Beauty and shopping
I got my nails done for the first time! I figured might as well while I’m in Korea and it’s cheaper than the U.S. (I did not realize people outside of the U.S. call it “the States.” It was an interesting thing to adjust to.) I chose a gel design and went to a place called Nail4Season in Hongdae. They usually require a deposit to reserve an appointment but if you tell them you’re a foreigner going by yourself they usually waive the fee.
After weeks of debating, I decided to purchase Gentle Monster sunglasses. Recently, Jennie from Blackpink released a collab collection with Gentle Monster so I’d heard a LOT about GMs. Every time I passed a store I would stop and try some on. This was the single most expensive purchase I made in Korea (and I bought the cheapest glasses they had too!). They were about $190. The quality feels good, but if I were to go back in time I probably would not buy them. They are cool to have though I guess. (I did not buy the Jennie ones, I just got regular ones.)
I consider myself somewhat of a kpop album collector, nothing too crazy though. I did go a little crazy with buying kpop albums in Korea though. They are just so much cheaper than in the U.S., especially with all the shipping fees I’d have to pay to Hawaii. These were some of the shops I visited (most located in Myeongdong).
Ktown4u
Kwangya (SM artists only)
Random bookstores and music shops will often have a small selection of kpop albums
More festivals, concerts, & fanmeetings
The second kpop performance I attended after Le Sserafim was Onew’s fanmeeting. Onew is my favorite member of my favorite kpop group SHINee so this was extra exciting for me. Even though I missed the initial ticket sales, there were still seats available. Much like the Le Sserafim fanmeeting, the event was 75% talking and 25% singing. Despite (still) not speaking Korean, I made a greater effort this time to utilize Papago to translate what was going on so I wouldn’t be totally lost. Overall a great experience and I got to meet a few fellow SHINee fans.
For some reason, when my friends suggested we go to Korea University’s festival, I was under the assumption that we would go to enjoy food, drinks, games, and music. I did not realize we would just be standing there for hours (five hours, to be precise) watching the festival performances. I did know most of the artists who performed though, including Apink, Illit, and Jukjae. They also had Jung Yonghwa from CNBLUE and the Wind.
Festival season in Korea is only in the spring semesters. Many universities hold festivals that are open to the public but some are only open to the university’s own students. Yonsei’s festival, Akaraka, is only open to local students, so most exchange students were not able to attend. They had a stacked lineup this year, including Itzy, Ive, Riize, Psy, Taeyang from Big Bang, Illit, Kwon Eunbi, Ateez, and aespa. I was very sad not to be able to attend (fortunately, I didn’t feel that bad since the SHINee concert was on the same weekend).
I also got to attend Suho from EXO’s concert. Pro tip: check the artist’s official Twitter to see if there’s a dress code announcement. For this concert, the dress code was pink and I missed the memo and showed up fully wearing black and gray. EXO is another of my all-time favorite kpop groups so I was super excited to see that Suho performed a medley of EXO songs as part of the set.
SHINee concert!
I’ve been a kpop fan since 2019, starting with BTS (as many people do), and slowly moving on to other groups like NCT, EXO, and Seventeen. However, my favorite group of all time is SHINee, a relatively older group. I spent basically the entire pandemic listening to their music and consuming content from them. Before coming to Korea, I never dreamed that I would actually have the chance to see them live in concert. This dream miraculously became a reality when they announced an encore concert in Seoul to their Asia tour that had been happening over the last year. (I previously attempted to get tickets for their Hong Kong concert in March but ultimately failed.)
The whole ticketing process in itself is a gigantic nightmare if you’re unfamiliar with it. Usually for kpop concerts, if you’re a member of that group’s fanclub on Weverse, you can have access to presale tickets. However, this requires multiple steps beforehand with a whole timeline of due dates and if you miss any of them you won’t be able to access the presale. This is what happened to me so I wasted $25 on the membership without getting presale access (only realized it two hours before the presale was supposed to start). Then I tried during the general admission a few days later to secure a ticket but ultimately failed (very stressful). Fortunately, I had a friend who had gotten a ticket during the presale period who generously chose to give hers up so that I could purchase it. Then I had a stroke of luck and secured a ticket for a different day of the concert (three days total), after checking the ticketing website daily for the past couple of weeks.
The concert itself was amazing (although it was a 2 hour trek out to Incheon and back). I met some new friends, bought a lot of merch, and sang my heart out. Getting to go two different days was amazing and I feel extremely fortunate that I was able to have this opportunity. It was undoubtedly my top experience in Korea, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Costco Korea
Costco in Korea is a whole tourist experience in itself. Well, I guess Costco abroad anywhere is like that. This week I visited Costco for the second time while in Korea, but this time I went to a Costco that was larger and also a bit farther away. We got lunch in the food court. They had hot dogs and pizza like America but some unique items included mushroom soup, bulgogi pizza, pork bake (instead of chicken bake), and a wider variety of dessert items.
For tourists, one of the main things Costco Korea is known for is cheaper bulk skincare. The variety was more limited than I had expected but I did end up purchasing a few things to stock up on and take home. I got two bottles of Roundlab toner, two bottles of Roundlab cleanser, and two bottles of hair serum.
Something else to note is that fruit in Korea can be quite expensive. I wasn’t completely sure, but I felt like the fruit in Costco was even higher priced than Hawaii. I bought a package of cherries anyway because I was feeling very vitamin C deficient. I also picked up some Dole peach fruit cups for extra nutrients. Lastly, I got some yogurt cups that they were giving out free samples of and was actually super yummy. Basically the only thing stopping me from getting more things was having to carry it all back home on the bus and the limited size of my reusable bag.
Baseball game
The first baseball game I ever watched was in Korea and it was a cool experience. Tickets were about $12 and I also got a shrimp and soda combo cup for about $13. The game had the Doosan Bears against the SSG Landers at Jamsil Stadium. The bears were the home team so we sat in that section, right below the cheering area. There was an energetic bear mascot, an announcer, and cheerleaders. The Bears ended up winning 10-3 against the Landers and I learned more about baseball that day (from my friend sitting next to me) than I’d ever known in my life.
I had previously purchased a Yonsei baseball jersey and decided to wear it to the game, but I wasn’t sure about attire etiquette for baseball games. Are you allowed to wear jerseys for other random teams that aren’t playing in that game? Still don’t know but I wore it anyway.
I’ve never seen a baseball game in America before so I had no idea what it was like compared to Korea. One of my friends mentioned that Koreans are a lot more spirited in a positive way, while in America people are swearing and getting angry.
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