Stepping into a Seoul subway station and shopping in a Korean beauty brand 'The Face Shop'

In the end of March, the spring weather is in full swing. But even in same March, early march is still cold. People who passing the street wore thick clothes in my pictures. 

I also went out with a long padding jacket. 

My favorite transportations are subway and train. I usally get carsick when I take a bus. If I ride a train or subway, there is no motion sickness. I even can read a book or news page by my mobile phone in a subway. 

If possible, I refer to the subway map first when I ready for a day trip. 

Myeongdong subway station in Seoul

It is a scenery of subway station of Seoul. The above picture is Myeongdong Station on Line No.4.

I went down the stair to the inside of subway station. As you can see, most of subway stations in South Korea are similar. There are a lot of shops and people are shopping or just passing.

If there are differences, the composition of the shop or daily floating population would be different.

There are mainly clothes shops, shoe shops, accessory shops and cosmetics shops. In the case of Myeongdong station, there is especially K-pop Star goods store for foreign tourists.

Seoul Yangjae subway station

This is Yangjae Station line number 3. It was built recently compare to Myeongdong station. Ine Yangjae Station are many various food or beverage stores in addition to clothing stores and shoe stores. BeskinRobbins Ice Cream Shop, NewYork Hot Dog, Cafe Pascucci, a Japanese restaurant 'Soyami', etc.

There are also many cosmetic brand shops like Lalavla which has changed their name from Watsons this year.

The face shop, Korean beauty brand shop

In and out of subway stations, usually there are various cosmetic shops in South Korea. Cosmetic 'road shop' brands such as Misha and The Face Shop have grown explosively since 2000s.
Thanks to this, Koreans can easily buy nice beauty products with a good cost.

Nowadays, Korean cosmetics are also popular among foreigners. Especailly Asian foreign tourists are the main customers of the cosmetic road shops in Seoul business quarters.
When I dropped by The Face Shop which is in Myeong-dong, Chinese ladies were picking cosmetics.

For this reason, saleswomen of beauty brand shops in Seoul can speak Korean and Chinese or Japanese both.

Kakao Friends collabo items, etc.

Korean facial cosmetic masks in the face shop

1+1 items are displayed on the outside shelf of The Face Shop. I guess a loss leader of cosmetic brand shop is Korean facial cosmetic masks.

I went into the shop cause collaborated products with Kakao Friends were so cute.

After a long time, I found The Face Shop offline store. AD model of the brand has changed from Suzy to Twice. Twice is a very popular K-pop idol group in Japan and Taiwan.
I was attracted to their ad poster inside the shop for a while.

eye cosmetcs of The face shop

I took a look mainly the color cosmetics such as eye shadow with pastel tones. I also like Nail products with light blue colors. It reminds me of the sky of spring.

If you want, you can buy various color of nail products. Price of it is less than a few thousand korean won.

Tomaru cosmetic brand products

The Face Shop brand store are on display as well as the Tomaru brand cosmetics. It also sell Beyond brand cosmetics if a shop has additional brand name like 'Nature Collection' on their sign board.

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Myeongdong Goroke | A popular croquette store near Myeongdong Cathedral

There is a store with long line always  in front of Seoul Myeongdong Cathedral. It is 'Myeongdong Goroke' which sells croquettes. 

Myeongdong Goroke tend to catch my eye when I visit Myeongdong Cathedral but I mostly gave up to buy their croquettes because of the long line. 

Today! I had my first challenge to Myeongdong croquette finally. I don't know the reason but the store wasn't as busy as another day.

Myeongdong Goroke near Myeongdong Cathedral in Seoul

Myeongdong Goroke is located in Myeong-dong. Sometimes when I see New York bakery in Seoul, I wondered why New York bakery locate here even it's not famous for bread.

Even a person who look like a foreign tourist is enjoying the croquette of Myeongdong Goroke. I was curious Korean food agree with foreigners. But on second thought, croquette isn't Korean food.

Guests waiting for croquette. A lady was smiling so brightly looking at croquettes. So that's a shame that I had to blur out her smile. I would like to eat the croquettes again after looking at below pictures.

