It reminds me of The World's Largest Sitting Bronze Buddah on Lantau island in Hong Kong. Granted, it's an impressive statue, but then someone told me that there were larger sitting buddahs in the world, they were just made out of something else that wasn't bronze. And there are really large reclining buddahs. The one in Hong Kong, was large, sitting, and bronze, therefore it gets the distinction. So, if you're looking for large, bronze buddahs, Hong Kong is the place, and if you prefer to do subterranian shopping, go to COEX Mall in Seoul.
The first thing that struck me about COEX was that it looked kind of like any other mall, except that I can't read the map. After about 5 minutes, though, the same thought hit me that usually hits me in Korean public spaces: "There's a crap ton of people here!" I'm slowly getting used to it, but it's still jarring to be litterally running into people everywhere that you step.
Most of the mall is pretty, well, mall-ish, but we did find a couple of unique things that we probably wouldn't find back home. First, we found a video arcade. Video arcades by themselves are not remarkable things, but there were a couple of quintessentially Korean things, starting with the crowd watching someone play a video game. Most Korean people under 30 play video games like they're training to be a pro. That would be funny, but there are actually video game playing leagues where games are broadcast on national TV. Apparently, this guy was really awesome at whatever game he was playing because he had a crowd of about 30 people glued to what he was doing:

Also in the arcade, we found some 1-2 people karaoke booths that were completely taken, or we would have done it. It's no secret that people here love karoake, and at 500 won a song (less than 50 cents), it's a surefire way to spend some time getting close to your significant other while wailing out the latest K-Pop song.

And most awesomely, we found a sort of circus game where you pay money to shoot rubber pellets at stuffed animals. I don't have anything against spongebob, but for some reason, it was fun pointing a gun at his yellow head.



And most awesomely, we found a sort of circus game where you pay money to shoot rubber pellets at stuffed animals. I don't have anything against spongebob, but for some reason, it was fun pointing a gun at his yellow head.


Outside of the arcade, we found the perfect place for "we're a boring married couple, but not so boring that we don't want to leave the house" couples like us. It's a cafe where you pay a small hourly fee to play board games. They also serve drinks and some limited food, but the real treat is getting schooled in Boggle by my wife.




All, in all, COEX is a mall and it is what it is. But for rainy days (or for a really nice bomb shelter), it's a good place to pass the time.



We're silly and adventurous, computer geeks and yoga peeps.
June 24, 2009
Greg Wesson
Hows that for arcane!
Greg
June 25, 2009
Kyle
June 25, 2009
Bessie the wife
June 26, 2009
Rose P.
June 26, 2009
DADDIO
June 28, 2009
Bessie
June 29, 2009
mumsie
July 04, 2009
Bessie
July 03, 2009
Donna
July 03, 2009
Linda
July 04, 2009
Bessie
The movies here are either in English with Korean subtitles or dubbed with Korean, which wouldn't be very fun for us! They also have a pretty large film industry & there are loads of popular Korean movies. Right now there's a bloody thriller out now about 5 murdering school girls - little to close to life for us!