We somehow nearly missed our flight from Osaka to Seoul - we had visions of us having a nice coffee at the airport - instead it turned out to be a mad dash and we literally got to our gate when the last people were getting on!

Anyway I was really excited about South Korea - always wanting to go there since I was young so I had high hopes for our adventures here, when we arrived in Seoul we got the airport limousine bus to our hostel - our first views of the city were military checkpoints on the hills, piles of old snow and lots of buildings that looked the same. We booked a hostel called Mr Seas which looked quite nice online, when we got there the owner said the room we booked wasn't available but he had a family room instead - we thought that sounded better until he showed us into this dungeon with no windows and damp and mould up the wall that stunk! We had to get another room instead which wasn't much better and had to pay more. We stayed in the Haywha area which was quite lively with students. We went for a coffee to people watch and we heard a drum beat coming down the road getting louder and louder, some middle aged people dressed in pom pom hats and long dresses were skipping in a zig zag and shaking hankies - it was a bit surreal!

On our first full day in Seoul we went to Yoido full gospel church which is one of the biggest churches in the world, we set our alarm but for some reason it didn't go off and we woke up with about 40 minutes to get there on time - we had to figure out which line on the underground to take and had about 3 changes but we made it just a few minutes late - we were ushered in by a men in pristine cream blazers and put in a lift to sit with all the other foreigners! I couldn't believe it when we walked in as it was like a huge theatre, there was a full on choir and orchestera, and we got earphone interpretation too. The service was good and after the service they had a foreigner breifing where they explained the history of the church. We met two americans who we went and spent the afternoon with, one guy was called Harris and was an English teacher in Jeju Island where we were thinking of going so we got his number to meet up with there.

Lots of guidebooks and other people we met raved about the Coex Mall saying you could get stuck in there for days because there was so much to see, so we thought we'd see what it was like - it was a bit poo and after an hour we'd seen enough! Some one we met also raved about Digital Media City - where there was all this futuristic technical stuff you could play with, Kam was really interested in going there, it took us ages to get there and when we came out of the underground we were expecting one big building with it all in - but it was just office blocks and building work with an old railway running by, we tried to ask people where the place was but the whole area was called Digital Media city, we gave up after wandering around for ages. We felt a bit dispondant.

We had a nice evening with one of Kams old London friends - Edward and his wife Lambyaa - he works for the British Council in Seoul , we met him at Hongkik - the most lively uni area in Seoul - and went out for traditional Korean BBQ, kimchi and tried a bit of Soju too. It was a really nice night and Kam and Edward relived their teens playing fifa on the playstation!

We booked a DMZ tour which we were both really excited about as we are fascinated by the whole divide between the two Koreas, we couldn't afford the full tour where you go to the Joint Security Area but we booked our self on the next best thing. We were supposed to be picked up at 7am so stood out in the freezing fog for ages - the minibus finally turned up at 7.50am! As we drove North out of Seoul the fog got thicker and thicker, we arrived at our first stop Imjingak park, as it was so foggy we couldn't really tell what we were looking at, there was barbed wire everywhere and soldiers in huts - there was a bridge we could just about make out -we didn't know how close N Korea was- we were only given ten minutes there and were quickly ushered onto a bigger coach with other tour groups. We then went through a checkpoint where we all had to have our passports checked and were driven to Dorasan Station. This is where the South Koreans hope that one day you will be able to travel by train all the way into Europe, the station was quite eerie as it was modern and looked fully functional but was just occupied by soldiers with big guns! Again we were quickly rushed out of there and put on the bus to go to the 3rd infiltration tunnel which was found in the 70's, if the North Koreans had managed to get away with their cunning tunnel plan then thousands of their army would have been able to pass through an hour and invade. The North Koreans had painted the inside of the tunnel black and said that they were mining and it was a mistake! We were able to walk all the way down the tunnel almost right up to North Korea! Our guide said that there may be North Korean tourists on the other side which was quite an amusing thought. After the tunnel we came out and the fog was really clearing and we could see a bit of blue sky. We both felt happy as we knew the next stop was the Dora Observatory where you can look at North Korea and see their massive flag and the propoganda village - as we got on the bus the tour guide said that the military were not allowing anyone to go there - we were so gutted and upset as this was going to be one of the hi-lights for us. So then we were taken to a shop selling tacky things and had to head back to Seoul. We both were annoyed, our guide said we could see a bit of N Korea on the way back - it was some mountains in the distance past all the barbed wire and a river with huge chunks of ice floating in. So that was our glimpse of N Korea. As we got into central Seoul our guide said we still had one place to go - a ginseng shop, we got shut in a room where a woman tried to sell us a box of ginseng for 200 pounds, we just laughed and walked out. It was an awful tour and we wish we had either splurged out on the full tour or just not bothered!

At Yoido church they have a christian retreat called Prayer Mountain which sounded really nice so we went up there for 4 days and we were close to the N Korean border again, people are praying towards the border which I thought was really amazing, unfortunately we didn't have a great time up there - no one said anything to us - not hello or even a smile and when we walked into the church services people let the door slam in our faces! We also didn't have enough money to eat there (no ATM) so had to eat really cheap rice cakes and kimchi. I also fell down some steps in a graveyard which Kam found very amusing.

So that was a week in Seoul - not the best place we have ever been and not the most friendly of folk we have met!