Tuesday, October 14, 2008

seoul 08: birthday getaway..

spoilt. sooo darn spoilt. as if being in seoul is not good enough a trip, this little princess was whisked away to kyungjoo, where the real shilla princesses lived back in the good ole days!! 3-hours away form seoul, we had to haul out overnight luggages to catch the train at 6am.

accompanied with the fact that we didn't get much eye-shut from latenight shopping AND cos we didn't pack ahead of time so we were trying to stuff random things into our backpacks at 6am in the morning, we were both very prickly and grouchy. man! i've got terrible temper but with a grumpy daniel, very lethal combination. good thing we picked up some maccas on the fly and caught a little rest on the train! made it to kyungjoo in one piece, with no missing luggages!

caught a cab and checked into this cool place! it was very traditional, felt so empty that we were sure that there were more hotel staff than guests! so surreal that it almost felt like we were living in a movie set!


the bed!! sheets and fluffy pillows! ah! pure bliss..(not too excited about the bed spread..)


a little hot spring tub in our bamboo garden! super cool you can literally jump out of bed, out of the window into the hot tub..


our little tea room overlooking the pond..



admittedly the millenium park wasn't that happening with their clay figurines, 'kicked the arse of chinese soldiers' performances and coya sauce workshop which was not open for business (!!) but we had a long walk through the park and took silly pictures of ourselves. it was like the tang dynasty in jurong! (if any one remembered anything about that place..) people in costumes, dramatic performances with gunshots and men on horses! it was entertaining while it lasted though. it was also funny how daniel dodged the school kids that would crowd around him to practise their english with random phrases of "hello! how are you?", "What are you?", "My name is XXX".. very cute! ;P

next morning, we woke up and missed our breakfast (head of cabbage soup sounded not too appealing anyway..) checked out and headed to the town of kyung joo, where our little adventure started!

as its a little country town with mostly local tourists, we decided to wander around on bicycles, just like locals! so we rented these ricketty squeeky bicycles somewhere in town, grabbed the map and pointed to little places that looked interesting and navigated ourselves around! 



first stop, lunch! thought we'd try something local!! this was the most amazingly large chicken we've ever seen! we were famished and ate heaps but did not get through half of it all!! it was super yummy with heaps of veggies and tunghoon dipped in sweet sauce..



found little mounds of grass in the middle of nowhere so decided to climb it, even though i was wearing my long glamourous dress! very garang indeed. only found out later these mounds are similar to their tombs. so i hope we were not trampling on someone's beloved pet or something.. it gave us a bird's eye view of the entire city! :) 


zhing caught mid-twirl.. (see in the background? how odd are the grassy mounds!?!)


my bicycle with a little basket! :)

we picked up some random homeware, a flowery apron, some frilly sleepwear and bits and pieces from this little quaint town of ours! ran into a corner shop stocked with fancy race bikes, shopped for foldable bikes, rode in padi fields of rice, past gardens of lotus and pink flowers, barked at by someone's dog (cos we were trespassing! yikes) but felt a million dollars!! just a short little break from city life to sit, sip tea and ponder. if only we lived every single day this way, maybe turning late twenties ain't that bad after all! :) 



8 comments:

  1. oh princesszhing! you look like a Bollywood princess in the last 2 pictures! you must have enjoyed yourself tremendously! haha :)

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  2. Such a gorgeous day, and oooo your dress rocks!

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  3. yes it was great fun!! :) thanks, babe!!

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  4. it was way too lovely to stay indoors!!

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  5. gosh! the hotel/inn? you checked into is simply lovely! esp that outdoor spring tub!! and you look really lovely in your dress. I love it!!

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  6. it was very cute indeed! :) you should definitely consider paying it a visit. (warning: that town is really not that fancy! all part of the experience i guess!)

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  7. haha! :) yes indeed! but all buttoned up in my attempt to look modest!

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