Home » Column » Travelogues (2) : Ihwa Mural Village, Dongdaemun Design Plaza, Haneul Park
Travelogues (2) : Ihwa Mural Village, Dongdaemun Design Plaza, Haneul Park
After our lunch at Gwangjang Market, we quickly head to Ihwa Mural Village (이화 벽화마을) before sunset (Autumn in Korea has lesser daytime, it gets dark around 5:30pm). The Ihwa Mural Village is also Dal Dongnae as I mentioned the last time. The place was to be demolished but it was given a new makeover by Through the Art in City – Naksan Project in 2006. Before we starting touring the village, we took a break at a nearby café and had a flavoured Makgeolli (막걸리).

It is up to one’s keen eye to be able to spot as many murals and art installations as possible. When visiting, we have to be considerate to the residents who are actually living there and not make too much noise and litter. Some murals and installations and since been removed in 2016 after my visit in 2015 due to the noise and littering problems caused to the residents, for example the famous ‘Flower Staircase’. 

We were also able to see part of the Seoul City Wall (한양도성) which was built to protect the city of Seoul against invaders. 
Dusk was falling and we decided to head to Dongdaemun Design Plaza aka DDP for short (동대문디자인플라자). Influenced by my previous Architecture company, I became interested in looking for interesting Architecture buildings during the countries I visit. There was a fashion show going on in the DDP but we were more interested to look at the building instead. The DDP also had a ‘LED Rose Garden’ display during our visit to accordance to celebrate Korean Independence Day (광복절) in 2015 to mark the nation’s 70th year of Independence. 

Our lunch from afternoon was starting to fade away and we were feeling hungry; I had planned for us to have a more local delicacy, Baekpan (백반). I only knew about this after watching an episode on Running Man. It is basically a Korean set meal with small dishes and you choose a main dish, usually grilled fish or pork. It is really cheap too, ₩7,000 per person! As you can see for the 불꼬지백반, we were served with the pork, lettuce to wrap the pork, different types of kimchi, soon tofu soup and rice topped with a sunny side egg. In the end, both me and my friends could not finish the meal. We then headed back to the guesthouse as we had to wake up early the next day to go to Haneul Park.
Haneul Park (하늘공원) was having their annual Seoul Eulalia Festival (서울억새축제) and we managed to catch it on the last day of the festival. It was a fine and clear morning, being autumn, we thought it was going to be chilly. However, when we arrived at mid-morning, it was very sunny and there were already many people since it was a Saturday. It is quite a hike up to where the Eulalia’s are displayed.

After an arduous hike (just for me), we finally reached the top! Other than the Eulalia, part of the park was displaying Pink and White Cosmos Flowers. After trying to take different angles of the flowers, we then moved on to the main display. Eulalia photography is quite popular among photographers (I’m not one but just likes taking photographs). Why are they popular I have no idea but I do know that when composing a photo of Eulalia, it reflects some emotions of myself.

We also saw a couple either shooting their wedding photos there or were just getting married. Do all Korean brides look that pretty? After 2 hours at the park, we were feeling hungry (as usual), we started our descend down and I took my time to look one last time at the view. At the foot of the park, we were greeted with an ‘achievement’ poster on how much calories we have burnt coming down the stairs. Off to gain back what we lost…

Writer : Wei Wei

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