I hope you're in your comfy chair...

We spent our Saturday in Seoul and here were the highlights:

Our destination was The Dongdaemun Market. It is the portion of the city that is known as the garment district. It houses the fabric market, and every other thing imaginable that is used to make clothing products of ALL sorts, including shoes. It was in summary, mind blowing.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. To start off with, we managed to get there! Darin was driving and I was navigator. So, right off the bat, my family is impressed that I was reading the map, and that somehow contributed to our arrival at Dongdaemun . Therefore, it constitutes highlight number one. Darin's highlight number one might have been that we successfully managed to park our car in a parking garage, and it did feel triumphant when we did that too.

Once we were out and walking to the fabric market, we paused for a moment to appreciate the view of the original ancient gate that was the entry to this market many eons ago. We couldn't get any closer to read the historical market. The roads have literally been built all around it. But we thought we should at least try to stand in front of it. For some reason, we were starting off with some grumpy kids. So the following photo series represents Darin's instructions, "Get out of the picture if you can't smile." Please enjoy the photos.

Good-bye George.

See you later, Jane.

That's not a smile Ruby. You're out.

The picture.
(and we wonder why the Koreans stare at us...)

Next highlight were the sidewalk sofa makers. I have no idea what they were saying, I imagine it went a little something like this: "Hey, need a couch, just give me a minute, I'll make it for you."

And then the workers here might be saying, "Hey, you don't like your bra, let's get you a better one. Come on, pick out the pieces."

But mostly, it was alley upon alley of stuff like this.

And of course, I couldn't stop laughing as I passed by my 100th ribbon stand. Only a week and a half ago I asked my sister to mail me ribbon, because I was not having any luck finding anything great online. I walked passed no less than 5 million miles of ribbon. Each mile was a tiny little tease, a representation if you will, of all that I have yet to discover about this place!

Darin gave me an hour or so to walk through the six story building that was the official Seoul Fabric market. He took all the children to find some lunch and carefully helped me find a good meeting spot which he hoped I would be able to find again. We synced our watches, and said good bye. After one hour of wandering through ENDLESS possibilities, I walked back out into the sun with a blazing headache. It was simply, too much. I will be back. On the first trip, who can be expected to even understand that place. I was lost most of the time that I was inside the building. Anyway, I'll be back. That's all I can say.

Here is how the serious Korean fabric market guys leave with their goods. My stuff just fit into my purse. I felt slightly like a failure when I saw how much he was leaving with. But it was time to move on.


After the fabric overdose, we needed fresh air, and fresh melon. Check out the melon-on-the-stick guy.




Next we wandered through about two miles worth of outdoor vendors in search of the perfect wallet for George. In search of shade, we cut through another alley and began wandering for what felt like another couple of miles of underground shoe stalls. Maybe we passed by 3 billion shoes.

After one more refreshing snack (please understand that these pictures elapse over about five hours worth of time. Each snack was well deserved.), it was time to find our way back to the car.



Thanks to the cute ladies posted around the city under umbrellas directing traffic and telling you when to walk across the street,



we nearly escaped Dongdaemun market. We were ALMOST to our car, when Jane spotted a Target sign and fell on the ground crying because no one would take her inside.

Have I mentioned before how much my ladies miss a good morning stroll through Target? Jane was beside herself in sorrow that we were about to leave Seoul without walking inside of this Target. It was hard explaining to her that this was not the "real" Target. I tried to show her inside the windows, etc. I finally just had to pick her up and carry her away. Poor Jane misses Target.


Which brings me to the final highlight of returning to the car, onto the freeway, and all the way back home, safe and sound with another Korean adventure under our belts.


Just a view of the scenery as we drive between Osan and Seoul. Somethings are just impossible to explain, you must see it for yourself.

Stay tuned for the next post with the sewing highlights from the week.