Wife and I just returned from our first trip to Seoul, and I just wanted to say kamsa-hamnida to the Korea experts here, especially mikesaidyes who kindly answered a few PMs for me. We absolutely loved Seoul and had a great trip! Advice I got from you all really helped -- upon arrival we knew just what to do: Global ATM for won, then to the GS25 by door 10 for T-Money cards, and then bus 6015 which dropped us off right in front of our hotel (BW Kukdo, just outside of Myeong-dong).

Everything in Korea was great: the people were nice, the weather was cool and comfortable, the Metro system is perhaps the best I've seen anywhere, there are clean public restrooms everywhere you go, the food is cheap and really good; I could go on but you guys know all this already!

Two brief stories that illustrate some of why we liked it there so much: we're on the Metro, and it's crowded so we're standing. My wife is holding her backpack with one hand and the overhead handle with her other hand. An ajumma is sitting directly in front of her, and I notice that she starts saying something to my wife and gesturing at her backpack. We don't speak enough Korean to understand, so I thought that perhaps my wife was inadvertently hitting the lady with her backpack or something. But no, it turned out that she was offering to hold my wife's backpack on her lap! Which she did for about the next 10 minutes until we got off.

The other story is when we went to the Seoul Olympic Park, and we visited the Olympic Museum. Admission is free, and they don't even solicit donations. On our way out, the young lady at the front desk stops us and hands us a nice shopping bag with two Seoul Olympics logo mugs and two nice little notepads! When was the last time you visited a free museum and they gave you a gift just for stopping by? Fantastic!

We can't wait to return. ^^^