There is an island in the middle of the Han River dubbed as Korea’s Wall Street and is said to be one of the most affluent regions in Seoul. There you would find the offices of Korean TV Network Giants MBC and KBS. There also is a tower that goes by the alias “63 Building”, which houses the highest art gallery in the world. I went there for that tower, and I got lost in that island.
Looking at a map
of Seoul you
would see how small Yeouido seems to be. Don’t be fooled. Two stations of the
Seoul Metro Line could be found here: Yeouido and Yeouinaru. All I could
remember was that after my Jung-gu excursion I decided to hop on the Metro and
go there to see this building that according to many had been popularized by
that Korean Drama My Geol, which is a personal favorite. I couldn’t recall
having seen the said building from the series given that it’s been years since
I’ve last seen it, but still it piqued my curiosity so why not visit, right?
All I could see
were buildings when I got out from the underground. If this building is as tall
as they claim it to be then it should dwarf the others around it! But I can’t
see such a tall building anywhere. Most of those in sight were almost of the
same size. And so I walked. Perhaps due to its popularity as a landmark you
could see road signs bearing its name and an arrow pointing to its direction. I
saw a park with a futuristic looking bridge. I went there to rest for a while.
The name of the
park is Hangang and it is located by the banks of the Han
River. I think it surrounds the whole island in that you could
tour its entirety and find yourself at the same spot after who knows how many
hours. I did not test that theory, by the way. No thanks. I love the bridge
because it looks so modern, and you could bring your bike up there because they
have a special gutter to guide your bike as you climb the steps. It was all
wandering around the city after that side trip.
The 63 Building is
actually the headquarters of Korea Life Insurance. “63” refers to the 60 floors
of the building above ground plus another three at the basement. On the 59th
floor is an art gallery which doubles as an observation deck. People don’t
really go there for art’s sake. They come for the view, which is awesome by the
way. Bring a 500-won coin with you to use the binoculars they have up there.
Are those even called “binoculars”? Whatever. Anyway the view is nice and they
also have information about the scenes on various stands around the floor. The
elevator trip takes more than a minute and at night it is said that there are
special elevators meant for couples to enjoy an exclusive one-minute ride.
Wonderful view of Seoul
as you go up!
There is a
“wishing wall” next to the cafeteria where you can post a wish and it would
come true, at least according to them. Well they better get ready to shed a few
million won for me because my wish doesn’t come cheap. Hahaha. I wrote it in
Tagalog, and for that I fear that they might remove it because they might think
I wrote something vulgar. Most of the wishes there are written in Hangul, but I
saw one in Russian, which gave me more reason to write mine in Tagalog, haha.
Anyway if you see a Tagalog wish there stating a desire to study Korean at SNU
for three weeks (but one year would be better), that wish is mine. My online
handle is there anyway so it will be pretty obvious. No, my dears, wishes don’t
come for free. You have to pay 3,000 won for the orange star. It does come with
a Hershey’s Bar though. Your sweet tooth be damned in the name of one wish.
It took me half an
hour wandering around that island to find a way back to the guest house. At
last I found the other subway station after passing by the MBC office. I don’t
know a lot of Korean stars so I am not sure if I saw one, although even the
security guard did look like a TV personality. Someone needs to review his
Korean Pop Culture, hehehe.
YEONGDOUNGPO-GU: 04 - Wish Upon a Tower
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