Five day holiday in Busan!

During the first week of May we had a five-day holiday! We started looking at prices to go abroad but because it's a little last minute, the prices were through the roof! We seriously considered somewhere in China or Japan. But we decided we will do Osaka in July and the China visa would take too long for us to get and we simply couldn't be bothered. The last few months with the new schedule and classes, has been exhausting and we really just want to relax. In the end, we chose Busan and stay in hotel instead of a hostel.

On Friday we took the 3.5-4 hour bus ride to Busan. This time I chose a different bus stop then the one originally and it's so much more modern! It's actually located in a mall so it was very busy. We had to walk to through a department store to reach the subway. Our hotel was located near Haeundae Beach called Hotel ForU.  It had said on the website that this used to be a love motel and was recently renovated into a hotel. We were a bit wary but it turned out very nice! It's very modern and looked great. They had housekeeping so every time we come back the bed was made and we had new towels. Too bad there's no room service hehe.

Rather than a long written detailed post, I'm going to summarize what we did in Busan. 

Day 1

- arrived in Busan

- dinner at Boi Brazil - amazing Brazilian restaurant! For $35/person, it was all you can eat meat!  There was five different types of skewered meats that they would deliver and shave onto your plate. My favourite was the bbq whole pineapple with cinnamon and brown sugar mmmm... worth every penny and even the meat sweats!

- walk along the beach

- first of many bubble baths

Day 2

- morning bubble bath

- breakfast at Sharky's 

- Holly's for a coffee and some blogging

- Shinsegae Centum City department store (known as one of the biggest) - I only bought a book there

- Megabox to watch Avengers 2 for the second time and got the Avengers popcorn tin and plastic cups that Neil now uses at work

Day 3 (rainy)

- morning bubble bath

- I watched Grey's Anatomy while Neil watched the fight on TV

- Indian restaurant - I think Gwangju's better

- Piewang for some homemade British style pies

- English breakfast for dinner

- baskin robins ice cream

- bubble bath (I took advantage of all the bubble baths I can have!) 

Day 4 

- morning bubble bath

- second attempt to go to a Korean restaurant An Ga - but still closed :( 

- walk along the beach

- also attempted to go to Sushi Berry but it was closed for two hours and we didn't want to wait

- ended up going to Ilpum Hanwoo - high-end Korean bbq restaurant attached to a hotel. It was good but very pricey. Also, there's a woman who helped us cook our food the ENTIRE time we were there. Maybe some people like it this way, but it was awkward. Neil and I were very aware of her the whole time and it made it weird for us to have a conversation so we ate in mostly silence with a few words here and there. Imagine you're going on a first date with a chaperon sitting right next to you. Good food, expensive but too strange of an experience. 

- nitrogen made ice cream along the Haeudae strip

- Japanese bbq skewere place for a night time snack (reminded me of Zakkushi)

 

Day 5 

- packed up, had breakfast and headed home.

Stand Up in Busan

Neil discovered a open mic for stand up in Busan, so needless to say, that's where we headed. I've always wanted to check out Busan. We booked a guesthouse near Gwangalli Beach since the venue is located there. Our stay was very short because it's only a weekend.

It takes the same amount of time for us to go to Busan as it does for Seoul (3.5 to 4 hours). It was snowing as we boarded the bus and for more than half the trip there was snow everywhere. However, as we got closer to Busan, there was no snow. I guess because it's near the ocean, it doesn't snow as much? Like Vancouver? 

I didn't realize how big Busan was, granted I do know that it's one of the biggest city - I think second? I expected a fishing village, but it's known for it's seafood there, but it's definitely a metropolitan city. Although their bus terminal was a bit less modern. There's a different vibe to the city and I can't quite put my finger on it. Their subway is pretty good and we made it to our cute guesthouse. This is our first time in one and it's super cute! It reminds me of a house that's in one of those k-drama. Tons of cute wall deco and furnishings. 

Our first night was the night of the open mic. We made our way to the beach and popped into a seafood restaurant right away. It was okay. The presentation was better than the food because there was a lot of food we're not quite sure what it was and the shells took up way too much space. I'd like to try other types of seafood though, so we'll definitely come back. It was a very very cold night and we walked back and forth on the boardwalk trying to find this venue, which we did.

This place had a window that overlooked the beach and the Gwangalli bridge and it was gorgeous! The evening went great as well. There were a lot of comedians, mostly amateur and some were funny. Neil went up and did his thing and he was great! The voting was buy the number of drinks you buy and there were over 10+ comedians that night, it would've been hard to keep track. Two local guys and a guy from Seoul won the top three positions. I still prefer Neil's edgier stuff compared to the safe and self depreciating ones. But then I am a little bias. 

It's a shame we didn't get to stay longer in Busan, we would've loved to look around more but alas work calls and we had to get back before Monday.