Day 28 - Namsan Tower (N Seoul Tower) and Dongdaemun

After I finished taking my midterms on this day, I went back to the dorm and took a short nap. At 6:00 PM, I went to the CIEE office on campus, which the study abroad program I'm doing, with a bunch of other students and we watched a Korean film called The Thieves. I really enjoyed what we watched of it but I didn't get to finish it because I left early with a few other students so we could make it to Namsan Tower by sunset!

Namsan Tower, which is actually called N Seoul Tower, is a large tower similar to the Space Needle in Seattle that sits on top of Namsan, which is a mountain in Seoul. Namsan literally translates as "South Mountain".

Crossing the street with Namsan Tower in the background

It took us about 45 minutes to get to the subway station closest to the mountain, which is Myeong-dong Station. However, once we got there, we had to wait about 30 minutes for three other friends to show up. As a result, we missed seeing the sunset but we realized that Namsan Tower is awesome at night (which I'll explain in a bit).

A "Shocking Step" at Namsan Tower. I have no idea why it says that.

Once we had all met up we had to walk about 10-15 minutes from the station to the Namsan Cable Car, which is a cable car that takes you up to the base of the tower. We had to wait in line to get on the cable car but it didn't take too long.

The view from the cable car on the way up the mountain

Once we got up to the top of the mountain we had to purchase tickets to be allowed to take the elevator up to the viewing deck of the tower, which cost us 8,000 won each (about $7).

A cool picture I took of a lit up pagoda with the tower in the background

Once we got up there, we realized how amazing it is to see Seoul from above at night! You could see endless city in every direction! We hung around up there for a bit and took a couple pictures before we headed down to go find dinner.

The view looking east from the top of the tower

We ended up eating kimbap (Korean sushi) in a small restaurant near the subway station that was really cheap!

The view looking south from the top of the tower. You can see three really bright bridges crossing the Han River (which runs through the city). All of the dark area is part of Namsan Mountain.

After dinner, we hopped on the train and headed to Dongdaemun, which has night-time markets that run until 5:00 AM! We had experienced some trials and tribulations on the way there (including getting off at the wrong stop), but we finally made it just before the subway closed for the night, which is at midnight.

A photo of me at the top of the tower!

We walked around through a street market that mainly had bootleg Abercrombie & Fitch and Hollister clothes and then we headed into a shopping mall called Good Morning City, which is open until 4:30 AM. Honestly, I don't know how they can afford to keep the mall open that late because there were maybe 15 customers inside, including our group of 6. Regardless, we looked around the whole mall before we finally started to feel tired and decided it was time to head back.

Mispelled Harley-Davidson t-shirt for sale in Dongdaemun

We split up into groups of three and took taxis back to Yonsei. Taxis in Seoul are incredibly cheap compared to the US! We only had to pay 7,000 won for a 35 minute cab ride through the city! So split between three people, it was only a little over 2,000 per person.

An arcade machine with really weird prizes that I played. The prizes included a calculator shaped like a high heel shoe, a lamp shaped like a fried egg, and a model of the Titanic.

That's all for today!