Beyond Seoul
Public transport is brilliant, so there’s no excuse for not stretching your travel horizons beyond the city limits and taking a trip to the fearsome Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), a 4km-wide buffer zone that came into being splitting South from North Korea at the end of the Korean War in 1953.
Although it sounds forbidding, it’s possible to enter this zone, and take a few tentative steps into North Korean territory – thousands of civilians do so every month, though only as part of a tightly controlled tour. Elsewhere are a few platforms from which the curious can stare across the border, and a tunnel built by the North, which you can enter.
However, to get a sense of what makes Seoul so unique, you’ll need to do more than tick off the sights and take a leap of faith into the local cuisine, follow the Korean lead on a wild night (and early morning) out…
The “proper” Korean night out has long followed the same format, one that entwines food, drink and entertainment. The venue for stage one ( il-cha) is the restaurant, where a meal is chased down with shots of soju; this is followed by stage two ( i-cha), a visit to a bar where beers are followed with snacks – usually large dishes
intended for groups. Those still able to walk then continue to stage three ( sam-cha), the entertainment component of the night, which usually involves a trip to a noraebang room for a sing-along, and yet more drinks.
Stages four, five and beyond certainly exist, but few participants have ever remembered them clearly.