Seoulmate: Shining Lights - Namsan Tour

Today I was greeted with snow. I stared at it for a good minute before accepting what it was. At first I thought it was some form of air polution, since it was actually travelling upwards. Then I saw how fluffy is was an looked around the neighbour thinking it was from a cottonwood tree -I now know there aren't any. Then, duh, it's snow. I haven't seen any since the Grouse Grind reopened in the Spring of 2015.

Saturday's tour was a visit to Namsan! A traditional village in the heart of Seoul.

We got to take a close look at the traditional homes of the Joseon dynasty. In the Southern part of Korea a channel it built under the homes to allow air to pass through cooling the house in the summer.  They're a little smaller farther up North here since the summers are not as hot. It's the exact same premise as a Queenslander. I think it's just another thing that humanity figured out, an easy way to keep your house cool, because this is found all over the warm parts of the globe.

The heating mechanism was a bit more unique. The floor is made out of a solid piece of rock, the kitchen oven is just a fire roaring in a hallowed out part of said rock. Eventually the heat is carry through the rock to other parts of the house. Meaning that in the Joseon dynasty Koreans had heated flooring. Puttin' on the ritz. That is also how it carries over to today where homes get their heating, not from vents, but from the floor.

We were lucky enough to be there during a performance. Yes, mum, with the hats. The MC of the whole thing recognised Seoulmate and posed for pictures with us and inevitably brought us into the dance. Check out some of the hats...

This is before we joined in.

I also got to hold the Seoulmate flag for a big chunk of the tour.

From Namsan we went to get an amazing meal nearby. This place had really good side dishes. As I have mentioned before, side dishes in Korea are free, and here we kept getting refills on them cause they were so good!

After the meal we were so warm and cozy we didn't want to go back out into the freezing weather. But we quickly caught a bus up to North Seoul Tower.

The clouds from the snow were still standing in the distance so the view could be better, but from what was nearby it was amazing. The North Seoul Tower isn't that tall at all, it gets most of its height from being on a small mountain. So, I didn't go up it, I should have plenty more chances to do that on nicer days. But I definitely enjoyed the view and being in the snow.

A good day, but very very much a cold day.