The people and the rawness of it. I also will admit my addiction to handbags and dresses, but that isn't what brings my to Seoul either.
This last week I've been finally seeing various Korean friends, old and new, and it's been lovely. It's so nice to just sit in a cafe or restaurant with your friends and talk for hours, about your life, life in general, old memories, and the differences we notice in our own worlds and in worlds we don't know so well. That has been really wonderful. I only wish I had done this more this trip.
I also realize I really really really miss cooking, and that it's such a huge part of my life. It's more than just a hobby, but my entire way of life. I can't wait to cook again.
Moving out of the dorms was so nice. I enjoyed our dorms and the laziness of dorm life for a very short period of my life, as I never lived in the dorms in college, but it wasn't the life for me. I am so glad I won't be spending my time in Turkey in the dorms, other than for the first week. The location of Shinchon feels rather fake to me. There are so many girls with their plastic surgery, and everyone looks and dresses relatively the same. Everything is so heavily based on appearance around shinchon and edae. I'm currently in a hostel in a less new part of Seoul, actually it is surrounded by a fabric market. It's rather run down, but I really quite like it. It's so interesting to walk around the area and look at the various textile stores. It's like a de-integrated Asian version of home depot around here. The interior decorating side of me really enjoys it, and it really feels like "Asia" more than other parts of Seoul. The people here also seem so much more real. I see a lot more older people walking around. It's kind of nice. It reminds you that Korea isn't entirely made of perfection and perfect appearances. It sort of has the charm of rural Japan, yet not so green and much more polluted. haha
My friend and I talked about the "Design Seoul" policy today and what a shame it is. They are tearing down so many old houses in Seoul, that in ten years there may be nothing but apartments if nothing is done to prevent this movement. The movement against this is being led by foreigners rather than Koreans though, which is rather surprising. One would think Koreans would be more interested in preserving their own heritage through architectural style, but like so many other countries and areas obsessed with progress and modernization, they too care more about maximizing utility by maximizing the resources of land than keeping certain things in tact. I still love Korea, and it is quite convenient, but I think it will be quite disappointing if those old style houses are all destroyed. It would be quite regrettable.
It is pouring rain right now! My shoes are soggy at the moment, so I'm taking a nice moment of relaxation to write this. Last night there were about four power outages in my dorm. A lot of Seoul got really dark...well at least the Shinchon area...it's hard to tell how far an area goes in the dark in such a big city, but it seemed like it was much bigger than that. The weather is very strange everywhere in the world these days I guess.
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