My 4 day vacation seems like an age ago now, but better late than never!

I had been here all of 2 weeks when I was given 4 days off while the school owners went on their annual vacation and the school closed. It wasn’t the best timing as I hadn’t yet had time to get to grips with things, plus the weather was probably at its hottest and most humid, so I didn’t do too much!

My first vacation day I went to Lotte Mart to have a look around. Lotte Mart is a large supermarket that is almost like a department store as it sells lots of things - clothes, food, household items, books, electrical goods etc.
That evening I went out for dinner with Misha (who is also an English teacher who lived in Deokjeong) and one of her friends Moises. We ate at a BBQ restaurant near to my apartment and then went from ice-cream at Lotteria which was a nice evening!

The next day I went exploring the town, which I have already written about so I won’t repeat myself now!

Thursday, I decided to try out the subway for the first time on my own and headed into Seoul. I went to Insa-dong and had a walk through Tapgol park which is a small park which has a pretty pagoda in the middle of it. It also has a stone pagoda which is enclosed in a plastic box which does somewhat spoil the effect, but it is one of Korea’s National Treasures so I guess it makes sense!

After wandering through the park I went to a small palace, called Unhyeongung place. It is not one of the 5 large palaces in Seoul and I believe that in comparison to those this one is really tiny. It was quite an interesting place to look around and the buildings were quite unusual.

After the palace I wandered down the main street of Insa-dong and had a look for a while at all the stalls in the street that were selling lots of interesting things. It wasn’t too long, however before I was far too hot and I went to one of the many tea rooms in Insa-dong and had a nice cup of apricot tea.

The rest of vacation was pretty rainy so it was a good excuse to just chill out for a couple of days before starting back at work again!