Trip to Busan and Gyeongju + Seoul International Fireworks Festival

Almost 2 weeks since last post, guess I have been quite busy. First I joined a group from the University on a trip to Busan and Gyeongju from the 25th to the 28th. Got on the slow train for nearly 6 hours to Busan, thought I could catch some sleep but there my seat was in the aisle and there were always Koreans sitting at the window seat that was only going for a couple of stops ..... But I had a nice Korean grandmother next to me for a little longer time. Don't no why but she gave me a small bag of nuts and dried fruits, didn't say anything, just stretched the bag over to me and then she got of the train ^_^ That was nice.

So Busan is the second largest city and metropolitan area after Seoul, it is located right at the south tip of the country and is quite famous for its beaches, fish and laid-back style of life. So we (19 people) checked in to our hostel close to the beach, and the first thing that happens is that one girl that sits in the upper bunk-bed bursts done to the lower bunk-bed :D Fortunately there where no one below her. But I guess that is hostel life? Have not done this traveling and staying at hostels that much so do not know what to expect till now. 

Well even though it was not as warm as in the beginning when I got here we had to get to the famous Haeundae Beach. Spent some hours here before we took a walk to find a nice view of the sunset with the city close by.... We totally failed this, the sun was already down when we got to the viewpoint but it was a nice walk anyway =) 

The day got finished with some drinks at the hostel and some dinner. The day after we had a long day planned, first with the Beomeosa-Temple. Old Buddhist temple up in the mountain were we got free vegetarian lunch. After that we had limited time so we we become two groups that went in opposite direction but ended up at the same place later. That was actually really nice, going from a group of 19 people to one of 5 :) So us 5 wanted to spend extra long time at Gamcheon Culture Village, which was a really cool place. After that we went to a fish market where some of us had dinner but I went to explore the street-food at Biff square. 

That was the end of the night for most of us, some went out but a group of us were planning on going to Haedong Yonggung Temple by the coast and see the sunrise. So got up at 5 and took a cab to the tempel. Even though I was pretty tired and a little bit cold I think this might have been the highlight of the entire trip :) 

After that we went to the next city Gyeongju, which is a quite small city but it has a lot of history because it was the capital of the old Silla Kingdom that was about 57BC - 935. We decided to rent bikes and ride between the different sights. Just the bike ride was nice. We only had about one day so we had to hurry to the different places. 

After that we went out for dumplings and some beers to celebrate one of the groups birthday. The day after that we had planned to go back to Seoul in the evening, but before that we wanted to visit a temple. 

Then it took me a couple of days to recover from that trip and also catching up with some studies. 

After that SKKU had their 616th anniversary at the campus. 3 dayd with free hoddies, beer and a lot of music. Saw my first K-pop performance by Dal Sahbet, was quite cool. 

Then I managed to go to the Seoul International Fireworks Festival down at the Han river. 1 million people gathered around the river on a blanket or in a small tent. It was truly spectacular, have never seen anything in that magnitude before.