Getting confused by platform signs

I only went to bed last night about 3.30am, so when I woke up this morning at 7am, I decided to go back to sleep. I got up at 8am, had a shower etc. as usual, then added some info to yesterday's blog while waiting for Moccle to have a shower etc.

Then we went out to the subway station and looked to see what train we needed to get to Suwon, so we could get the shuttle bus from near Suwon train station to the Korean Folk Village. We found we needed to change at Seoul City, and then change again at Guro. But when we got to City Hall, we walked all the way down the platform to the stairs so we could switch to the platform on the opposite side, but when we went through the turnstiles at the top of the stairs, it used up our cards. I guess there must have been another way to get to the other platform without going through the turnstiles, but we didn't see it.

So we had to buy our tickets again, and could then get down onto the correct platform for the train that stopped at Goru. At Goru we switched trains, you have to make sure the train you want says Suwon on the front according to our guide book, which Moccle checked.

When we got to Suwon we were just in time to buy our tickets and get on the Shuttle bus. The trains probably took about 1½ hours, and the bus took about ½ hour. The trains were quite busy, with quite a few people standing, which I thought was surprising given that it was after 9am and on a weekday. The trains are quite wide though, so they can fit a lot of people on, and don't get packed solid like the London underground (or even normal trains coming/going to London in rush hour).

At the Korean Folk Village we looked at some of the houses etc. they have there, which are all very similar, and watched some horse riders do stunts, which was good. They also had the same farmers dance that we saw yesterday outside the Korean National Folk museum, so we didn't actually watch it, but decided to look at some of the other buildings they had there.

For lunch we had 'Dalk mal gi' or sumat similarly named, which was chicken soup and a bowl of rice (with side dishes). We used the Korea guide book to work out what the Hangul said so we could order it, but I can't remember exactly what it was called now. The chicken soup had bits of chicken in it, but they seemed to mostly be chicken skin. Me and Moccle thought we should eat them anyway, but after eating a few bits we found out that actually there was lots of bits of real chicken meat in there as well, I guess they added the chicken skin just to improve the flavour of the soup. Unfortunately, we were full before we could eat everything, so it meant we had eaten the chicken skin when we could just eaten nice chicken. Doh!

The shuttle bus ran every hour on the half hour, until 4.30pm, so we decided to get the 3.30pm bus so we would miss the rush hour traffic on the trains. This meant there was a bit of the Korean folk village that we didn't look round (the Temple, Government building, and another small part), and there was lots that we saw but didn't look round properly as we were just rushing past them trying to get back to the entrance in time for the 3.30pm bus.

We did catch the 3.30pm bus, but when we got to Suwon station, there didn't seem to be any trains going to Seoul, despite a sign saying 'Seoul Station' on the platform nine side. We waited for ages, then walked around for ages trying to find a way to get to the middle platforms, which we could see went to Seoul. However, we couldn't find any way to get to the middle platforms, we even went through the ticket gates (thus clearing out the credit left on our tickets) to try and see if there was a way to get to the two middle platforms from the main part of the station.

We walked all around the main part of the station, and even a bit outside, but couldn't see any way to get to the middle platforms. Eventually we asked a bloke, and he said that platform 8 was for Seoul.

So we bought some more tickets, and went back up to platform 8/9. However, this time we took the escalator instead of the stairs, and Seoul Station was listed on the platform 8 side of the sign at the top of the escalator. That was quite confusing, as the sign further up the platform by the stairs definitely said Seoul Station of the platform 9 side of the sign.

Moccle said we should just get the train on platform 8, despite the information board for the trains arriving on platform 8 not mentioning Seoul at all (luckily Moccle could remember what the Hangul for Seoul was, as the departure board was all in Hangul). I also was pretty sure that the trains on platform 8 were going the same way as the train we came in on (so they would be going away from Seoul).

Moccle said that even if the train was going the wrong way, we could switch at the next station for one going towards Seoul. We didn't get on the next train, but the one after that, and Moccle looked at the route map that was above the door and checked the name of the next station that was on it, and we were going in the right direction.

We switched trains at Seoul City Hall station, as we did on the way to Suwon, but managed to do it without going through the ticket barriers this time. Luckily Moccle knew which station we wanted to go to as well, Euljiro 3 (Sam) ga. When we got out at Euljiro Sam ga, we couldn't remember what exit we 'normally' used, and the exit we did go out was different. So, as always, we used the gps to get us back to the hotel.

When we got back to the hotel, I started copying one of the memory cards I'd used today across to the laptop, and also wrote most of today's blogpost. Eventually it got round to about 8 o' clock, and the memory card still hadn't finished copying across, so we went out to try and find Namdaemun Market and the Sungnyemun South Gate.

We got a bit confused trying to reconcile the information from the gps with the map in the Korea guide book, and a few times thought we were going the wrong way, but did end up at Namdaemun market. Moccle asked someone there where the South Gate was, and they told him, so we followed his directions, but couldn't see it. Moccle checked the map and the gps, and it seemed we were in the right place, then we realised that it was covered up by a building.

It's being restored at the moment, and rather than building scaffolding all round it (or maybe I should say as well as), they had built a building to enclose it, though the building didn't go down to ground level on all sides, so you could see a bit of a hill or something underneath it. Also, it said about the South Gate and restoration work on the boards around the South Gate site. I did take a few panos while we were out though, so it wasn't a wasted trip. It's interesting just walking around anyway.

When we were walking back to the hotel through Namdaemun Market, a lot of the sellers had packed up, or were just packing up, so it seems we had got there just in time (as they weren't packing up when we walked through there earlier). On the way back Moccle also bought a pen and paper, so we can practice writing Hangul, and write down any other stuff we want. He looked at the crisps as well, but said they were all weird flavours like shrimp or fish, and had cartoon corn on the packets.

We got back to the hotel at about 10.15pm, then I finished writing this blog post and copied another memory card to the laptop, sorted the photos, and copied them across to the hard drives. Annoying since I wanted to try and be in bed by 9pm today so we could try and make an early start to Sokcho tomorrow.

Food
Breakfast: Slice of toast with jam; Rice biscuit (I think); Chocolate mallow biscuit (like a fat wagon wheel); cup of fizzy grape drink.
Lunch: 'Dalk mal gi' (or whatever it was); weird crispy seawood looking, fish tasting stuff; bean sprouts and some other vegetable stuff; Kimchi; water.