the rough guide to seoul

THE ROUGH GUIDE to Seoul Imperial splendour • Fiery food • Neon nightlife The publishers and authors have done their best to ensure the accuracy and currency of all the information in The Rough Guide to Seoul, however, they can accept no responsibility for any loss, injury, or inconvenience sustained by any traveller as a result of information or advice contained in the guide. YONGSAN Seoul Station Yongsan Station National Museum World Cup Stadium Cheongnyangni Station Olympic Park Olympic Park Namsan Park Namsan Park Children’s Grand Park Children’s Grand Park Achasan Park Achasan Park Gwanaksan Park Gwanaksan Park Han River Han River HONGDAE JAMSIL APGUJEONG GANGNAM ITAEWON YEOUIDO SEOCHO BUAMDONG SEODAEMUN YEONGDEUNGPO DAEHANGNO DONGDAEMUN 5 4 3 2 6 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 The palace district Insadong The business district Northern Seoul Along the Hangang Southern Seoul SEOUL 02 km About this book Rough Guides are designed to be good to read and easy to use. The book is divided into the following sections and you should be able to find whatever you need in one of them. The colour section is designed to give you a feel f or Seoul, suggesting when to go and what not to miss, and includes a full list of contents. Then comes basics, for pre-departur e information and other practicalities. The city chapters cover each area of Seoul in depth, giving comprehensive accounts of all the attractions, whil e the listings section gives you the lowdown on acc ommodation, eating, shopping and more. The around Seoul chapters describe excursions further afield. Contexts fills you in on his tory, religion, film and books, while individual colour sections introduce Seoul’s splendid food and fascinating traditional architecture, and language gives you an extensive menu reader and enough Korean to get by. Next comes the small print, including details of how to send in updates and corrections, and a comprehensive index. Colour maps covering the city can be found at the back of the book. This first edition published June 2011. Seoul written and researched by Martin Zatko The Rough Guide to www.roughguides.com Seoul written and researched by Martin Zatko The Rough Guide to www.roughguides.com [...]... head of the table – the one who is paying, in other words – to sit down first, as well as allowing them to be the first to stand at the end of the meal The latter can be quite tricky, as many Korean restaurants are sit-on -the- floor affairs that play havoc on the knees and backs of foreigners unaccustomed to the practice All in all, Koreans will tolerate anything viewed as a “mistake” on the part of the foreigner,... central, and each is connected to at least one subway line The main bus stations also have direct connections to the subway, but unfortunately they’re all rather awkwardly located to the south and east of the centre By air 22 Most people take the bus from Incheon Airport to Seoul, but following the completion of a train line to Seoul train station, via Gimpo airport (the terminus for most domestic... should endeavour to keep topped up those belonging to others The position of the hands is important – generally your inactive hand should be resting on the forearm attached to your active one, with the requisite level of Confucian “respect” shown by how close (lots of respect) or far (less respect) the hands are to each other Watch to see how the Koreans are doing it, both the pourer and the recipient,... Local tour operators Aju Tours W www.ajutours.co.kr Has a few interesting additions to the regular Seoul tours and DMZ trips, including birdwatching, oriental health or a tour of shamanistic sites Grace Travel Wwww.triptokorea.com A user-friendly website – click on “Customized Tours”, select your time window, then choose from a range of interesting options Rye Tour Wwww.ryetour.com In addition to a... important to travel thoughtfully and responsibly, with respect for the cultures you’re visiting – not only to derive the most benefit from your trip but also to preserve the best bits of the planet for everyone to enjoy At Rough Guides we feel there are six main areas in which you can make a difference: • Consider what you’re contributing to the local economy, and how much the services you use do the same,... Getting there There is no way to arrive in Seoul by land, since such opportunities are choked off by the spiky frontier with North Korea, and most visitors fly in It may come as something of a surprise to learn that Seoul is not Korea’s main international transport hub: that honour goes to Incheon, a city just to the west, yet essentially part of the same gigantic urban conurbation Incheon is home to the. .. displays and tea ceremonies to men walking across the Han River by tightrope, there’s simply no better time to be in Seoul, and the event also incorporates the Seoul World DJ festival Jongmyo Daeje Korean kings performed their ancestral rites at the Jongmyo shrine for hundreds of years prior to the end of the monarchy, and it’s been carried forward to this day; the event is necessarily sober but very interesting,... travellers leap at the chance to visit the DMZ, the chilling 4km-wide buffer zone separating North and South Korea In fact, on some tours it’s technically possible to walk across the border, under the watchful eyes of rifletoting soldiers, a surprisingly simple way to generate some travel kudos Two major cities are easily accessible from Seoul, and actually on the city’s subway system Incheon to the west has... history, Japan and China protect Korea from most of the area’s typhoons, but one or two manage to squeeze through the gap each year The best time of the year to visit is autumn (Sept to Nov), when temperatures are mild, rainfall is generally low and the mountains that encircle the city erupt in a magnificent array of reds, yellows and oranges Locals flock to national parks to picnic surrounded by these... mind for the duration of their stay – many slowly realize that they’ve inadvertently been saving more than half of their salary 30 Seoul is the most obvious target for those wishing to teach English in Korea, and with the number of teaching jobs on offer, it’s quite possible to handpick the area of the city you’d like to live in Doing so may save unnecessary disappointment: those who fail to do their . River HONGDAE JAMSIL APGUJEONG GANGNAM ITAEWON YEOUIDO SEOCHO BUAMDONG SEODAEMUN YEONGDEUNGPO DAEHANGNO DONGDAEMUN 5 4 3 2 6 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 The palace district Insadong The business district Northern Seoul Along the Hangang Southern Seoul SEOUL 02 km About this book Rough Guides are designed to be good to read and easy to use. The. 2011. Seoul written and researched by Martin Zatko The Rough Guide to www.roughguides.com Seoul written and researched by Martin Zatko The Rough Guide to www.roughguides.com