Chocolate Snowflake Bingsu

Patmiok's (팥미옥) version of chocolate snowflake bingsu (초코 눈꽃빙수) is my favorite chocolate bingsu that I've tasted so far. The thing about it is that it's not overly too sweet and those really crunchy chocolate toppings are just delicious. They also offer two different serving sizes for your order that you can choose from—1 person or 2 persons (1인/2인) serving. This location that I visited is the one located in Sinchon (신촌) area, but they have multiple locations all over Seoul so you can find them in different neighborhoods as well. I would definitely recommend this bingsu, especially if you are a fan of chocolate.

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Graduation Day

Last summer, some of my friends from Yonsei Korean Language School finished their 6-levels language program and I got the chance to attend their graduation day. It was truly a bittersweet moment. I've became good friends with some of these people and I know how hard they studied and worked for to get to this point. I was truly happy for them for completing the whole program and made it this far. On the other hand, it was kinda of sad because I know we probably won't be able to see each other that often anymore. A good number of people are going back to their home countries after this graduation to go on with their next chapter of life and, to be honest, I don't know when I will be able to see some of them again in the future. Even so, I'm grateful for the experiences and good memories that we've shared together during the short time that we have in school. Some I got to be friends with and some, I'm even lucky enough to call my good friends. 

It's apparently a tradition at Yonsei KLI to wear Hanbok for graduation day, so almost everybody wore Hanboks at the ceremony. I went for a little fun impromptu photoshoot with a couple of my friends to commemorate their last day at school. Sharing with you some of my favorite shots from that afternoon. Hope everybody have a great weekend ahead! :)

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Here are some behind the scenes shots. My friends are one silly bunch :P

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Royal Guard Changing Ceremony

The first thing that came to my mind when I saw this ceremony was "the royal guards sure have a really cool uniform". My eyes were feasting on the colors of fabrics that the guards were wearing. I mean, how can you not, really? Plus they have really cool hats, flags, weapons, and musical instruments too. There are two royal guard changing ceremonies that you see in Seoul, one in Gyeongbokgung Palace (경복궁), and the other one at Deoksugung Palace (덕수궁), which is the one I went to. The ceremony itself took about 20 minutes or so, consisting of the guards marching out of the gate bearing flags and playing traditional musical instruments, the exchange of guards, and the final march accompanied by the traditional musical instruments once again. I would probably recommend checking this ceremony out at least once because it's pretty interesting. Since it's a scheduled ceremony, you can check out the time to see it here before coming to Deoksugung Palace.

Fun fact: I had to get pretty close to the guards to get the low-angle shot and when the head guard saw me squatting in front of him, he stared directly at my camera for a good minute without blinking. He's so cool for being a good sport about it. 

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5Extracts

It's been a while since my last post. The end of 2015 and the first couple of weeks of 2016 were hectic. With family matters to attend to and traveling for winter break, I had to put a pause to update this blog. Now that I'm back, I'm slowly starting to catch up on back logged pictures and actually have time to edit again. So expect more posts coming your way soon :) 

For my first post in 2016, visited 5Extracts (파이브익스트랙츠) in Hongdae (홍대) with Soo Zee for an impromptu coffee session. Have been hearing about how good the coffee selection is at this place, but never actually been here before, since I don't drink coffee and all. But since Soo Zee suggested the place, we went. The place is actually pretty cozy. Not too big, not too small, and it was pretty quite, which is kinda nice so you don't have to scream at your friends when you talk them. But then again, I came on a weekday night, so things might be different on weekends. Anyways, definitely go try this place out if you want a good cup of coffee around Hongdae.

ps: Hope everybody is having a great first month of the year! Can't believe January is almost over. 

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Welcoming Fall

When the summer heat has finally left the city and you constantly hearing the crisp sounds of those stepped on fall leaves on the pavements, you'll realize that fall is finally here (that and the time it takes you to get out of the house became longer cos you have to put on layers now :P). Seeing the leaves changing colors in Seoul is one of my favorite moments that I think I'll be always looking forward to. I've been to Olympic park (올림픽공원) in spring before and I can definitely say that coming to this place in Fall is like visiting a whole different place. The moment I arrived on this street, I was amazed by the colors of the lined ginko trees (은행 나무) that are neatly standing on both sides of the sidewalk. Maybe it's the change of scenery, or maybe I've just never lived in a city where I can enjoy as much fall foliage, but this view was quite something to me. All I wanna do was just threw a blanket, have a picnic with some friends right in the middle of this side walk, and enjoy this view. Maybe for my next visit ;)

p.s: things have been pretty crazy this past few weeks (and still are), so I'll try my best to post new posts. bear with me :)