The parade in Insadong reminded me of the Cavalcade of Magi in Spain.

Pungmul performance during the parade.

As in Chinese culture, the dragon is a very important figure in Korean culture, and it is very present in all Korean celebrations.

Chariots were made of a kind of paper with light inside, which made them very colorful at night.

View of another chariot.

Lanterns are everywhere in the city during the Budda’s Birthday previous days. All Buddhist temples, as well as the busiest areas of the biggest Korean cities are adorned with lanterns like these during these days.

More lanterns

View of the Jogyesa Temple, with all the lanterns for Budda’s Birthday.

Also for this occasion, the Cheonggye Stream (a.k.a. Cheonggyecheon) had this great look with all the lanterns.

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There were two things that surprised me. One is that there were many children skating, and many of them taking speed skating (the boys) or figure skating (the girls) lessons.

View of the ice rink right after being cleaned-up (every hour more or less everybody has to go out during 15 minutes so that the ice rink can be cleared of scratches in the ice).

People skating. On the left you can see the children learning how to speed-skate.

The second thing that I saw was that there were many couples wearing “couple t-shirts”, a trend in some Asian countries by which couples wear the same clothes to show their love in public. This is not just limited to t-shirts (or hoodies in this case). You can also find “couple pants”, couple shoes, couple cups… and some couple even dress totally the same, from shoes to cup…

Couple t-shirt model “heart”.

Couple t-shirt model “posh”.

Couple t-shirt model “cute”

And the speed skating star. Born to skate!

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In fall, the color mixture on the trees’ leaves can make the day of anyone who likes photography

More color mixture…

It is only possible to enter the palace in one of the organized tours during the day. There are tours available in English, Japanese, Chinese and Korean, at different times during the day.

One of the yards of the palace. Those stone posts on the ground are indicators of the position where the different king’s officials must stand.

A closer view of the posts. On them there is the name of each official written in Chinese.

This lake gets full of water lilies in summer, giving it quite an amazing look (picture here).

One of the gardens’ gates. The fences are made of bamboo and the roof is the one you can view in many temples and palaces from the Joseon dynasty.

This lake is another one of the many romantic corners in this palace.

Many famous Korean dramas have been filmed in these gardens. Among them, one of the most popular is Dae Jang Geum (or Jewel in the Palace, in the States), set in Korea’s Joseon dynasty.

Jiwon doing the favorite pose of all Asians

Visits to this palace are quite limited. It closes on Mondays, and to go in you have to join one of the few organized tours for 3,000 KRW the normal one, and 5,000 KRW for the one they call “special” (I don’t think it is so special, but can be an option if you miss one of the “normal” tours, as there are not many tours during the day). The “normal” tours in English start at 11:30, 1:30, and 3:30. The tour takes around one hour twenty minutes approximately and you can expect to walk around 1.6 miles during that time.

Given their proximity, it is possible to see both the Changdeok and Gyeongbok palaces in one day. If you take this option, it may be better to see the Changdeok Palace first, because it closes earlier and it is also more limited in times.

Finally, I must also say that, only on Thursdays, it is possible to visit the palace without a tour (they call it “self-guided tour”) given that you are willing to pay as much as 15,000 KRW per person. For those who want to take pictures without people around this may be a good option.

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The entrance to the park reminds that of any Disneyland.

What I liked the most of this park is that it is in the middle of the mountains, with attractions mixing with the trees. The park is so huge that you have to take a chairlift to go from one area to another. The rollercoaster in the background is one of the most recent attractions (it opened in 2008). It is made of wood and has one of the steepest freefalls in the world (you can see some pictures from when they were building it here). Unfortunately (or luckily) I couldn’t ride it, as it was closed because of the rain.

One of the few attractions that we could ride was the “Safari World”, or “사파리 월드”, as they write it in Korean.

Basically, they get you on a bus and take you on a tour in a “Jurassic Park” style.

In Safari World, animals (bears, tigers, lions, jabalis… what you can usually find in a zoo) are more or less in liberty, although as you can see they are quite far from being wild animals. This is that this poor bear had to do to get some cookies from the bus driver.

This tiger on the other hand, decided to forget about the cookies and take a nap instead.

These kind of giant rats are coaties. They had them walking on these bridges that went over the path that people followed.

This is the most similar to a roller coaster I could ride…

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The funniest thing for a foreigner that goes to a Korean water park (or beach, swimming pool, etc.) is probably the way Koreans (specially girls) dress for this kind of occasion. Interestingly enough, you can’t see a single bikini. Well, actually they do wear them, but they are hidden underneath those long sleeve t-shirts (to protect from the sunlight, as tanned bodies are not fashionable at all here) and mini-skirts or short pants, of course everything fitting together perfectly. It is also important to make use of a cup and/or sunglasses to protect you face from the evil and cancerogenic sun. Another important detail are your toe nails. Yes girls, your toe nails have to be perfectly pedicured, and if possible, also matching your bikini.

