Seoul!

So my first trip to Seoul went rather well. The ending was sad... but that's another story.

Here are the highlights from my weekend in Seoul:

A palace tour! I'm pointing at a map in front of the site showing all the historic places in Seoul

The inside of the main palace where the King sat. The background is on all their 10,000 won bills

This is the palace. It's not really that small. It's quite huge, actually.

Part of the King's "Secret Garden" (isn't that AWESOME?)
It's a pool that symbolizes the connection/meeting of earth (symbolized by the square pool of water), sky or heaven (symbolized by the round island of trees in the middle), and man (symbolized by the two feet of the building sticking into the water).

The Korean Cultural Museum. VERY cool. Too many awesome pictures to post on here.

Korean culture borrows a lot from the Chinese. So these Chinese Zodiac statues were outside of the Korean Cultural Museum. I'm a Tiger.

Then later that night we saw a traditional Korean performance which showcased the different traditional outfits, instruments, and dances! It was incredible! Sadly, there was no photography allowed during the performance. I felt like I was at Disney.

Ahh... on Sunday we found a treat! Something we'd BOTH been craving since leaving the States! COLDSTONE ICE CREAM!

The best surprise, however, was going to the traditional market in Seoul and getting a Korean name stamp. All Koreans have one. They use it to sign their name on important documents like a King or something. So... I now have one with my name in Korean!

My name in Korean. And yes, those are Tigers. How awesome is that?

All in all... good first trip to Seoul.