Good Night

Good Night

(Unknown Author)

As the night gets deep and dark,

Let your worries fade,

Let this night change your life,

And make it a better place.

Give you new hope,

And the love you need,

Let the stars shower you with joys,

And the moon bless you with peace.

[SONG] exile ~ michi

"Omoide ga jikan wo tometa"

“My memories stopped time”

Kyou no hi wo wasureru na to

As if to say “Don’t forget today”

Minareta keshiki nido to narabenai

Where we'll never again walk together in the familiar scenery

Omoide no michi
A road in my memories

Kono michi de kimi to deai

I met you on this road

Haru ga bokura wo tsutsundeta

Spring enveloped us

Ai to yasashisa oshiete kureta ne

You taught me what love and tenderness were

Nakanaide arukou

Don’t cry, move on

Sora, kyou mo aozora desu

The sky is blue again today

Nakiwarai shita ano toki

That time when you smiled tearfully

Atarimae ga mirai ni kawaru

Things you take for granted change in the future

"Kibou" "yume" "ai" hanashitai

I want to talk about “hope”, “dreams”, “love”

Ugoku na jikan

Don’t let time move

Sora ni sakebu

I scream into the sky

Kimi wo wasurenai

I won’t forget you

Yasashisa ni deatta koto de

When I found that tenderness

Boku wa hitori ja nakatta

I wasn’t alone

Dare mo kesenai kokoro no arubamu

Nobody can erase this album in my heart

Waraeru kamo ne

Maybe it’ll make me smile

"Ugokidashita saigo no jikan"

“The final time has moved on”

Kimi ni tsutaetai kotoba

Words I want to say to you

Namida jama shite sora wo miagetara

When my tears got in the way and I looked up at the sky

Haru no oto kikoeta

I heard the sounds of spring

*Michi, kimi to aruita kyou made

I walked this road with you, up to today

Kasuka ni ugoku kuchibiru

My lips move just a little

Tokubetsu na jikan wo arigatou

Thank you for this special time

"Kokoro" "yuuki" "tomo" "egao"

“Heart”, “courage”, “friend”, “smile”

Ureshisugite

I’m so happy

Afuredashita

That tears have overflowed

Namida ga tomaranai

And I can’t stop them

Yukkuri to arukidasou

I’ll walk on slowly

Kono michi mirai e tsudzuku

This road leads to my future

Sayonara nakanaide

Goodbye, don’t cry

Wasurenai yo

I won’t forget you

Hanaretemo ai shite imasu

Even when we’re apart, I’ll love you

Repeat *

grateful..

salam.. wow, there seemed to be no entry in august! then this is not a web site but a cobweb site, hehe.. pardon the cheesy pun. actually, i want to write about a lot of things but the mood to write it is not there. this time, i want to talk about being grateful...

eventhough i'm ashamed to admit this, i had to admit it anyway. i'm the type of person that usually take things for granted. i remembered to be grateful only when there's something major happened in my life such as my graduation or receiving something that i wanted for a long time or when my dua's are answered. there are a lot of things, some may seem small or minor that i forgot to expressed my gratitude for. here are my list:

1. Family: i have such a happy family. it's not perfect but who's family does? my parents, they are the best and the most important thing is they are still alive. yet, i seldom called them. i'm the type of person that only called my parents when i need to ask or to inform something to them. my mom is the one who usually call me. when i was studying abroad, i called my parents more frequently compared where i'm here, close to them. my mom was the one that started to say 'i love you' at the end of of conversation. it was a bit awkward at first but now it's easy to say them. my best friend's parent were both gone. but she's really strong. i couldn't imagine my life without my mom or dad. i always reminding myself to keep in touch with my parents more frequently. my brothers and sisters, each and single one of them has been there through my toughest time. they helped me emotionally and financially.and not to forget, my niblings. they make me laugh and they challenge my mind with their innocent yet tough questions. trying to answer them give me a glimpse of what my future looks like (when i'm having children of my own, insyaAllah). this is the most obvious but easily forgotten reason to be grateful and thankful every single moment.
2. Physical: my physical is perfect. i have both legs and hands and with them, i have fingers. i have eyes too see. i have ears to hear. i have nose to smell, to breathe. i have everything. but, i've always take them for granted. once, i read about a lose his thumb, and given quite a lot of compensation. his friend joke about it, saying he was lucky to receive a lot of money just by losing only a thumb. he told he friend, he would give all the money in the world if he could get back that one thumb! he said it was hard living without it.he couldn't grasp things easily anymore. that got me thinking. only a thumb but change things a lot. when i watched documentaries about those special people, how they still can survive without having the things that we took for granted, i'm amazed and ashamed at the same time.
3. Job: i may not loving my job but still i'm happy for it. the are a lot of people with great qualifications still looking for occupations. i still get my monthly salary. i have a lot of good friends at work that made the job 'bearable', hehe.. but again, i've always took my job for granted. if i don't have this job, i would have no money to buy things that i need and also things that i want.
4. Friends: i have a lot of friends. i don't know how many true friends that i have, but i think i have enough. they are the one that stood by me through my toughest and hardest time. they are the one that understand me without having me to explain it into details. they are the one that love me with all my quirkiness, craziness, moodiness, crankiness and so on..

there are a lot of other small things that i took for granted. the one i listed, i think is the major one. i hope that i would be remember to be grateful for every single thing, no matter how minor or how small it is.. ameen..

events recap

salam.. i'll be doing summary of several events that happened couple of months ago. since i haven't got the time to write them in details (excuses,excuses), hehe..

11/05/2014: mother's day

on this this day, both my sisters and i celebrated mother's day with our beloved mother at putrajaya lake club. our brothers couldn't make it, so it just mother and daughters.of course, my sisters are already mothers on their own. we bought a cake for this occasion. i know that some people said that we should celebrate and appreciate our mother everyday, not just on mother's day. but for me, yeah we appreciate her everyday but to have one special day for her would make it, well special. just like you celebrate anniversary and such. my mother plays a vital and important role in my messy life. and the song 'i turn to you' by christina aguilera really summed it up for me...

13/05/2014: alif's birthday

alif turns three this year.he knows numbers up to 100, alphabets (lower & upper case), spells and read more that 30 words but still could only speak a little. one day i received a whatsapp message from my sister that read abcsong. i knew immediately who's the culprit. my sistertold me, one of her friend got elephant a smessage.alif thought whatsapp was a search engine.oh,he knows how to operate google and youtube. kids there day are soo gadget/tech savvy compared to me.

01/06/2014: fun run & syaira's birthday

miss a and i joined another run this day.this time we joined the masquerade run and got the chance to dress crazy without looking weird. i took this chance to wear my yukata. miss a wore the cute animal hat that we bought before. while walking, a tourist took a picture of us.. and that night we celebrate syara's sixth birthday at kak ala's house.

aren't we looking cute?hehe..

syaira's birthday

07/06/2014: awed's engagement

today is my bff's big day,well one of the big day. awed is finally getting engaged! miss a and i got there one day earlier to help what we can.we turned awed's bedroom into engagement looking one. we moved all the extra things to awed'd brother's room, hehe..and we helped cut the the beef and chicken for the engagement's meal. the ceremony goes smoothly and i really am so happy for her. couldn't wait for the wedding at the end of this year.

[busan/seoul] day 7: bye bye korea

28/03/2014 (friday)

now is the day to say goodbye to south korea. we took a bus from busan straight to incheon international airport. i slept throughout the journey. our flight was at 4:15pm. we got to the airport at around 1:30pm. we had checked in our luggage and then had some lunch. after lunch, we got back to the waiting area. and while waiting, a local man approached us to fill up some survey about our vacation here in south korea and we got a nice purse after that. flight departed as schedule. honestly, if i've got time and money, i'll definitely come again here. i think there are a lot of things i haven't seen or done. and this entry is the end of my south korea trip with my bestest friend, miss siti norhawa a.k.a awed...

[busan] day 6: busan museum, UN cemetery & haedong yonggungsa temple

27/03/2014 (thursday)

on our second and last day in busan, we first visited busan museum. we managed to experience to print on a rubbed copy. it's the traditional way to make copy and is called takbon in korea. you had to pay KRW2000 only to have this experience. first, you wet the printed block. and then, you put a piece of paper on it. after the paper is put, you rub it to stick to the surface by brush. once the whole surface is done, you use this special brush to put carbon powder all over it. and then it's done!

After the takbok experience, we got another chance to wear hanbok here for free once again. It's in this museum that we learned the different types of hanbok. the one that we tried here was for the royals or aristorats. after the hanbok, we began to explore the musem. there are several halls in in these museum:

• Exhibition Hall 1: Late Paleolithic Period, Samhan/Three Kingdoms Room, Unified Silla Room, Goryeo Room, Joseon Room-Public Affairs/Education, Joseon Room-Relics
• Exhibition Hall 2: Korea-Japan Relationship Room, Modern Room, Contemporary Room, Living & Culture Room, and Busan Folk Room
• Kiln Exhibition Hall: introduction to the process of making earthenware and tiles through kilns and displays tiles which visitors can touch
• Outdoor Exhibition Hall: displays stone monuments and statues (such as Dongnae Nammun Monument, Cheokhwa Monument, Yakjojechal Monument and Sacheoseokgyo Monument)
• Donation Center: displays items donated to the museum
• History Experience Room: Touching Relics, Printing a Rubbed Copy, Erecting Stone Pagoda and Wooden Brackets, and Trying Folk Crafts (Source: VisitKorea website)

our next destination is the UN cemetery.  The UN Memorial Cemetery in Korea honors UN soldiers from 16 countries that were killed in battle during the Korean War from 1950-1953. there was a hall here that shows a video  footage of the korean war. we watched the footage after strolling around the cemetery. it was a sad and tragic video. we learned a little bit about the korean war from it. once we've finished the video,we moved to our next destination, the haedong yonggungsa temple. on the train, we met this couple, an american guy and a korean lady. they asked us whether we're from malaysia and we said yes. it turned out that both of them had worked in perak for about three years, under some teacher programme. so, we talked for a while before they getting off at a station, earlier than ours.

haedong yonggungsa temple is is situated on the coast of the north-eastern portion of Busan and offers visitors the rare find of a temple along the shore line. Most temples in Korea are located in the mountains. it was first built in 1376. Many people often come to this spot on New Year's Day to make a wish for the new year as they watch the sun come up. there were a lot of tourists here.

since we still got some time before went back to the hotel to pack, we went to the shinsegae centum city.  is registered in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest shopping complex in the world. the only shop that we visited here is the kyobo bookstore, hehe.. the bookstore reminded me a little bit of kinonukiya bookstore back in klcc, malaysia. we then went back to our hotel to have lunch again at jagalchi market and to pack up since we got a early bus to catch tomorrow.

[busan] day 5: jagalchi market, beomosa temple & busan tower

26/03/2014 (wednesday)

we took a bus from seoul bus station to busan. the ticket cost around KRW24,000. our bus was on 6:15am. the ride took four hours. when we arrived at busan bus terminal, the first thing we did was buying the ticket from busan to incheon international airport. and this time, the ticket costs a little more expensive, around KRW33,000. as usual, we took subway to get to our hotel which was located in the center of jagalchi market. again,  our hotel was quite hidden. we had to ask the local for help. and this one guy didn't only showed us the way, but he also called the hotel for us. the manager of the hotel personally came out to the place we stood (it's not far), and helped us with our bags.. seem, the hotel manager was quite fond with women wearing hijab. he said that we looked pretty in it, huhu..

after checking in, we had a big seafood lunch. jagalchi market is quite famous for it's seafood. the market also sold a lot of things such as fresh fruits. we bought some strawberries and a big local pear. it took me three days to finish the pear.our next destination after lunch was beomosa temple. this temple is located at the edge of Mt. Geumjeongsan, a famous mountain in Busan. we took the subway until beomosa station. from there we took a taxi. we spent about one hour there. then we walked down. it was drizzling a littlebit. while walking down, we enjoyed the breathtaking scenery. there was a stream that flowed downhill. once down, we again took a taxi to beomosa subway station. we stopped back at jagalchi market and then walked to busan tower.

busan tower was not as famous as namsan tower in seoul. so, there were not so many people around. the entrance fee is only KRW4000/person. still the view from the observatory was beautiful. there was also a place for love  padlocks here. i think the tradition is still new since there was not so many padlocks around. i had a little accident here, huhu.. while trying to put my padlock at this high place, i borrowed one of the plastic chair that belong to one of the tower shop. i put in on a bench. once i climbed the chair, one of the leg broke (obvious fact that i'm heavy). we then took the broken to the owner. maybe i sound a little bit hysterical and i almost cried. the only thing i could say to him was, 'ajussi, mian haeyo.' several times. and the owner, seeing me said, 'gwaenchanayo ..' i thanked him in korean many many time as well..

then we walked back to our hotel. along the way we did again some window shopping and stopped at another coffee house. i think the local people treats hanging out at a coffee shop was one of their culture. after coffee, we continued window shopping and finally had our dinner at lotteria. it is a famous fast food franchise in korea. we had this seafood burger; squid and prawn. you could use your t-money to pay for the food here. since i've mistakenly overload my t-money, i used it here. the food was quite okay according to my taste bud. we ended the day after dinner and it's mean the end of this entry.. until later, peeps...

[seoul] day 4: korean folk village & korea house

25/03/2014 (tuesday)

on our 4th and last day, we went to the korean folk village. the entrance fee is KRW24,000. to get there, we must first go to suwon station and then took the shuttle bus provided. we arrived there around 10am and still among the first visitors. we rushed to the performance area to catch the 'farmer's music and dance' that started on 1030am. it was very amusing. the performers where this special hat with feathers and a rope. when they turned their head, the ropes moved beautifully. they did a few acrobatic things as well.

after the dance, at 11am, we watched the tightrope walking performance. it was done by this elderly man. it's quite amazing,watching him not just walking on the rope, but jumping and many other maneuvers as well. and while performing, he cited a few traditional korean poetry. there was also a tightrope on the ground for those who wanted to try. actually i want to try it, but since only children are the one who did, i cancelled my earlier intention, huhu...

we moved again to the performance are to watch the next performance, equestrian feats. this was performed by several young youths. some of them even performed in the farmer's dance.as usual, they don't only ride horses but did several amazing and interesting things that required a lot of experiences and skills. they stay horse, the ride it backwards, they made a human tower on horses, they did archery and many other things.

the last performance we attended was the traditional korean wedding. if you're used to watch korean drama, you may know how it was done. there was this special setting made especially for the wedding with cock and fruits and such. then the groom came first and did the bow several times to the elders. then the bride was brought in by several elder ladies and both bride and groom started bowing to each other. in the end,the bride was brought into a tandu (i don't know the word in english. the only word that came to my mind was carriage, huhu..) that was carried by several people and the groom rode a horse. they newlywed now will move into their new home, usually the groom's home.

after watching all four performances, we went to roam the area. but first, we had a very lavish lunch. i think that was our first real lunch/meal since we arrived here. we ordered a lot of things. here in korean folk village, you have to buy the coupon for the food you want first. only then, you gave the coupon to the stalls that sold the food you want. there are many stalls and various choice of foods. done with lunch, we continued strollling around the village and visited several traditional workshops. it showed us how things such as straw shoes and silk traditionally made. we left the village around 4pm.

we then went back to the city and did some window shopping, killing sometime before our 8.30pm performance ant korea house. we also went to seoul bus station to buy our ticket to busan tomorrow morning. i bought the ticket for performances at korea house online while still in malaysia. the ticket was a little expensive, KRW50,000/pax. but, i assured you, you'll get what your money worth with these performances. we arrived at korea house at around 8pm and while waiting, i saw this unique group consisting of several turkish and japanese ladies. they were all muslims and wore hijab like we did. i called them unique because of their way of communicating with each other. they talked in their mother tongue but still the other party understood and could reply.

we watched the performance with a group of japanese and german people. they had a welcoming party for one of the workers at the banquet hall. and then, the person that sitting next of me was sort of my dream man, haha.. first, he was japanese.. i have this weakness for japanese man, influenced by all jdrama and anime that i watched. second, he could speak german and english.. and it would be complete if he was muslim and single as well, haha.. he is quite handsome and during the performances, i kept secretly glanced at him.. i think he didn't notice my glances, since he was focused on the performance and the colleague beside him, haha.. end of story.. we were allowed to take photo with the performers one the performance ended. and it also the end of this entry. only a few entries left for this trip.

ps: since we did a lot of walking, my shoes was damaged. i had to buy a new pair. and while choosing the shoes, i came into this pair that i really liked. i almost paid for them but remembered to check the inside in case it was from 'pigskin.' and it turned out to be true. i chose another pair and need to 'samak' my hand and socks at the hotel, huhu..

