Arrival in Seoul

Monday, July 30^th

Beijing, China & Seoul, South Korea

Our itinerary for today was to pack up before our evening flight to Seoul, meet up with Valerie’s friend, Trisha who teaches in Beijing before heading to the Lama Temple one last site. 

Our trip out to visit Valerie’s friend took longer than expected and the taxi driver originally drove past our stop.  He was speaking to us in Chinese about the location but we had no idea what he was saying so we probably added a good 20 minutes to our trip since we couldn’t effectively communicate with him.  Fortunately, we were able to spend two hours with Trisha and her friend talking about life and teaching in China.  It was interesting getting her perspective on living in Beijing.

Since it took us longer than expected to get there, we ended up scrapping the Lama Temple to get back in time for our airport shuttle. 

Unfortunately, our plane we delayed for three hours in Beijing so we didn’t arrive to Seoul until 1:00am. We found a cab easily and our cab driver was really nice helping us with Korean phrases as he drove.  It seemed as though our fare would be a flat rate of 70,700 Won (Korean dollars), but when we got to the hotel he told us it was 100,000 which is approximately $80 USD.  My guide book said it should be 60,000 Won plus the toll fare.  Thankfully, the hotel clerk came out and helped us out with the fare and we ended up paying 75,000 Won.  It’s hard not speaking the language but glad we had researched the estimated cost so we didn’t get taken advantage of. 

It’s early morning here and I need some sleep, but one of things I noticed immediately here is that there are 7-11’s again!  I think 7-11’s are a symbol of democracy.  I didn’t see one 7-11 in all of China.  They have convenience stores, but there are no 7-11’s.  Taiwan had a 7-11 every block!  I will definitely write more about my time in China and comparisons between Taiwan and Korea, but I must sleep!  (And please excuse any errors in this one, its 3:30am here in Seoul!)