The storekeeper Ajeossi was very fast when he put croquettes into a paper bag. His hands are faster than eyes! 

croquettes of Myeongdong Goroke

A various of delicious croquettes! I realized that the vegetable croquette sold out. Perhaps the usual long line was for buying the vegetable croquette.

Myeongdong croquette sell Vegetable croquette, potato croquette, mustard croquette, cream cheese croquette and red bean croquette. Price of croquettes are all same, 2000 won.

I finally succeeded to get Myeongdong Goroke. I purchased a potato croquette and a cream cheese croquette.

a potato croquette of Myeongdong Goroke

I tried a potato croquette first. It was crispy and still warm to eat cause I ate it immediately after i bought it. 

I was surprised that the portion of bread was thin. So even if a croquette are not thick, its inside is full. Potatoes are soft as if it boiled and finely mashed. The potato croquette was not so oily and and savory. I was able to eat happily. 

I ate a cream cheese croquette as a dessert after eating 'Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap'. It contains plenty of sweet cream cheese. Its cream cheese matches well the bread of Myeongdong Goroke.

I liked cream cheese croquette more than potato croquette. But both croquettes are delicious enough.

Next time, I would like to try mustard croquette and red bean croquette, of course Vegetable croquette, too!

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A dish to try in Myeong-dong | Chungmu Gimbap, A memory of Tongyoung travel

I can't forget the taste of 'Chungmu Gimbap' which I ate when I travelled to Tongyoung province in South Korea. I found Chungmu Gimbap by chance in Myeong-dong, Seoul. I introduce you to 'Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap'.  

Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap in Myeong-dong of Seoul

The Restaurant Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap is using a 3rd floors building all in the middle of Myeong-dong where has expensive rental costs. You can guess how many people visit Myeongdong Chungmu Kimbap, so that they can manage the Restaurant in such a tough rental place.

Kkakdugi(sliced radish kimchi) and Ojingeo Muchim(spicy squid salad) 

Ladies who is working hard in the open kitchen of Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap. Over clear window, they are making Chungmu Gimbap under people's nose . When people pass through the restaurant, they are attracted their sight without knowing. 

There is only one menu. They sell only Chungmu Gimbap. It is very clear just like the name of restaurant.

Customers waiting for packaging. When you go inside to the shop, there is more space to sit on the upper floor. It was easy to settled down as dinner time a bit passed. The business hour of Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap is until 11 o'clock every night.

I ordered my menu after taking a seat on the second floor. In fact, I didn't have to order, I just needed to say how many servings do I need. Cause the menu is only one kind, chungmu Gimbap(I really like these kind of restaurant).

The price of Cheongmu Gimbap is 8000 won per person. (Chungmu Gimbap of the below photos are for two people.)

Myeongdong Cheongmu Gimbap for two people

Chungmu Gimbap consists of Gimbap, Kkakdugi(sliced radish kimchi) and Ojingeo Muchim(spicy squid salad). It have originated in a food for sailors and became one of representative foods of Tongyoung province. 

And now we can also meet this food in Myeong-dong. The restaurant Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap serve Chungmu Gimbap with a soup. 

Chungmu Gimbap is a food form which put pure rice in Gim(seaweed) without other ingredient. So Korean eat Chungmu Gimbap with Ojingeo Muchim and Kkakdugi. 

The main character of Chungmu Gimbap is Ojingeo Muchim(spicy squid salad). I'm worried that this restaurant may feel difficult to manage thier menu cause the price of squid is going up nowadays. 

Ojingeo Muchim include sesame oil and Gochujang(hot pepper paste) stimulate appetite. It's very spicy as it looks. Please be careful if you cannot eat well spicy foods.

In my case I pick Ojingeo Muchim first with a fork and eat with Gimbap. And after I eat Kkakdugi(sliced radish kimchi). I like Kkakdugi's crispy texture. 

Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap is not as good as the original Chungmu Gimbap of Tongyoung. But I ate it all without leaving.

Actually it's not pleasure to meet local special foods in Seoul. (I think that it reduces regional diversity.) But this limit like Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap is ok to bring up memories of 

travel. I will visit Myeongdong Chungmu Gimbap occasionally when my memory of Tongyoung travel comes up. 

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Seoul half day tour | Myeong-dong Street, Myeongdong cathedral, Chungmuro Daehan cinema

Myeong-dong is famous for many foreign tourists like Chinese and Japanese. I visit Myeong-dong or Itaewon when I want to feel an exotic surrounding. 

In fact, I would like to say that one of the best courses to trip a half day in Seoul is Myeongdong. There are lively street with many people and Myeongdong Cathedral which has a history. 

Let's look around Myeongdong Cathedral on a weekend day after eating brunch in one of restaurants of Myeong-dong. In my case I also watch a movie on Chungmuro Daehan cinema after Myeongdong tour. 

Myeong-dong subway station

The most convenient way to visit Myeong-dong is by subway. If you use a bus or a car, the arrival time might be lengthened depending on the road situation. Especially on weekends, there are often demonstrations in Jongno and Gwanghwamun city near Myeong-dong. 

Myeongdong station is subway line no. 4. If you use line no.3, you can transfer to the line number 4 from Chungmuro ​​station. Please use exit number 8 and go into the alley. (The Northface building is located on the opposite side of the exit no.8) 

Myeong-dong street in Seoul

 

There are English, Chinese and Japanese on the shop signboards of Myeong-dong.  There is also a exchange bureau that has symbolic mark of dollar, yuan, yen and eurok. It is Myeongdong.

The most popular type of shops are restaurants and cosmetics stores. I remember seeing statistics that the most shopping items of foreign tourists are cosmetics.

There are Various Road shop brands such as The Face Shop, It's Skin, Nature  Republic, Misha, Skin Food and Tony Mori, etc. Those kinds of stores occupy the first floor of Myeong-dong buildings. They have many kind of cosmetic products. I went shopping for a while and then moved to the direction of Myungdong Cathedral.

Myeondong cathedral in Seoul

The closer you get to the Myeongdong Cathedral, the wider the road is and you can see the offices and hospitals in the building more instead of cosmetic shops and restaurants. 

If you see the Catholic Hall, there is Myungdong Cathedral. You can see tourists holding a carrier in front of the lobby of the Royal Hotel Seoul. Walking a little more from the Catholic Hall, you can see the Myeongdong Cathedral building. 

The Myeongdong Cathedral is the first Gothic cathedral built on Korean peninsula. The construction was designed by French priest Eugene Coast in 1892 and it was completed in 1898 at the end of the Joseon Dynasty. 

Myeongdong Cathedral is designated as Korea Historic Site No. 258. It isn't bigger than European cathedrals but has its own beauty. 

There are some tourists and Christian who are smiling each other. 

I found a guide to the near cathedral. There are the cathedral main building on the center, the Catholic hall on the left outer and the area for penance on the left inner side. 

There are also located Kosthall and room for hallow on the right outer side and the office of parish on the right side inner building. 

I moved to the left side of the cathedral main building in a more peaceful mood. When you walk, you will face the statue of the first priest of Korea, saint Andrew Kim TaeGon. 

Catholic talk about equality of human and faith in God instead of human kings. Joseon Dynasty persecuted Catholicism and saint Andrew Kim TaeGon cause Joseon had strict status system.  

After saint Andrew Kim TaeGon's martyr in 1846, Pope John Paul II canonized him in 1984. 

Myeongdong Cathedral

At present, the number of Catholic believers in South Korea is over 5.7 million. It means that religion is Catholic in one out of every 10 Koreans. 

In the capitalism society like now, the rich and the poor are kind of new status system. And the catholic message of 'Every being is equal in front of God' attracts people's heart. 

The moon rose above Myeongdong Cathedral in the early evening. I stopped for a moment in that impressive landscape.

After finishing my day trip include a dinner in Myeong-dong, I finished the day by watching a movie in the Chungmuro Daehan Theater.

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