Shopping in Seoul

Slept really well last night, in spite of being woken at 3 am by someone trying to get into our room when they were supposed to be going next door.
Breakfast wasn’t quite up to the standard of our other Korean hotel, but it was still fine, and the room itself is very comfortable. So far, that first hotel has set the bar for all others.
Korean traffic is interesting: there’s plenty of it, but no one seems to be hassled, and there aren’t horns blowing all the time. Italy was the worst for city traffic: it was dangerous for pedestrians there, quite apart from the speed everyone drives at. (I nearly got run down twice by cyclists in Italy, and motor scooters paid no attention to pedestrian crossings.) Here in Seoul they drive fast enough (our taxi driver was doing 80 kph at times) but they don’t give pedestrians so many frights, even though motor scooters drive on the footpaths as well as the roads.
We decided to go walkabout this morning, and investigate the markets. Went down the road and found the fish market - or what we call the fish market: the stallholders sell fish almost to the exclusion of anything else. Sardines, fish like whitebait, herrings, all that sort of thing as well as bigger fish. But there are thousands of them, boxed or strung together on strings. The place smells very interesting. And it’s packed: the stalls all run into each other, and go off down other lanes on either side. There are real shops, but even these tend to have stalls outside. Many of the stallholders were sitting watching mini-televisions while waiting for customers.
After this we turned right, intending to go towards the Dongdaemun Market, which is held within the Dongdaemun Stadium. This wasn’t so interesting, because many of the stalls were still closed. I don’t know whether Monday is a holiday for many or whether they just start late. But again the place was packed with stalls, and with stuff. Koreans don’t go for the minimalist look: quantity is everything. In a European or British department store, you’ll have plenty of stock, but it’ll be laid out with some breathing space between items. In Seoul, the shops are stuffed full. We road up the escalator in one clothing shop (about eight storeys high) and every floor had mannequins standing row upon row, and clothes taking up every bit of available space.
We had lunch at a roadside stall - it had seats, some of them on the road itself. It was a wonderful lunch, a thin soup, noodles with a spicy sauce, and chicken kebabs. The lady didn’t sell coffee, but gave her mate along the road a bit a wave and she brought a couple of small coffees over. The woman was very friendly and helpful and we really enjoyed the meal - until we had to pay. It was 25,000 won, which is about £13. A lot more than we thought it would be, because food is very cheap here.
It’s been very overcast and misty today, and even rained a bit. It’s even cold, which we didn’t expect!

A little frustration

We decided to go to Alacante today and use up at least some of the remaining money on our Eurail Pass. This meant getting up at 5.45 in order to catch a train at 7 am. (This was Celia’s idea, not mine.) We managed this task, although for some reason (I think I’d eaten too many grapes in one go) I had to get up during the night at least three times, and I had the most incredible dreams which didn’t make me feel as though I’d slept well at all. In fact I actually went to sleep on the train for a half an hour, something I rarely do.
We arrived in Alacante without any hitch and without having to pay any additional supplement on our Pass. The sun wasn’t shining much when we got there and I anticipated a chilly day, but it got hotter and hotter and finally we were shedding stuff in order to survive.
We discovered that there’s a tram system in Alacante and thought we’d take it to one of the beach stops, Costa Blanca. But finding the tram was a major issue. We found the place the main stop was named after - the Mercato, a two-storeyed market with dozens of fish and meat stalls - but couldn’t find the tram. Celia saw a sign for the tourist information - and then we couldn’t find that. But we did come across a small museum dedicated to the artists who are involved in the St John’s Festival time. (Hogueras St Juan is the Spanish name.) Seemingly they elect a Princess (and possibly a Prince sometimes) and they make all these extraordinarily imaginative installations (Celia’s word, and apt) which in some cases stand several metres high - and seemingly at some point they burn them! Now I may have got something wrong here, so don’t quote me on this yet.
Anyway, in the museum were posters, photographs and even better, working models of the installations, mostly done in plaster. At least that’s what I gathered they were: things rescued from oblivion by some interested parties. They were a delight: fantastic and detailed and very creative, done by men who were superb artists and sculptors, men who had great senses of humour and weren’t afraid to be robust in their humour!
After this we found the Information place, and had to walk back up the street (and a short hill) to get to the Tram. Still no sign of it and then we realised it was underground - again. Certainly it is a tram, but it begins its run underground and only gets to look like a tram after about five minutes.
We got to the beach and had lunch and sat and read and probably got burnt a bit, and were greeted with a Buenos Dias by two elderly Spanish ladies, but ignored by the Brits. And finally we decided it was time to come home.
We were going to catch the 15.25 but when I checked I was told it was full. So I booked on the next one at 16.16 and even got a refund on the booking charge we’d had to pay last weekend for our tickets to Madrid. But then the fun started.
You might remember that we had to get a bus from Barcelona Sants to Tarragona last week before we could get on the train. This is still happening, and today it caused a great long delay. The train from Barcelona arrived about 16.35, and because they then had to clean the thing before anyone could board it, no one was allowed on board till well after 17.00. I don’t suppose we were the only frustrated people, but the Spaniards in general kept it hidden from view.
The train shuffled off at 17.25 and meandered its way to Valencia. Instead of taking only about an hour and a half, it took nearly two hours, the same as it had in the morning, when we’d been on a slower train.
Got into Valencia and intended to catch a 5B which goes down our street. 5Bs were few and far between apparently. In the end, (frustrated) we got on an 8, which we’d taken this morning, only to find that the board that allows disabled people to get on the bus wouldn’t retract after a person in a wheelchair was put on. Several people got off, intending to get the next number 8 (they were much more frequent), and then a 5B turned up! We raced for it - even Celia with her sore foot - only to find that the driver refused to accept our tickets. ‘But the ramp was stuck!’ cried Celia, frustrated. The driver hadn’t a clue what she was saying but there was no doubt that he wasn’t going to let us on his bus with another driver’s tickets.
I got off in a little dudgeon. (It wasn’t ‘high’ just moderate.) And we boarded the number 8 again, which had now got itself sorted out (a mechanic had appeared from somewhere). Amazingly they offloaded the person in the wheelchair and left him sitting on the pavement! The ways of the Spanish are beyond the ken of English-speaking people.
Finally got to the famous Towers of Serranos once more and crawled back to the apartment. Which we have to vacate tomorrow morning, so as to move to our next apartment five minutes away.
And then home on Friday. Well, home to Norfolk.

