30. Eunkyung

The last two days have gone by in a blur, albeit a very colorful one. I arrived at Incheon airport shortly past eight in the morning, and made my way into the city by bus. It was a long but pleasant ride, and it gave me time to enjoy the scenery - at least when I wasn't busy watching the Korean soap opera that was on TV just behind the driver. As we made our way towards the city I caught my first glimpse of one of the huge apartment complexes that are common here. At the beginning they were visually competing against green hills, soon they started blending into the massive city that is Seoul.
I arrived in Gwangwhamun about two hours before I was supposed to meet my host, so I walked to the next subway station to find a locker for my backpack:
I was so overwhelmed by the massive amount of Korean explanations (well, at least I guess that's what they are), that I completely overlooked the English translation. But I wasn't going to give up so easily - I thought about how the locker would work if I had built it, tried a couple of buttons, and hey presto - my stuff was locked away. So I walked in the general direction of onwards, and saw the palace guard guarding Deoksugung palace.
I was in no mood for museums though - I needed to get the feel of the city. So instead of going in and looking at the palace, I continued my way through the financial district, just as far as the Great South Gate (Sungnyemun on my map, but Namdaemun in my guide). Unfortunately the gate had burned down in 2008, and all I could see was the protective wooden wrapper that had been erected around it. I turned around and ambled back to the subway station, the locker, and all my stuff. Which I thought would be easy enough to retrieve, until I tried. After a few misses, I thought I had found out which buttons to push - just the ones that made sense if I thought about it - but the door to locker number 3 did not open. Well, no reason to panic - I was just going to have to ask my host to help me decipher the Korean instructions. I double checked that the door had indeed not opened, and went outside, to the front of Hotel Koreana, to wait.
I did not have to wait very long - the lovely Eunkyung soon arrived, and followed me back to the subway station, the locker, all my stuff, and a locker repairman who was just checking and closing the door - my door - and then rebooting the system. I'm still not sure what had happened (my Korean is way too sketchy for that), but upon trying the method that had made the most sense again, we were finally able to retrieve all my stuff from the locker - which I may have slightly overfilled if I'm perfectly honest. After that everything was just fantastic. We dropped my baggage in Eunkyungs apartment, and went for something to eat: make your own rice paper dumplings with a great array of tasty ingredients!
After that Eunkyung brought me to the local indoor bouldering hall, where I was sorely reminded of how much I am not in shape (I can't really write out of shape, as I don't think I ever was in one). But I simply love climbing, and so even though even the simplest route became increasingly challenging the more I grew tired, I had a great time trying, and watching the local cracks perform laws-of-physics-defying feats. A great first day in Korea to be sure!