[hkskyline]

Insadong is a maze of narrow alleys, restaurants, and art shops in the heart of Seoul. I walked around many of these alleys during the mid-autumn holiday. While the stores were mostly closed for the holiday, it was still quite an interesting urban experience.

MORE PHOTOS : www.geocities.com/asiaglo.../seoul.htm

 

[Brighter Hell]

nice pics. photos of districts like that with narrow alleys and mysterious doorways always make me think what a great setting for a game like deus ex or splinter cell

 

[taal2910]

Deus Ex ... how I loved that game

And it did have a similar setting - There was a Market, in some district of HK, it was on a very small scale but it was interesting none the less

 

[SD2]

Great pics hkskyline. Im curious, what are your impressions of Seoul (this goes out to anyone else who's visited as well)?
A friend of mine went and said it seemed pretty lacking in infrastructure and he found the people unfriendly.

 

[doady]

Very nice... I never saw places like when I was in Seoul. I was there only for like a few days or something, I don't remember exactly.

 

[hkskyline]

Seoul's subway system is very extensive. You can pretty much go anywhere on it, and it is very well kept. Ringers sound as the train approaches the station so passengers can get ready to board. Next station announcements are automatically made inside the train and some of them play a bird chirping sound to get people's attention before the announcement is made.

For a large city, Seoul has a lot of intimate streetscapes and lots of history. There are several royal palaces in the central core, while there are also bustling street markets and wide boulevards. I didn't have a chance to interact with the locals much because of the language barrier though, but I did meet a large contingent of non-natives teaching English in Korea during my stay.

 

[mpolo2]

I spent a couple weeks in seoul and was pretty impressed. I actually thought their infrastructure was pretty good - especially the subway system (as noted). I suppose traffic is not great, but it is a huge city and so congestion of some sorts is sort of to be expected. I liked the narrow streets that you would stumple upon, and the food was amazing (much better than any Korean food I'v had here in Toronto). As for the people, Koreans have a reputation for being more insular and xenophobic than their surrounding Asian neighbours. This is probably in part due to their history (they have been invaded alot) and part due to the massive US army presence (their is a huge base in Seoul itself and supports a neighbourhood known locally as hooker hill).

 

[shumoon]

map of Seoul's very extensive subway system: