N Seoul Tower + The 1,000 Step Program + Sorry Ed!

After a great experience at the Korean War Memorial, it was once again time to see some some historical sites on the south side of the Korean peninsula. The plan was to visit the N Seoul Tower, where N apparently stands for New. This tower officially opened to the public on October 15, 1980, making it exactly 45 days older than I (and 33 days younger than Stephen - mazel). After a 15 billion won addition in 2005 ($1 is about 1000 won, so $15m USD), the N prefix was added to emphasize the 'New' look on the tower, mainly referring to the thousands of customizable lights that were added - similar to how decorative lighting has become a huge part of the Empire State Building at night over the past few years.

Luckily, Hotel Shin Shin was really strategically located in Seoul, as many of the things I wanted to see were a quick walk or subway ride away - and now that I'm on my way to Phuket, I'd gotten very comfortable walking around and commuting in Seoul. Again, the impact of most things being written or spoken secondly in English after Korean can't be understated.

Related note - there were three 7/11s within a three minute walk from my hotel, which was also very convenient. Side note - who else wants to change their ring tone to Kevin Spacey's ring tone when Kate Mara calls him in House of Cards? Another side note - who else wants Kate Mara to call them?

Now back to the Tower. It would have been difficult to find the escalator/elevator entrance for the cable car building up to the Tower had I not gotten lost trying to find the subway for the War Memorial just the day before. I actually spotted it as I walked around aimlessly, searching for the subway, with little clue as to which direction I was headed.. so thankfully, sometimes getting lost can be fruitful. Unfortunately, I can affirm that this is typically not the case. Just read on.

The cable car up was a breeze except for the class of 30+ little Korean chilluns (probably around 6 or 7 but I'm a terrible judge - they could've easily been 4-5 or 8-9) running into the car right before the doors closed - but they employed the accountabilibuddy system, as pairs of them all held hands, which was downright adorable.

When the cable car arrived in the area surrounding Tower, I probably should've taken note as to exactly where I'd need to go to get back onto the cable car going down.. and roughly how many steps I walked up from the cable car building before I reached the platform of the main attraction - but (foreshadowing alert!) I did not do this.. more on that to come.

The Tower itself and the views were pretty phenomenal - some of my many photos are attached to this post.  One could mostly see all the way across Seoul from various points around the Tower.. pretty amazing.

I ended up purchasing a package to eat at the nicer Korean Restaurant (Hancook) there, which turned out quite well.  As you can see from the photos, I had some kimchi pajun, jabchae, kimchi, and bulgogi with lettuce wraps and my favorite, the reddish-orange bean paste - and all were great. The desserts/fruits were extremely tasty too. There were a number of other food establishments around as well, and one even had NY-named dishes (see photo) such as the Long Island Fish Burger, the Hamptons Shrimp Burger, and the Manhattan Classic Burger. What?! I'm sorry, I thought this was Korea.

After lunch I checked out an area around the Tower that had an excellent view of Seoul, but it was unique in that thousands of locks and ornaments, many with writing on them, lined the fences surrounding the platform. The idea is to memorialize your love (presumably with another person) on this lock or ornament and attach it to the fence so that you can come back years later and find it rusted or worn, behind hundreds of other locks/ornaments placed there by like-minded individuals, or perhaps not even find it at all. I mean.. there are thousands of locks and ornaments up there. It's like, come on. But this didn't stop me partaking in this wonderful tradition. I purchased the most awesome ornament I could find, thinking that I'll save my lock-placing moment for the future, should I ever return with a lover that happens to be a person. Since I didn't have such a person with me, I decided to profess my love for the one that was in my life at the moment - my one, my sweet, my Seoul (see photo attached).

After professing and memorializing my love for Seoul, it was time to return home (or so I hoped) via the cable car that took me up to the Tower. And so I began to walk in the direction I'd come from, gleefully trotting down steps for what started to seem like an extremely long time.. but I continued trotting down gleefully, hoping to reach my destination shortly. I must've run down 500 steps before I saw a sign for some kind of trail,  another sign for a parking lot, and also a sign for a national library, none of which were remotely familiar to me.

I had been feeling a bit weighed down at the time by the heavy lunch I had just eaten, and the thought even crossed my mind that it'd be nice to get some cardio in later that day. Be careful what you wish for. Thus began my treacherous trek back up to the cable car entrance. I was carrying my dSLR+bag+souvenirs. I don't do well on inclines. It was cold. I was sweating. It was grueling.. and I had a really long way to go.

When I finally returned to the point where I came from initially, burned and broken, I saw the entrance to the cable car heading down. Once I confirmed it wasn't a mirage, I stopped for a minute and looked around to see where I went wrong.. you know, so I could correct my behavior for the next time I'm visiting the N Seoul Tower.. probably trying unsuccessfully to find my amazing Seoul love-ornament bear. It turns out that I needed to go down only maybe 20 steps and make a slight turn right, and I would've been headed home. Alternatively, I could've noticed the large sign on the cable car building, pointing out the entrance.. but who's counting? I must have been distracted. My legs were extremely sore, but all was not for naught - there were a few really amazing vantage points as I headed down (and back up) what seemed like miles (but was probably just meters) of stairs.. and so a productive cardio workout and photography exploration it turned out to be.

When I arrived back in my hood, I took a side street back to my hotel to check out some of the street vendors out there. I ended up getting a $10 grey sport watch (I needed to pick one up after deciding to not bring my nicer watch) which is hopefully waterproof but I can't be certain due to the language barrier.. and I also found a great navy blue hat which supposedly said "bad guy" in Korean, and I took that to mean badass, right or wrong. This may or may not be a perfect ironic gift to my stepfather, Ed, who is anything but a bad guy.. but I also may end keeping it because it's awesome and getting Ed something else. Sorry Ed!