[seoul] day 3: nami island, hanbok & souvenir shopping

24/03/2014 (monday)

on our 3rd day, we went to nami island. nami island is famous for the korean drama 'winter sonata.' i watched this drama a long time ago. my sister borrowed the cds from her sister in law. there got about 12 cd altogether, i think.. i only watched the first two cd and skipped to the last one. really couldn't wait to know the ending, haha.. i'm not a fan of long long story.

we started our journey as always, around 7am. to get to island,  we had to change several trains. the final station is gapyeong. from there, we took taxi to get to the jetty terminal. you could go by bus but since we were not sure which bus to take, we took a taxi. at the ferry terminal, we bought the entrance ticket to enter nami and cost KRW10,000 each.we arrived nami island around 10am. there are a lot of things you could see and do while here at nami island.

we explored all around the island and as you could guess, we took quite a lot of pictures. during this time, there was a 'nami world's children's book exhibition.' you could see signs with stories for children along the way. the stories came with illustration and it was fun to read them. the story from malaysia was about two flocks of different birds; black and white. they always fought each other but when a common enemy (human) appeared, they let go of their feud and worked together, sound a little bit like 'rio 2,' isn't it?

we had our lunch here. i forgot what it's call, hehe.. i just remember that it was rice, egg and kimchi in a metal box. you had to shake it before you ate it. the metal box was hot and you had to wear gloves. the food was quite simple but it was very delicious. we also ordered a kimchi pancake which ended up being shared with fellow malaysians in the restaurant, since we were quite full..we chatted with them for a while and it turned out, one of them was my boss' neighbours. what a small world.. we continued our walk after lunch and even rented a tandem bike (bike for 2 person) and cycled again around the island. we left the island around 2:30pm in order to get back to seoul for our hanbok wearing experience.

we arrived at seoul around 5pm and managed to made our reservation at seoul global culture and tourism center. this center is located at the heartog myeongdong and it's in a tall building, like an office building. you won't see the sign outside. you could only see the sign for the center once you get inside. we were given 15 minutes to wear the hanbok. and you have to take the photo yourself. they provided tripod for you to use.or you could just simply asked another nice person to take it for you. the hanbok is free for you to wear.

once satisfied with our cute and pretty photos (hehe), we made a move to namdaemun market to finally shopped for souvenir. we didn't actually explore the whole market because we planned on going to dongdaemun market next. we only shopped everything at this one store. since, we bought a lot of things, we got quite a good bargain (we think), and a few free gifts. the price for souvenir here is reasonable. as always, don't forget to bargain. on our way back to the subway station, we stopped a while to watch an ajussi doing caligraphy on the corner of a street. we rushed then to dongdaemun market to buy some korean silk actually. unfortunately all the stores were already closed for the day. they closed at 8pm.

after dongdaemun, we went to gwanghwamun gate in order to see king sejong monument. we didn't realized that king sejong monument was actually of gyeongbokgung. the reason was, yesterday, there was some sort of market in front of it and it was blocking our view. done with the photos and all, we went back to our hostel to get our beauty night sleep. we need to start early again the next day.. well, until the next entry.

ps: all the while we were here, we would perform solat at any place that is quite hidden from the crowd. we don't have to wear 'telekung' since the clothes that we wore was already covered our aurat. we just brought along clean socks..

[seoul] day 2: bukchon, palaces, korean folk museum & namsan tower

23/03/2014 (sunday)

on our second day in seoul, we visited quite a lof of places. we started at bukchon hanok village. bukchon is actually the name of the place and hanok is the korean traditional house. we arrived there around 9am. there were not so many people around yet. as usual, the first thing that we did everytime was to find a tourist information booth. we took the map and started the tour. there are eight specified photo spots in bukchon. i think we went to all eight but couldn't be sure, hehe.. because to our untrained and inartistic eyes, they all looked quite the same..

