Salam Aidilfitri

Eid Mubarak!

from:

Ilish Asmin

Safurah

Ilsa Imaan

13 Sept - Third Day in Seoul

Dear Imaan,

The third day started with the trip to Namdaemon with Tuk Bonnie. It's definitely a must-visit place if you ever go to Seoul. This is where people come to buy the famous Korean brooches. They actually sell them in bulk (wholesale) and only a few would be willing to sell 'just one' loose ones to you.

Entah laa.. bila dah tengok banyak sangat choice, rasa takde mood nak pilih :P so Mama just pick two stalls (each one person you see sitting down in the picture represents one individual stall/seller) and bought a few of whatever they've got

As usually, the "kraze-'bout-babies" Korean.. (they've got a famous fastfood joint here called Kraze burgers-- guess they meant "crazy"? :)

Besides the brooches, there were also lots of really, really pretty home decorating items. Mama noticed that like Japanese, they are quite into those English country like designs with roses and what-nots.. Mama found another clock to my liking and purchased that together with a few place mats.

We spent nearly half the day there before joining in the city tour bus that we missed yesterday. Since it was already late, most of the museums were already closed, hence we just stayed on the vehicle most of the time (Half of the time was spent sleeping!). The only time we did come down was when it stops for a rest at the Seoul Tour. Mama was delighted to find works by graphic designers 'mmmg' (milimetermiligram) sold at the souvernir shop.

We reached the co-op residence quite late as we joined the night tour as well. Am exhausted just thinking about the day we had that day!

The haze are getting worse these days. Mama have been staying over at Nenek's house so that I won't have to bring you to and fro in this bad weather. Hope your sniffles would get better soon.

Love Imaan-yang-tidoq-golek-golek :)
Mama

12 Sept - Second day in Seoul

Dear Imaan,

Ok. So on to the second day in Seoul. Retrospectively, Mama think it was a bit unorganized.. well, at least not as organized as Mama had planned. The initial plan was to hop on the Seoul City tour bus and spend the day touring the city (obviously). The plan was thrown into disarray when all three of us only managed to leave the residence at about half past ten.. due to waking up late, of course :P So we decided to just board the bus at one of its stops nearby (Dongdaemon stadium).

Luckily there was a Tourist Information centre there where we can ask a few things like about the "T money " card (works like our Touch n Go --plus u'll get discounts for each ride on the subway train summore...). Abah did all the asking and Mama held you while a Korean 'Auntie' who works there cooed at you in some Korean gibberish. They were all quite taken with your big eyes and kept comparing them with Abah and Mama's not-so-big eyes (told me through our ayam-itik conversation). But anyways, all Koreans here are crazy about babies.. both (not surprisingly) the aunties and (surprisingly) those grown-up men in office attires -- they would do that clucking-sound with their tongue or weird-weird faces at you. So every now and then Mama and Abah will have to go through what abah called 'toll'. Unlike western people, orang Korea ni akan selamba je tetiba cium2 imaan, tenyeh2 pipi imaan and even angkat imaan and dukung2..from Mama's experience, in western countries people takkan berani buat camtu because parents diorang kan lebih cautious about 'germs' and what nots and you might offend them if you touch their babies.

We were then instructed to wait for the bus at the stop just opposite the information centre. We waited like 15 minutes only to find that the bus that was scheduled to come every half hour conveniently decided not to stop (sending us chasing after it 3 blocks down before giving up). So.. time for plan B (which is to plan for Plan C :P )

PLAN C:
1) Visit the Toy Market near Dongdaemon as stated in the map.

2) Buy the T money card (around 2500 Korean won each) at the train station.

3) Go to Itaewon. Visit the mosque and the much acclaimed Salaam restaurant for lunch.

4) Not sure. Maybe go to Yongsan to check out the price of Plasma TV (Samsung and LG) and see if they're any cheaper.

After finding there's nothing much except for the easy access to halal food at Itaewon (plus finding rows of antique furniture shops at the back row), we decided to head to Yongsan as planned. It's supposedly the biggest electrical market in asia. It's not really a wonder as Mama noticed in Korea they tend to group shops together in one area. So if you find yourself lost and in some place selling something like shoes, you'd likely to find that there'd be ten more stores just next to it selling the same thing. Anyways, Yongsan was like, a shopping mall as big as Mid Valley filled with shops selling mostly electrical appliances. We found the Plasma TV only that here it goes under the name Pavv for Samsung and Xcanvas for LG -- plus it was more expensive there due to the currency exchange rate (it was RM3.85 for 1000 Korean won at the time).

We ended up wandering around aimlessly until we decided it was time to head home. Dah laa Mama tak bawak stroller Imaan! Aduhai... sakit pinggang Mama. Nanti Imaan tolong urut ek! :)

On the way back, Mama and Abah decided to pandai-pandai turun at the train station yang sounded much more nearby to our place (Uljiro). When we emerged from the subway station, nothing looked really familiar but from afar we can see the "Doota" and "amPm" building which was supposed to be 5 minutes walk from our residence.

So we walked straight along the road from Uljiro 3 to Uljiro 6 (where we're staying). Found rows of shops selling hardwares untuk rumah-- tiles yang cantik2, even wallpapers- which instead of in small rolls like ours, wallpaper diorang lebar macam sebidang kain and the rolls were stacked up on the wall ready to be pulled and cut by the yard (or how they say it "yard-de" ..no metric system here). We stumbled across a market selling seaweeds and all those kimchi like thingies (jeruk ala Korea-- ada sekali tu Mama nampak ketam seekor2 tu pun diorang jeruk!:o ) We bought some of the seaweeds and like 5 ekor udang basah for dinner. Malam tu Mama masak sambal tumis (packet :P) udang on the kitchenette stove of our room. The sambal might not seem much here but at that particular place and time - was heaven sent!

Well, hopefully the third day story won't take as long as this one to upload and write! The connection here at Mama's new workplace is sometimes like dewa siput (especially peak hours). It's just my fifth day working from 8 to 5 and already I'm feeling that I've missed a whole lot of seeing you growing up. Sedih pulak :( especially when it was the maids who announced to the family of the things they saw you've done and achieved on that day . . . . . . .

wasn't that supposed to be me?

:*( Mama miss imaan

A summary of our days together..

Dear Imaan sayang,

Well, that's it then. The whole full one month holiday. Initially it sounded long.. so Mama had been a bit ambitious in planning how to spend it. It ended up being just like this:

First week:
- Abah drove us to Penang to visit Tok Mama's house.
- We then drove to Kuala Perlis and board a ferry to Atuk and Nenek's second house in Langkawi to make your new passport (!)
- The rest of the week is spent in Penang where Abah and Mama had endless Char Kuey Teows.. hehe

Second week:
- Mama was busy finishing all the small jobs for pixel latte (greeting card and wedding card designs)
- And of course, the last minute packing frenzy..!

Third week:
- Our trip to Korea (yippee!)

Fourth week:
- Mama thought it would the final week for me to golek-golek with you.. but turns out you'd began crawling on Monday! And that ends the day when Mama can leave you on your own for a while, even when you'd fallen asleep -- the other day Mak Long found you already underneath the bed grabbing god knows what! ..and HOW you'd managed to get down there from on top of the nearly 3 feet high bed is beyond me! Luckily you seemed fine, though it constantly worries me that you might have gotten some internal injuries that I might've foreseen.. sigh!

Since it's Mama's first day of work tommorrow, Mama had better continue later. Here are some images on the departure day and the day we arrived in Korea. Mama will be telling you the rest of it later..
Till then little angel.
:-*
Mama

Our flight was 1 a.m! We'd be going with your Tuk Bonnie (Abah's Aunt whom we refer to as Aunty Bonnie). Her kids (your aunts and uncles) and Tuk Yahya all waited till 12 am to accompany us.

Upon arrival, Tuk Bonnie went to rent a mobile phone (somehow you can't use the ones we have in Malaysia.. and only Maxis sim cards have international roaming there.. apelaa tm.. :p)

After checking in the Co-op residence at Uljiro (I'll post the images later), we went to Dongdaemon market area to tempah Mama's curtain (yeay!).. The area was filled with lil' shops selling bedspreads and Korean traditional dresses (Hanbok).

Everything looks soooo lovely that Mama felt like skipping! :D

Korean still do wear the Hanbok during their weddings so this place is quite like Jalan TAR and the likes where we go to find materials for wedding dresses... (By the way, it's funny how Abah likes to relate the places there with Malaysia; i.e. "Kiranya tempat ni macam area 'Bukit Bintang' /'KLCC'/ 'etc' diorang la ek..")

Inilah Mr.Park, dealer curtain Tuk Bonnie. Tuk Bonnie ni buat business curtain, so kalau sesiapa nak tempah curtain cantik-cantik dari Korea boleh laa tempah kat dia :)

There were tonnes and tonnes of choices and all so very pretty. Mama particularly liked this one in Mr.Park's catalog but it was a bit over our budget.. so Mama had to settle for another fabric.

Thanks to Abah for waiting patiently (sampai tertidur2 Abah and Imaan! heheh)

After the long tiring day of looking at curtains and laces (Ooooh! Girlfriends, you have GOT to see the laces they have at the market.. am getting dizzy just thinking about them!) it's time to eat. Since Lotteria sells squid burgers (!) and prawn burgers which your Tuk Bonnie said is halal to eat, so that was what we had.

Then, off to bed!

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