Namdaemun Market

Johnnie and I decided to go shopping on Sunday. I told him I wanted to go to Namdaemun Market. He looked at the map and got familiar with the subway system. Since very little information is in English, planning out your trip is a must. So out the door we go, two strollers and a backpack. We had to walk about a half of a mile to Hannam Station. We bought our T-Money (train ticket) and tried to maneuver the strollers to go inside. This country is NOT stroller friendly! We had to take both boys out, and carry the strollers up two fights of stairs! After two trains and numerous stops, a lot of screaming (Jarrett Ray wasn't having fun), we finally made it to our destination. Again having to carry the boys up the stairs was not a fun job. So there we were at Namedaemun Market, and neither one of us had any idea what to expect. This place was HUGE! It is streets upon streets of vendors. You can find anything here! We decided on Gate 8, walked through, got our picture made, and BAAM...rain! I had only one umbrella, so Johnnie parked us under a shelter while he took the umbrella and tried to find us more. It was about 20000 won which is about 21 dollars for 4 umbrellas. Caleb held his in the umbrella stroller, and I attached one to the Joovy stroller for Jarrett. Johnnie and I each held one and tried to steer down the narrow streets, dodging people as we went. BAAM...it quit raining!

We walked around the market trying not to get lost, and ended up at an underground fresh market with air conditioning!!!! We ate lunch and got on the subway to come home. Just the same as before, we had to carry strollers and deal with two tired babies. Finally, we came to our stop. We walked outside and saw that someone opened the flood gates to the sky! It was POURING! Out the umbrellas came, but this time Jarrett was in the umbrella stroller. He was not happy about the umbrella situation, so he screamed the whole way home. Koreans were looking at us like we were crazy. We looked like wet dogs pushing strollers! My hair was stuck to my head, as was Caleb and Jarrett's. The umbrellas we bought were not of the best quality, so water leaked through the top. It was horrible!!! Johnnie laughed and said..."I was going to wash these shoes anyway!" When we got home, Jarrett had been sitting in about two cups of water (who knew umbrella strollers would hold that much water)! We were soaked right down to our underwear...and to top it all off it stopped raining when we walked into our front door. Needless to say, it was a crazy day!

We can't wait to go back to Namdaemun Market when we can look around and enjoy this great Korean culture!