Thursday - Porridge in Myeong-Dong

While we were in Myeong-Dong, we were getting hungry...we stumbled upon a second-floor walkup restaurant that specialized in Korean rice porridge and thought we'd give it a try.  (Beth tried some for the first time on the plane ride over, and we had some one time at our hotel with breakfast, but this was our first time having it at a restaurant.) It was awesome....and filling!  Beth had mushroom and oyster porridge and Fritz had mushroom and beef....yum!  Now we'd like to have some at home sometime!

Thursday - Out and about in Myeong-Dong

After going to Lotte's, we set out to browse around Myeong-Dong, another one of the shopping districts.  It was pretty crowded for a Thursday, probably because it was Children's Day (a national holiday here in Korea).  This is a newer, more trendy shopping area, and it was sprinkled with more American-brand stores - it was weird seeing American and other countries stores here...we kind of like the Korean style ourselves.

 Korean  Street Food

 Sample American Stores :(

Thursday - Shopping for Sneaks at Lotte Department Store

Well, the shoes Mommy brought to Seoul were good for slipping on/off....which you do at some of the more traditional places and even in the hotel....but werent' the best for all the walking around town....so Thursday AM we headed down to Myeong-Dong and the Lotte Department Store.  We went there last time, and were equally impressed this time too.  It is huge (10+ floors), and is probably more like what our downtown department stores were like back in the "heyday".  Each little section had multiple well-dressed clerks ready to help out.  One of the bottom floors had a very high-end grocery department with all types of goodies.  It was NOTHING like the Macy's shoe department we went to before we left home, where everything looked dumpy and picked over!  Here, the lady even tied Beth's shoes for her!They definitely had more bright colored sneakers than we've seen back home..

 Mommy's New Shoes!

Wednesday - Fun pictures and quirky signs

Here's the latest edition of fun pictures and silly signs.....enjoy!

Wednesday - Dinner in Insadong

After a break at the hotel, and getting some laundry started (fun fun) we headed back down into Insadong, up one of the alleyways, and into another small restaurant where we had a huge meal with all the banchan (side dishes).  We also enjoyed some bamboo wine!!

Wednesday - Birth clinic vist

One thing that we did for Annabelle, that we also wanted to do for Aaidan, was to take a trip out and get some pictures of the hospital where he was born.  The last thing that HaeSung helped us do was take a subway/train and then taxi out to see the birthclinic where Aaidan as born. The clinic actually moved after he was born, so the first few pix are of the old clinic, and the remaining ones are of the new one.

Wed - Lunch in Hongik University area

After our fun at the palace, HaeSung took us to the area around Hongik University (a university specializing in the arts) and took us to one of her favorite restaurants where we grilled beef belly and had wraps and sides.  We also took a stroll through the shopping area there.