there are a lot of small but interesting museums and culture centers around this area. entrance is usually free but if you want to engage in the traditional crafts making, you have to pay a little. as for us, we went to the bukchon tradtional culture center. the workshop provided are different each days. since, we were here on sunday, we got a choice of either making traditional shoes or dyeing handkerchief naturally. we chose the second one since it's faster and cheaper, KRW7500/pax. and the results were as shown below:

we finished our tour around bukchon around 11am. we planned to go to watch the 'changing guard ceremony' at gyeongbokgung at 1pm. the ceremony is three times per day; 10am,1pm and 3pm. oh,gyeongbokgung is actuall one of the palaces in seoul. there are quite a numbers of them. the famous one are, gyeongbokgung, changdeokgung, changgyeonggung and deoksugung. since, we got a couple of hours to spare (the palace is a walking distance from bukchon), we explore the cute and charming stores along the way. we found one etude shop that got a sale and bought a few of things..

we arrived at gyeongbokgung around 12.30pm. so, we took the time to explore a little bit on front of the palace. the entrance fee is KRW3000. the guard changing ceremony is in front of the castle, so it's free to watch. some of the guards are already in front of the gate (gwaghwamun), standing guard. we took the chance to take photo with them. they are really tall, so we look quite petite standing next to them. while waiting, an elderly korean couple approach us with a camera. so, we assumed that they wanted us to help them taking photo. surprisingly, they want to take photo with us! we were quite shocked, huhu.. maybe they found us unique because of our hijab. but then, there were quite a lot of people wearing hijab around. so, we just vainly made the conclusion that we are just so much cuter compared to others, hahaha.. ok, back to the guard changing ceremony.. it was for 20 minutes and very interesting to watch.

after the ceremony, we entered the palace.. it was quite big. the architecture was amazing, again an opinion based on my untrained eyes.. we took several pictures and moved on to the korean folk museum. there are a lot of amazing inside. i loved the row of antique stores most of all.. i really don't know how to describe this experience in details. all i could say that visiting the palaces, not all, maybe one or two like us is recommended. you'll learn a little bit about korea culture and history.

around gyeongbokgung

korean folk museum

we went to changdeokgung to catch the huwon (secret garden) tour. we walked and we got a little bit lost, hehe.. we stumbled at this small palace, unhyeongung, thinking it was changdeokgung.. so, we were wondering together, why is the palace so small.. according to the map, the area should be quite huge. while we were pondering upon the map, this nice ahjuma approached us. in english, she asked where we were from. and she personally gave us a free tour around this small humble palace herself (seemed she worked there). when the tour finished, she showed us the way to the real changdeokgung. don't underestimate the power of two cute malay girls with hijab has on the elderly ajussi and ahjuma, haha...

we finally arrived at our intended place and just is time for the tour. the tour costs KRW5000/pax and was around 90 minutes. the tour brought us the the secret garden that are only used by the royal family back in the old days. the garden was very beautiful but i bet it would look much more beautiful in late spring, when the trees got more leaves and more flowers.. still, it was worth the time and money. our tour guide this time us a very beautiful and graceful korea lady wearing hanbok. our tour finish around 5pm.

our last destination for the day is the famous namsan tower. we went there by train until myeongdong and then cable car. maybe, it was sunday, there are a lot of people around. we had to queue for about one and a half hour. the fees for rounddtrip cable car is KRW8500. previously,there was a teddy bear museum there. but, now it was changed into a sort of trickeye museum. the fee for going up the tower is KRW9000. up at observatory, there are a post office. me and hawa posted a few postcards for our beloved family and friends back home. when we got back down, we looked at the famous love padlocks. we even bought padlocks for ourselves and put it there...

we went back to myeongdong and walked along the streets. they were many stalls that sold different sorts of things, from accessories to foods. we found a halal kebab store managed by a muslim korean man. and that kebab became our dinner with a few of other things like dried squid, corn and twisted potato sticks. oh, and for lunch, we ate a lot of fish cakes.. okay, i admit, we don't eat much here.. we made do of what we saw, hehe.. done was the 2nd day entry, hoping to write the 3rd entry soon..

[seoul] day 1: SHINHWA!!!

22/03/2014 (saturday)

this time around, i managed to coax my sister a.k.a my brother-in-law since he's the one that's driving to send hawa and me to lcct. our flight departure time is 1am. we arrived at lcct around 10:30pm. by the time we got there, we could already check in. as usual, i already checked in online. so, we just need to drop our luggage and passport checked. we had a little trouble here since our luggage exceeded the weight bought. we only bought 20kg under my name since we'll not be bringing a lot of things there. alhamdulillah, we managed to reduce the weight by transferring few items into our hand luggage. our flight departed as schedule.

we also arrived as schedule. but it took some time through the immigration and getting our luggage. once we got our luggage, we went to the K-Books store to get the SIM card i bought online from EG SIM CARD website. since the roaming charges are expensive, i bought the local SIM in order to stay connected. unfortunately, the SIM i bought couldn't make any outgoing calls or sending text messages. so, i just used in for data purpose alone but still it was worth the money. after retrieving the card, we bought T-Money from 7-11 store nearby. may i emphasized again here, as a tourist with no transportation, T-Money is a MUST!!! this card will save you time and money while using the public transportation.

we took several trains to get to our hotel, girl's generation hostel (all girls, dormitory style). the ride took about one and a half hour. the subway here in seoul is very effective but a little bit confusing if you are new and unfamiliar to it. they got many line,  many stations and many exits. sometimes, you could just walk underground, while looking at the interesting shops there (there are A LOT), and you'll find yourself already at another station. beside T-Money, the SUBWAY MAP is a must. you could get them easily at any of the station. and if you have a smartphone, which i'm pretty sure you do, just visit this Cyber Station site. no need to worry about the connection, there are almost free wifi everywhere, here in seoul.

we got off at the right station but exited through the wrong exit. we crossed the same road almost five times. luckily, there were not many people around. otherwise, they may think that we're crazy. our hotel is located behind an alley. that's why we couldn't find them in the first place. and then out of nowhere, well maybe from behind us, a kind ajussi showed us the way. he just kept pointing his finger to our hotel direction without uttering a single word. i think, he saw us crossing and re-crossing the road, with big luggage and such and knew that we need help. when we arrived, our landlady was nowhere to be found. a few nice girls even helped us to call her but still couldn't get through.

while waiting, we did something a little bit crazy! hehe, we painted our nails... oh, in this hostel, we shared bathrooms. it also got a kitchen, a laundry room and a cyberroom. we met a lot of nice girls from different countries. there is this one korean girl who could speak malay since she learned indonesia language. the walls here are full of the korean boyband posters. once the landlady arrived, she showed us our room. the room is very small but we need it only for sleeping, right? fortunately, our room is directly in front of the bathroom, easy access..

once done, we took a train to seoul global culture and tourism center which is located in the myeongdong area. initially, we wanted to makea reservation for hanbok wearing experience for tomorrow, but it turned out that reservation could only be made on the same day basis. we rushed to the olympic hall, where the concert is being held afterwards. the place was already crowded when we reached there. a lot of fans wearing orange (orange is the official color for shinhwa fans, they called themselves 'shinhwa changjo.') colored clothes with orange accessories. by the way, hawa is the real die hard fan, and i'm just a so-so fan. for me personally, i preferred jpop (exile, kinki kids, arashi) to kpop...

we sat at the back cause it's obviously cheaper. we met a fellow malaysian there and she must be more hardcore fan since she'll be coming again on sunday to watch the concert. and that sunday ticket is a VIP ticket. she just bought it here, at a lower price, for those tickets were unclaimed/unpaid by the original buyers. i felt very excited and i knew hawa must also feel the same, maybe more. this is her main objective after all, hehe.. overall, we REALLY enjoyed ourselves! we sang and even dance to the songs! the crowd was wild!!! i felt like i'm a teenager once again.. oh, we did bought head scarves with the light before we went it.. the name on mine was dong wan, while hawa was jun jin...

the concert started around 6pm and finished around 10pm.. like i said, we really enjoyed it and had the time of our lives! we took train back to our hostel and turning in early. we are tired and tomorrow we must wake up early for another new experience.. if you guys are wondering what we have for breakfast, lunch and dinner, here are the answer.. breakfast: in flight, lunch: rice and kimchi (courtesy from the hostel kitchen), dinner: bought onigiri, bibimbap, and bread from the convenient store.. me and hawa are not so choosy about food as long as they are halal and edible.. so, that's all for this entry.. hope to write on later days soon..