Of course, I found out all about the Bonfires Festival on the Net after I'd written the stuff above. Check it out here.

Frustrating Day

We’ve had a rather frustrating day today, though not entirely. You can read about the good bit on my other blog.
We sat down to plan what we’re doing next this morning. We know already that we’re flying home from Lyons in France on the 7th November, but what we were going to do in the week before that hadn’t been organised. In the end, after some debate, we decided to go overnight from Madrid to Paris on the 3rd. Tried to book online. Complications. Eventually decided we’d go down to the Railway Station and book there. This was after lunch, and we arrived at the station just before 13.58. How do I know it was that time? Because that was the time we picked out a ticket from the booking office and sat down to wait.
We were ticket number 567. The tickets that were being handled when we sat down were in the mid 300s.
It was around four o’clock when we finally got attended to, so you can imagine our disbelief when the guy behind the glass told us we couldn’t book an international ticket because international tickets were only booked on Saturdays until 1 pm. And not at all on Sundays.
Celia berated him a little. To put it mildly. I had to carry her out of the office screaming. We did manage to book a ticket to Madrid for the 1st at least - before she had hysterics.
So that put paid to another day in Valencia. Our intention had been to go to the Market, and then get a tram to the beach. Achieved neither. Worse, Celia’s heel, which hasn’t been playing up since she had a cortisone injection last year suddenly decided to make its presence felt again. We’ve been walking around Valencia mostly, so far. But with her heel playing up we’re not sure how we’ll get from A to B. We got a bus to the show tonight, but we walked back (because it was difficult to find a bus), and her heel didn’t enjoy it.

Chester

Overnight it poured, so by this morning the tent was soaked - only on the outside, thank goodness. But that was enough to make it something of a task trying to get it down and shaken off without covering the inside of the car with water. As it was, I donned my swim shorts to go to the loo: it was easier than getting my pyjamas wet.
Anyway, we left the campsite by the river Ouse where we’ve been for a couple of days and decided to head for Worcester, once again to try and get to see Crowle (and Mamble). Before we left York we stopped off at a café for some breakfast, as neither of us had managed to have more than some muesli, with all the dampness around. We were sitting there waiting for our order, sorting out the most recent lot of photos we’ve taken, when my son Ben rang! And then we realised we’d forgotten it was his birthday, although that wasn’t why he was ringing. Celia explained to the young lady who was witnessing that we were talking to one of our children in NZ, but she looked as though she had no idea where NZ was and if she did, hadn’t a clue how we could be talking to anyone anywhere else.
After breakfast we headed off for Manchester, as a first port of call, and though we thought we’d put the city centre in, found ourselves outside somewhere in a suburb called Heywood. There was an indoor market there, and so we went in and had some lunch: it wasn’t very busy inside, probably because it was still raining a good deal, and the young feller behind the counter was interested in our being from NZ, wanting to check whether it was as dry as Australia. We assured him it wasn’t. It’s constantly interesting how many people have relatives in either Australia or NZ, or who have a desire to go and visit one or both of the countries. There are still many links between the places, even though the European Union is such a dominant force now in this part of the world. I don’t think most English people really think they’re part of the EU, and they wonder at all the Europeans coming over to find work, especially the Poles.
There was a long slow patch on the motorway heading south, so on a whim we decided to head for Chester, as the road was clear. Chester is near the border of Wales, and at one point, while we’d taken a wrong turn in looking for a campsite, we found ourselves crossing the border - while I was typing an email, as it happened.
We’re camping in Chester - the rain has stopped for the most part, although it was extremely heavy in places on the way - and we’ll see whether we spend any time here tomorrow or not.

