Free Hanbok + Making of Specs at ALO

Today i went to M Plaza for the free hanbok trying session. I think its the only place where you can try the hanboks for free! We were supposed to meet at 10.30am to book a slot since you can only reserve it on the day itself. But we all ended up late, so by the time i reached, we could only go for the 11am slot. But that was okayys for us since most of us werent there yet till almost 11.  The staff helped us to try the hanbok, i couldnt choose any as there was only 1 hanbok that was S size and it fitted me well :DDD 

satisfied, and i wore the matching headdress :DDDD

Reserve your slot here and wear your hanbok here!

Sinlin and I ! omg the hanbok totally fits sinlin. her hanbok reminded me of Sungkyunkwan Scandal when Park Min Young wore it and YooChun caught her. 

act ge shy

Our only group photo, not everyone were in it T_T we didnt have enough time

Ratings:4/5
Review:I wished that more time was given and more hanboks were available for us to choose from! But considering that its a free service, i shouldnt expect too much. Quite lucky that Yiyi told me about it otherwise i wouldnt know where i can have a chance to wear hanboks for free. I like that they have props for us, like fans, and many headdress to chose from. 

Directions: 
Its at M Plaza, Level 5. 

After our hanbok tryout session, i went to make my spectacles cos i was in a rush to have it done. This is because i have extremely high astigmatism hence my spectacles take a longer time than average to be done. Like for others, it only takes a few hours or less to make it. For me, it takes 1 day to have it done. And i will be leaving on 20th so by hook or by crook, i had to do it today. I chose to do it in korea as i heard that making spectacles are much cheaper and the spectacles here are nicer too! 

Previously i didnt know which optical shop to make my spectacles so when i was at myeongdong helping my friends to buy their cosmetics, i chanced upon this shop that featured many celebrities wearing their spectacles so i reckoned that their spectacles are good. And they had discounts till 31st december!!

And when i went to enquire , they have a staff who speaks mandarin. Awesome, no more language barrier. So all the more, it made me wanna make my spectacles here!

ALO is just opposite F21 myeongdong

I had a free eye checkup, apparently, my astigmatism fell abit, other than that, my degree didnt change at all. Phew...

The way they did the eye checkup was different from singapore. They used more equipments than we do in singapore. Unfortunately i didnt have chance to snap any photos. After they did the checkup on my eyes, they let me wear the metal spectacles and choose my frame.

looking ridiculous in the metal eyecheckup spectacles LOL

 Initially i asked him to choose a frame for me, but he recommended me a light coloured frame that i didnt like. so i decided to choose on my own. shortlisted about 6 after almost 1.5hours of choosing my frames, i took so long that when sinlin came back from shopping at f21 with gina's sis and frens, she was like ' WHAT? still havent finish choosing?!'

sheepish me.
Thankfully the optician didnt rush me and let me chose at my own pace. i finally settled on one, and i chose the normal lens cuz my frame was around 119k won before discount, after the promotion, it wa around 80k++ won, my lenses was 30k, so in total, it was around 113300won.

Quite ex, i expected it to be cheaper. But i was like, aiyah already choose for so long, just buy it. dont wait and find other optical shops anymore. feel bad for choosing frames so long in his shop ,then if nv buy, ill feel very paiseh.

I was told to collect my spectacles tomorrow after 12pm, wheee cant wait to collect it!!

Ill post a review on it after ive collected my spectacles (:

After making my spectacles, i decided to go back to my room to rest for awhile before meeting Yuni for dinner at gangnam. Kinda regretted not meeting more often at gangnam for dinner during the semester. Eat at snu station until sian.

On the way home, it started snowing again, since ive posted so many photos of snow, il post videos instead. Enjoy(: and be jealous of me , teehee (; just kidding

took this video when i was standing right outside of the staircase to my goshiwon. My goshiwon is above a pub but surprisingly the sounds from the pub doesnt travel into my room. And its rather safe. No drunkards around. 

War Memorial of Korea + Kstyle Hairstyling Session at M Plaza

Woke up late cos of my hangover. Had a hard night sleeping. I went to bed earlier around 1am KST i think...but i kept tossing and turning in bed and felt nauseous. But luckily i didnt vomit and felt better when i woke up. I had a slight headache when i left my goshiwon to go out, nontheless, the thought of visiting war memorial of Korea kept me excited.

