The first day of this journey was among one of the longest (and best) days of my life. 

I woke up at 2:30 in the morning, took a shower, and we headed off for the airport. I fell asleep almost immediately after getting on the plane to Dallas. The same would have happened for the longer flight to Seoul if they weren’t going to serve us lunch. I slept for another 5 hours, watched 2 movies, had dinner, slept some more, and before we knew it, we landed in South Korea.

On the drive to the hotel in Jongno-gu, I was first enthralled by the vast differences and, also, similarities between the way the streets and the signs are laid out and designed over here.  The designs of the license plates over here are also very different and simplistic. I like to pay attention to these little details, those that would be too minute to catch most people’s attention.

I would describe the general vibe of the city as being super artsy. Within 5 minutes of getting of the bus, we saw numerous sculptures and statues lying in different corners of the city. We checked into the hotel soon after and I have to say the hotel rooms were exciting. More on this on later posts.

After a nice dinner and orientation, we had some free time to ourselves. It turned out that May 5 was Buddha’s Birthday, which is a widely celebrated holiday in South Korea, and there was a festival on Insadong-gil, the biggest avenue in the neighborhood, so we decided to come by to take some pictures. We were very surprised when we saw the lights, the flames, and the dance music and next thing we know, we were dragged into a train of people into the middle of the party. Like everyone else around us, we followed the moves of the guys on stage and danced the night away.

And that was our first day in South Korea and I was having the time of my life.