Fifth day in Korea (1)

Today was the day the group split. While the rest headed on to Seoul by bus early in the morning, I stayed back in Gwangju to meet up with a friend.
Long story short, he was busy in Seoul and had arrived back to Gwangju by bus early in the morning. Allowing him ample time to snooze, I hung out at his friend's apartment.
By the time he woke up, it was time for lunch and the bunch of us decided to order delivery, taking advantage of having a local among our group.
The meal was around 5,000-8,000 Won per person, depending on what you ordered.
It was refreshing to see the delivery man arrive with a box filled up with containers of food that wasn't disposable items.

 

The delivery man chatted to me in  Korean while I gave him a blank look.

According to our Korean friend, he thought I was a Korean, which explains a lot on why random people on the streets kept on conversing with me in the language.

It was an interesting experience, which made me feel a wee bit part of the culture.

Even when it comes to delivery, the side dishes are not forgotten, which really impressed me as preparing multiple dishes and delivering them seem to be a great hassle.

I got even further impressed when I was told that after the meal, all we had to do was pack up the utensils, place them in a plastic bag provided with the meal and leave it outside the doorstep for the deliveryman to return and pick it up.

All I could think of was 'Wow! That's dedication for customer service."

Fourth day in Korea (1)

The fourth day in Korea was pretty uneventful as the whole day was spent travelling to Gwangju.
Much like the first day in Korea, an omelet and sausage breakfast was prepared by Pitto (and Ah Liang, I think), complete with a smiley face to start the day.

We took the 8am ferry from Jeju to Mokpo City, which was going to take us 5 hours to get there. I don't really remember the price of the tickets ( I vaguely remember it to be around 22,000 Won), but it was the cheapest class tickets, which isn't really that bad.
You basically just sit on the platforms provided in the ferries. There are also pillows provided if you wanna take a snooze, with ample space to lie down.

;

This was the moment when the weather turned from bad to worse in Korea (for those interested to visit Korea, keep in mind that this is mid-July).
The rain went from a light drizzle early in the morning to pouring profusely within an hour.
We were already drenched during our third day here and it was not the end of it.
The sky was dark and foggy:

 

And the waves were relentless hitting against the side of the ferry, rocking it more than usual despite its size:

The air was cold with the strong wind delivering the extra chill to the bone. 

Outside the ferry, it was an unforgiving world.

But inside, it was a different story. 

Warm and equipped, it made sure that its passengers are well taken care of with a cafeteria open for those who are hungry and water readily available in water coolers for those who are thirsty.

There was even a little boy who got pleasantly entertained with arcade games on the ferry.

By the time we reached Mokpo City, the rain was so heavy we could hardly see past a few metres ahead. Instead of keeping to the initial plan of taking our time to get to know the city, we decided to head on straight to Gwangju by bus, which took around an hour.

Through the drizzling rain, we headed to the nearest hotel with an English signboard in Gwangju called Classic Hotel (60,000 Won for four of us) and retired for the night, too drenched and exhausted to do anything else, waiting for the next day to arrive.