The Busan Bandida: Chuseok: To Everland & Seoul!

Last week I had my first Chuseok experience. Chuseok is this big Korean holiday, kind of like the American Thanksgiving. Everyone gets together with their relatives in their hometowns, eats more than is humanly possible, and hangs out. This year Chuseok gave us a 5 day holiday, so woohoo! In honor of this, my friend Eric and I took off to Seoul for a few days to inspect things and to check out Everland. Everland is like Korean Disneyland (sort of) and they were having a special event Chuseok price for foreigners, so we were all over it!

We took the train to Seoul on Wednesday, which was so absurdly long, and then stayed in a hostel called Seoul Base Camp. It was actually kind of like a camp, with no real walls (more like thick canvas curtains), but it had everything one needs and everyone was lovely and helpful so no complaints here.

Thursday morning we set off for Everland. Allow me to elaborate on the hectic process of getting there. There is a subway line that goes straight there, but it does take a bit of time. Not as much time as you'll spend trying to take the bus tho! We got to Gangnam Station (shameless photo below...) around 10:15, and the bus arrived.

Oh but buses here... basically, the bus is going 70 mph, it stops somewhere on the bus stop and everyone clamors to get onto it. No order, no line, just bodies on the bus until it is full (and I don't mean legal safety full, I mean, there is no more floor space anywhere, including the exit steps). We missed 2 more buses due to this crowded mess, but eventually caught one around 10:45. While waiting at the stop we got chummy with some Eastern Europeans, with whom we shared the floor space (including one dude who was sitting on the exit steps).

The whole trip took about 2 hours, and once we got to Everland, I immediately proceeded to buy some cat ears because I couldn't help myself. Just like any amusement park, everything was overpriced. We wandered, went on a few rides, ate some peanut butter roasted squid (which was just absurdly delicious, let me say) and had an all around good time.

Friday we spent wandering around Seoul, checking out Seoul tower (which is on a giant hill by the way, which was torturous for me to climb, also by the way. I don't hike), scoping Itaewon and generally doing quite a bit of walking. Good times all around tho, and I can say that I have been to Seoul.

Real talk: Most of the time I was in Seoul, I forgot that I was in Seoul. Going anywhere in Korea, it seems, is just kind of like this huge bombardment of flashing lights and neon, so there's nothing particularly unique about streets in Seoul versus streets in Busan. I mean, I didn't spend that much time in Seoul, but I would be down for Busan in a heartbeat. It's basically got everything Seoul has, but with a beach! You can't go wrong.

Now it's almost the weekend, and the next 2 weeks are bringing more holidays so bring on the fun!