As my goshiwon is near a kimbab store, about 10seconds walk from my goshiwon, i bought a 계란길김밥( not sure if i typed it correctly) as my brunch.

Its basically just the usual kimbab but wrapped with additional layer of egg. 

My favourite kimbab. Second favourite is tuna kimbab.

It was snowing a little at SNU station

small snow flakes on my hair

By the time i met the rest at Samgakji Station, it was snowing , and it gradually grew heavier, much to our excitement. We started to take loads of photos around the War Memorial of Korea. We hadnt even went into the memorial/museum yet. Please understand us, we seldom get to see snow, so that explains our excitement whenever we see snow. I think we spent close to 1.5hours snapping photos in the snow. My hands grew numb from it. Love my boots, it held me warm quite well even when my boots were covered in snow.

All around the Memorial, we could see the large military equipment on display. It feels surreal that those very equipment was used in the past or even if they were replica, it just feels surreal to me. 

Photo spam:

sitting on the snow! it wasnt as cold as ive expected

covered in snow

my hp camera lens became wet with melted snow

the useless umbrella. cuz the snow flew below it onto me

Finally we were done with photo-taking and we went into the museum!

covered with snow. My bag was utterly wet. But luckily, it was water-resistant so my items were dry but cold.

random shot, it looked pretty

Inside the war memorial, there were 4D screening rooms. But i didnt quite like the 4D cuz the 3D glasses made me felt very dizzy and nauseous. But i like the seats, they were wayyy better than the sinchon 4D seats that i tried. At least the movements of the seats were more intense, which i like. To me, its like if i want to watch 4D, i like intense movements of my seats then ill feel that im inside the movie. otherwise i feels fake.

There were 3 levels but we went to only 2. At one of the levels, there was a cafe. I like the view at the cafe .




doesnt it look like switzerland? (;

Review:
i liked it but i regretted leaving too early. there was a photobooth that i didnt have time to try. i think i only spent 1hour inside, which was too short. 2hours should be enough. it also depends if you are a person who likes museum. Some of my friends who went in were quite bored by it and left early, so for them, 1hour was more than enough. I would prefer that the 4D screening have better 3D glasses , otherwise it makes it less enjoyable cuz we felt giddy. Oh and its free admission too! i like that its so near the metro station, so accessible. 

Directions:
[Subway]
Samgakji Station (Subway Lines 4, 6), Exit 12. It is 5min away from the station

I didnt take the bus, but here are some info i obtained from visitkorea website.

[Bus)
NO. 149, 150, 151, 152, 500, 501, 504, 506, 507, 605, 750A, 750B, 751, 752 (Samgakji Station)NO. 110B, 730, 421 (Main entrance of The War Memorial of Korea)

After that, i left as i had to attend a kstyle hairstyling session at myeongdong at 4pm with Yiyi. I expected the instructions to be in english as it was only for foreigners, so when it turned out to be in korean, i was a little disappointed. But luckily they had a staff who knows english so she sat beside us to act as our translator.

We were taught on what is going to be the trend next year during spring/summer. Then they taught us how to tie a bun with ribbons.

Photo spam again:

we were taught the first photo hairstyle, a modified version with ribbon

he is famous for styling celebrities' hair, demo-ing on one of the participants 

Yiyi helping me to do my hair ^^v

tada! for once, i was quite satisfied with my side view. usually my side view is horrible

Yupps so that was the end of my day , Yiyi took a video of how to tie the hair w ribbon so ive to wait for her to send it to me before i can upload it!

Review:
I only knew about this hairstyling session when Yiyi told me about it. Apparently the tourism centre organises activities for free quite often, so do follow their facebook for their updates! From what i remember, they organised temple stay, hanji-making session(korean paper) and many other activities for free! So if you are on tight budget but want to explore more of korean culture, stalk their updates! LOL!!!

it was quite fun learning to style our hair. but it would be better that it was in english to cater to more people. the session was rather short. about 1h 15mins only. Do follow Seoul Global Culture and Tourism Centre. They often organise free activities. click here! 

Directions:
Ah when you have signed up for their activities they will email you the directions to their centre (: