Day 7 is one of the best things ever, and something about which you should expect me to rave for the next few years if you ever ask me about my trip to Korea:
The cafe culture
If you're reading this blog, you probably know at least
some of the extent to which Korea is obsessed with cafes. Everything here is a cafe. There are PC cafes, DVD cafes and then just your standard cafes, which are eeeeeeeeverywhere.
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| Inside a Tom 'n Toms in Sinchon. Tom 'n Toms is a common cafe in Seoul and there are usually around three in each suburb. This one is massive, with four different floors and many study rooms. |
Cafes are not only high in number here, but each cafe also has its own quirk to it. Korea is obsessed with cuteness, couples and just aesthetics in general. So, every cafe is decked out with some mad decor, which makes it an awesome environment to be in! Actually, you can experience a little of what I'm talking about in a few different Korean cafes in Sydney. My favourite is
My Sweet Memory, which is located at two separate spots in Sydney city - one near Haymarket and the other near Town Hall station.
Tom 'n Toms is also right next to
MSM (at both locations), but I prefer the vibe of the latter. Give them a visit!
MSM is known for its trademark hot chocolates, especially during the winter! ^^
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| Inside MSM at Town Hall. I love cafes so I crave this. |
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| Cute coffee-art at MSM. |
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| Some of the delicious treats on offer at MSM. <3 |
I am a massive cafe-lover, so I crave this place. I go to cafes to chat, to study, to indulge in tasty beverages or even just to sit. There are many cafes on campus at my university and they are such a pleasure to sit in. The drinks are super tasty, so thankfully they are very cheap. These days, my daily schedule is not considered complete unless I have had a drink of some description from a nearby cafe.
My favourite cafes are literally twenty steps from my dorm! Other common cafes here are
Starbucks,
The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and
Paris Baguette. These cafes are
so common. There are at least three of each in every suburb, and streets often look the same as one another, because there are the same cafes/shops everywhere. All are equally delicious, but some are more expensive than others. Most cafes also do the coupon thing:
Because there are so many cafes in Seoul, you can sort of tell that there's a bit of competition to see who can reel in the customers. Cafe owners clearly try their hardest to make their cafes look desirable from the outside, and some succeed!
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| A cute little cafe in Hongdae. |
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| Another cute cafe in Hongdae. |
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| Another cute cafe in Hongdae, the next corner down from the last. |
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| One of my favourite cafes so far: the You Are Here cafe in Hongdae. From the outside, it is massive and looks so homely. |
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| The Hello Kitty Cafe, also in Hongdae. |
The Hello Kitty Cafe is a classic example of a cafe with its own quirk, and its quirk is
definitely as-much-pink-as-physically-possible.
Even the bathrooms are cute:
Fun fact: The Hello Kitty Cafe also has a Hello Kitty Resort on the island of Jeju:
I know some of you would feel that visiting this cafe would compromise your masculinity, but take solace in knowing that many, many men visit this cafe, such as this lovely gentleman right here:
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| He had no regrets, I am sure! |
And, if that's still not enough to make you go, you could always bring a girl with you! I know I would have no objections to returning here! Check out how cute the food is:
At this point, I feel like I have spoken too much about the Hello Kitty Cafe, so I will move on.
Cafes in Seoul are overall an excellent place to study. Much like Australia, it is not strange to go to a cafe by yourself and whip out the textbooks. There are often tables/booths especially for study. Heck, I am even 'studying' right now in a cafe (and by 'studying' I mean writing this blog). Here is a photo of a line of students studying at
The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf on campus:
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| Sneakily taken through the window. |
The
You Are Here cafe in Hongdae is the size of a large house, and has many separate rooms, so you can stay there all day and study! Check out some images below:
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| One of the study rooms. This guy was definitely suspicious. |
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| A cute message board for visitors. |
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| The front counter. On the back wall, there is merchandise and also textbooks for studying the Korean language - all available for purchase! I believe the cafe also offers Korean lessons themselves :D |
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| Some cute decor and the standard bin-station within the cafe. (The Korean bin system is the worst, but more on that later) |
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| A cute study room, in which Tinika and I sat and chatted for a couple hours. We felt cute. It was very secluded and the music was lovely. |
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| Me enjoying my iced cafe latte and garlic herb scone (and my phone). |
I tend to get side-tracked a lot whilst talking about cafes. For example, I could write a whole other paragraph on how good the above carrot cake was, but I won't. There is a lot to say about the cafes here, but as usual, I want to encourage you to come to Seoul and experience it all for yourselves.
This guy was certainly experiencing it for
himself:
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| Taking full advantage of the barrier between himself and the counter by having a righteous nap. |
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| Another cafe-napper. |
Korea also provides cafes for those K-Pop lovers who want to go and stalk their 'oppas' by waiting outside their Entertainment Company buildings all day. For instance, here is a photo of the 'NIT' cafe, which I assume is taken from the word 'infiNITe' (a popular K-Pop boy group). This cafe is located literally
right outside the Woolim Entertainment building.
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| It's so weird but so great for reeling in cash. The fangirls arrive at all hours of the morning and stay for an extended period of time, hoping to catch a glimpse of the stars. |
I participated in this activity myself for a few hours, and could not believe the level of fan-girling that occurred when any of the
Infinite members walked past. I kind of enjoyed it, though.
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| Inside the NIT cafe, before it filled up with fan-girls. |
There is so much more to say about the cafe culture in Korea, and I hope that you can one day experience it for yourselves! This culture is definitely one of the things I will miss most about Korea.
Until next time! Thanks for reading!
Signed in Seoul,
Kristin
Kristin is supported by the Australian Government through the Australia-Korea Foundation of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
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