight back to Singapore. I don't want to go back!!! =(( *I promise myself I'll be back again! for sure. heh.*

Let's get started! I woke up early on the 22nd Dec 2012 to catch my flight with China Eastern Airlines transiting at Shanghai before I get to Seoul. Here... Let me do a review of my experience with China Eastern Airlines. If you check up online review websites, most of them gave really terrible reviews and I was honestly quite worried about my flight but those worries were useless. Firstly, I read online that form transit flights, you have to check in and check out at Pudong Airport and check in again but nope, apparently at Changi Airport I could check in for both flights and got seat numbers immediately. So no worries peeps! Oh and i asked if I could do the same when I return, the lady told me it's the flight for the same day so yes I can do check-ins for both flight when I return.

It was pretty good in fact, the air stewards or stewardess were nice and a few of them are really pretty! As most review shared, they only offer main screens for everyone to share and not individual screen, that's true but it was definitely not noisy at all. They provide ear piece for those who wish to watch the movies they played, I didn't watch any since I bought my Samsung Galaxy note 10.1 with me and was watching a Korean drama called School 2013. You get dehydrated on flights easily so I consistently ask for water (I thought the stewardess are probably gonna hate me for pressing the bell so many times! hhahaha.). I was preparing myself to speak in Mandarin for a glass of water but to my surprised, no need to ask! The stewardess came with a glass of water ready for me! Excellent! And probably some time close to the preparation for landing, the stewardess came out again (I pressed the bell again!) with a tray of covered plastic cups of water and gave me one, then proceed to give out to the rest who needs in on the flight. Even SIA doesn't have such excellent service for water when I took SIA to Guangzhou with school back in September 2012.

After a whole lot of excellent stuff about China Eastern Arlines, time for the not so fantastic ones. You have no idea how long more before you reach your destination because you can't really see the small and personal sort of screen placed high up at the top of the plane. transit at Shanghai Pudong Airport and I have to say they ought to get more people who speaks English at the airport. I ended up being the translator for like 10-15mins when I actually wanted to ask where I should head to for my transit flight. It was really messy and even being able to read Chinese, I had no idea where I should go. That's the terrible part. I mentioned previously about checking-in for both my flights, I still had to queue for some passport checks (this is fast but more time spent on queue-ing). Sadly, for travelers from the western countries like London, France and etc.. I helped them translate at the airport and for those who had the check-ins done, they queue like I did. Met a couple from France (I speak no French and they don't really speak English so I had some difficulties but managed in the end), they had to check out and check in again.

Done with the long review for China Eastern Airlines! It quite worth it to travel with them, so feel free to go ahead and take their flights! ^-^

After arriving at Incheon Airport, I attempted to rent a phone from Olleh and other telecoms but it's really expensive so I don't suggest wasting your money on it! I'll do up a post on getting a pre-paid phone though I didn't get any pre-paid phones in the end because!! Wifi is like everywhere in Seoul. Except for the subway stations, subway trains, buses and maybe sight seeing venues, you get wifi easily over at their restaurants and cafes. Cafes are the life of Koreans, so there's one at every corner, just walk in and get some wifi!

You have to take this tram to collect your luggage at the Airport!

I was really sleepy because I actually had an exam the night before I flew off, which is like 7-10.10pm on the 21st Dec 2012. I left early because I completed the paper but still, I had to pack my luggage since I spent more time studying then packing so I slept late. heh. Hence... I hoped on a cab, and no worries about not being able to know which cab to take because you just have to go to the taxi line, there will be staffs helping you and they will speak basic English, give them the address and they'll get you a cab driver. My hostel was a little difficult to find so I had to call the hostel's owner like twice before I finally got there. haha! No pictures here because it was really dark and I was sleepy! oh FYI! Don't cab if you can! The cab ride cost me 55,000won! That's a lot of money! Have to add in the toll fees as well which was 7,100won. It wasn't worth it at all. I regret later on but oh wells, what can I do? heh.

Reached my hostel and it's called Sun City Hostel for those who might be interested! The pretty good looking owner came to pick me up at the main street and bought me to the hostel, I paid for my full 16D15N stay and I was originally given discount, he gave me more discounts during payment. ^-^

My room was actually a twin bunk bed room and the owner told me specially for me, I get this room all to myself (I came to Seoul alone by the way), how lovely~ Each room has a own private bathroom and as you can see from the picture, it isn't a very big room but I thought for it's price, it was really good already. You can top up your water bottle everyday at their pantry area, or cook instant noodles or cook any other food using their pantry, they won't stop you. They consistently have people living in the hostel so you wont actually feel alone and don't have to worry about not being safe because the owner and probably his partner or something lives in the hostel itself and they tend the front desk from 8am to late at night. They will greet you every morning when you leave the hostel and say "hello~" when you return. Nice people! I recommend this hostel!

Map of hostel, credit to Sun City Hostel

One other reason to stay in this hostel? It is located 2 mins walk away from Samgakil station as shown on the map above. you can exit either exit 1 or 13 depending on which line you are at. Line 4 exit from exit 1 while line 6 exit from exit 13. How convenient is this place? Extremely! You can get to Itaewon (line 6) which is 2 stations away and no transfer needed or if you enjoy walking, you can walk to itaewon. If you look at the map above, it says Seoul station right at the top, it's 2 stations away on Line 4, again no transfer needed and yes again, you can walk over instead. What else? Line 4 is actually the line which Myeongdong and Dongdaemun are along. So you don't have to transfer to get to those place, just pop on the subway and travel there. ^-^

Alright! That's all for Day 1! Flight took up like 3/4 of my day anyway. hahah! More updates to come.. I'll try to blog day by day and provide as much details as I can for everyone who intends to travel to Seoul. Cheers! Happy Year 2013 by the way!!