Market

We discovered the Oxford market by accident: it’s similar in style to the inside market in Melbourne: lots of little permanent shops all crowded together under a permanent roof, some of them fully enclosed so you have to enter a door, some of them open (like the fish shop and the butchers) so you can buy straight over the counter, like you would in an open air market. One of the most appealing was a cake shop where they were doing the decoration of the cakes in full view of the public. They had dozens of things on display, cakes with people on them, and all sorts. And then there were hundreds of decorations you could buy to put on cakes, some of them edible and some not.
There was also a small café where they had free internet access, so of course we stopped there for a little while, as we carry the big baby, as it gets called to distinguish it from the little baby (the GPS), around with us most of the time for just such occasions. We only do this while we’re staying in places where we don’t have some internet access at home - we’ve been fortunate to be able to use other people’s broadband a lot of the time.

Interneting in the Rain

Yesterday we tramped around in drizzling rain trying to find one of the pubs in Northampton that has internet access available via The Cloud. The first place we went to was under new management, and the staff knew nothing about Internet access. One of the blokes at the counter suggested another public house a street away: this turned out to be only BT (British Telecom) wireless access, which wasn’t any good to us. We only discovered this after we’d bought a coffee and tea. (Strong, strong coffees and teas.)
Finally we made our way to Abington St and found two Cloud access places opposite each other. If it hadn’t been raining so hard we could probably have sat out in the street between them (it’s a no vehicular traffic area) and picked up the signal. In the end we chose Lloyds No 1 over the Wedgewood, because the music was too loud at the latter.
Lloyds No 1 is part of a chain of pubs around the country, and provided us not only with great tea and hot chocolate (covered in cream, the latter was) but with inexpensive meals. We got through some business on the Net and some blogging, but no Skyping. However we were back in town this morning because we wanted to look at the Market in Northampton (where some woman was selling very good DVDs, but changing the price to suit the customer!) so we skyped two of the kids and had a conference call with them.

Wireless, market, church, library.

Celia and I went into Norwich today, intending to have a look round the place, but also to try out our wireless laptop, which we haven’t managed to do so far. We paid for three hours of use on wireless with The Cloud before we left, but I’m not entirely sure we need it. Time will tell. Anyway, today we sat just near the market in Norwich and opened up the computer and voila! we were online. It wasn’t quite as easy as that, but it was pretty straightforward.
By the time we’d got all that sorted out, and rung one of the kids (Celia was going to Skype him, which was the idea behind the excursion with the laptop, but then realized he isn’t on Skype!) and walked from the car park and back to it within an hour, we didn’t get much else done. However, we reparked the car in an area where there were no restrictions, caught a bus back to town and walked about without the weight of the laptop or the backpack – both of which we’d brought with us on our first trip in. Sounds complicated? Yup, we seldom do anything without complication.
Anyway, the market has all been upgraded, and all the stallholders now have permanent wooden stalls, closed in above, and closeable at night with shutters and such. This means that many of them look much more professional than in the past. The secondhand bookstall, for instance, was so tidy I didn’t want to disturb the displays. Didn’t buy anything from there but did buy a copy of Dombey and Son (which I think I’ve already got at home) from an op-shop later on.
I did get a watch from one of the stalls – again, it was much more like a little shop than a market stall. The watch is very similar to the one I’ve had since Celia went to England the time before last (around twenty years ago). My old watch has suddenly come apart, which is distressing, as I’m not a person to change watches at the drop of a fashion. I’ve only ever possessed two: one I got for my 21st and the other one I just mentioned. Now that I’ve said that, it’s possible I did have another earlier one: I seem to remember a rather ugly thing I was glad to replace with my 21st birthday present.
The weather continues to be mild and often hot, and we both came home exhausted from traipsing around and not really seeming to achieve anything much. I did have a look around the library, and even joined up on the off-chance that I might borrow something from there during our stay. The library is only seven years old, with a great deal of glass, a huge covered forecourt (there was a careers display going on while we were there) and three stories high. When you look out through the glass from the inside you can see the wonderful old church of St Peter Mancroft just in front. (It’s next to the market.) The church has all these plates in the floor where either people have been buried or that are just memorial stones; I’m not sure which. It also has three marvelous series of stained-glass windows; stone heads sticking out from below the upper-level windows, and a blazing gold altar of carved statuary. Quite a place.
There isn’t a saint called Peter Mancroft, by the way. The church was originally St Peter and St Paul, but St Paul got dropped at some point and the Mancroft bit was added. It’s thought that it relates to the name of a person who owned the piece of land where the market is now situated.
The other remarkable thing about Norwich is that much of the original city wall is still standing: it wouldn’t actually keep anyone out, but it’s been there for an awful long time.