These bay-watches are there just to watch that nobody stands on the area where waves break, and that nobody without a life-jacket goes into the deep area of the swimming pool. The life-jacket thing makes sense specially if you consider that this pool can get really, really crowded, and also that most Korean can’t swim.

Jiwon completly scared thinking of what’s coming…

And here you go!! Luckily she was protected with her cup, her life-jacket, and her t-shirt anti-sun.

And here I am like a king-of-waves in front of the Korean people. The water you see doesn’t go downwards, but upwards, allowing you to stay (not without much suffering and equilibrium) in a quite static position on the bodyboard. Wow! So stylish! So cool!… So ashamed when I fell of after half a second in that position!

Even on a rainy day, early in the morning, you have to wait quite long lines to get to the attractions. This is what we had to wait before enjoying the boomerango.

Besides the outdoor area, there is also a quite large indoor area. Its perfect for babies and the rainy days of Korean summer.

And another view of the indoor area.

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This is the place where the king used to rest in summer. It’s completely open and surrounded by this lake so that his majesty could be really cool.

I guess it’s on this small boat how you get to the palace on the lake.

His majesty’s throne.

Detail of the columns.

Another of the palace’s lakes whose aspect had improved a lot with the arrival of spring.

I thought this was a nice picture, don’t you think? (UPDATE: It’s funny who this picture differs from these other from Kirai. Korean and Japanese cultures, while being similar, have quite a lot of differences: while in Japan he is the one and only king, in Korea she is definitely the princess.)

Another couple enjoying the good weather at the palace. I couldn’t tell whether the guy is dressing as a tiger or as Pikachu… in any case, he could have more style

Already outside of the palace, we found this temple with the typical buddha’s birthday decoration, the same that we saw during our trip to Yeoju.

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Mass of people and cars going to the island to see the cherry blossoms.

Sometimes, it was even hard to walk with some many people around.

Another shot of the people in the street. Fortunately, the streets are closed that day to avoid accidents (there were many children around too).

We decided to stay at the island until night to see the lighting. It was definitely worth it…

…in fact, there were even more people at night than during the day.

All the main avenue was full of trees with lighting in different colors.

I was pleased to see that they have bathrooms for handicapped people, with easy access for wheelchairs.

I took this picture when we were leaving, after several hours walking around and with a blister on my foot that has been annoying me for one week. It is the Korean National Assembly, were the famous raws between politicians take place often, by the way, between members of the same party.

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You can get to Oido by subway (line 4, last stop). If you go out of the subway station (there is only one exit), you have to take the 30-2 bus (at the bus stop before crossing the street), and you have to get off when you see the red lighthouse. It’s about one hour subway ride plus 20 minutes by bus, but it’s worth it, specially if you like shells.

And, what’s there in Oido? Shells. In all kinds and sizes.

Jiwon and the pale sky I told you about in the last post.

This is how this coast looks like. What is between the boats is not water, but mud. [[Cuando sube la marea]] the mud is covered by the sea, allowing the boats to move.

Near the beach, there were these ayummas selling fish that reminded me of the Jagalchi market in Pusan.

Another picture of the beach.

Near the coast, it’s all full of restaurants selling shells. Most people going to Oido, go there to eat shells.

Cooking the shells.

More shells…

And more…

And more…

And more…

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Here are some pictures of the park and the cherries.

Entrance to the park.

Children jumping among the cherries.

“Magic Hand” you can get your hand made in wax, first time I saw that. They cover your hand with some liquid and then put it inside a bucket with wax. Then they let it dry and remove the hand as if it was a glove. Pretty cool.

I don’t know who he is, but it looked very nice with the trees on the background.

Inside the park, there is also quite a big zoo (specially considering that there is no entrance fee).

The cherry blossoms.

Good view of the cherries.

P.S.: A change of location at the commercial office and some Korean exams by the end of this week kept me from updating the blog for quite a long time. I’ll try to give you guys updates more often.. promise.

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There were several performances, but the one I really liked was a gayageum solo performed by Gwak Eun-Ah. After that, they performed a pansori, a traditional form of poetical storytelling typical from the southwest of Korea.

If you are in Seoul, the same event will be held again on December 15th at 3:00 PM. I think they organize it every year around the same dates, but I can’t tell for sure.

First performance.

Gwak Eun-Ah with her gayageum.

Pansori performance.

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