Norah Phillips-Pinkney, TEAN: Seoul Spring 2025
As an American it’s extremely difficult to travel outside of the continental United States because flights can be so expensive. Like most people I wanted to take advantage of my time abroad and the accessibility to travel to different parts of South Korea and other countries. Thankfully through the program Tean I’ve had the opportunity to visit two other cities in South Korea, and visit Tokyo, Japan in the beginning of May.
Within the first few weeks of being in South Korea we visited Nami Island, which is a man-made island an hour and a half away from Seoul. Around the area before you take a boat to Nami Island are a lot of chicken fried rice restaurants (닭볶음밥) and water sports. Since it was early March we can really only take advantage of the restaurants and scenery. Nami Island is really beautiful during the winter and spring when the snow covers the entire island or when the flowers have fully bloomed.
Also during March we visited two cities in Southern South Korea, Ulsan and Busan for a two day trip. On the first day we caught the KTX (the high speed rail in South Korea) to Ulsan, one of the port cities in South Korea that also headquarters Hyundai. Ulsan is also one of the top cities in the world to see sunsets, alongside Lisbon, Portugal. While in Ulsan we explored different areas of the cities from an art exhibition exclusively made from recycled materials, the ocean front and an observatory. Out of everything my favorite part of our trip was the oceanfront, because the weather was so nice the ocean looked beautiful. But also I felt like a child again climbing the rocks trying to get beautiful photos and the oceans and playing silly games with my friends. After arriving at the hotel, we were treated to a delicious buffet dinner treated to us by the city of Ulsan.
The next day we started early at 8am heading to Busan, the second largest city in South Korea. Busan is the largest port city in South Korea, home to the Busan Film festival and beautiful beaches. Our first stop was the APAC House, which was built in 2005 for the APAC (Asia-Pacific) summit taking place in Busan. From there we walked through the park to one of the main beaches in Busan, Haeundae Beach. I wish we were able to have more time at the beach because I could’ve honestly sat there for hours, the sounds of the waves crashing and the wind was so peaceful. After that we went to the famous Gamcheon Culture Village known for its colorful roofs and mutuals. When the village was created following the Korean War it was primarily inhabited by older people, when college students saw how sad the residents were they decided to liven up the area with color, making murals ranging from the little prince to BTS. We then headed to BIFF (Busan Film Festival) street which is where I tried Hotteok (a warm brown sugar filled pancake) for the first time. There’s a bunch of food stalls and stores along this strip. After BIFF was made our way back to the Busan train station and went back to Seoul. I had so much fun during my time in Nami, Busan and Ulsan, and I can’t wait for our upcoming Busan Trip!
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