UNSRC Korean Cultural Society

Korea Herald

A street in Myeong-dong

Myeong-dong is the busiest shopping area in Seoul. In some senses, it looks like one huge department store spread over several blocks. The area is packed with items to accessorize your outfit, excite your mind, or change your whole image. As the most popular area among foreign tourists, Myeong-dong is the alpha and omega of traveling in Seoul. Myeong-dong is especially popular among Japanese tourists, and so we sometimes hear more people speaking Japanese in the streets than Korean. For this tour, I went with Mr. Tanaka, a Japanese freelance reporter working in Korea. There is a Korean proverb saying “Eating first, Geumgan-san the next,” meaning that one can only appreciate stunning beauty on a full stomach.

Tanaka suggested “Myeong-dong gyoza” as highly reputed dish in the area. Gyoza is simply made by putting chopped meat or vegetables inside dough and steaming it. The dish is widely eaten in China and Japan as well. But, as there is always a long line of people waiting at lunch time, we decided to come back later for a snack.

The second choice was gomtang or gukbab. Both are simple meals that come with meat or bone stew. What is good about these dishes that they come very quickly and taste good in almost any restaurant. In a narrow alley, between boutiques and accessory shops, is a 40-year old beef stew gukbab restaurant called “Ttaro-jib.” A middle aged woman frying sliced zucchinis covered with egg was seen through the small window. This small yet cozy restaurant, also well-known among many Japanese, shows the history of Myeong-dong.

While looking for a fancier place to eat, found Haemultang Street. Although the street is named after a kind of seafood soup, only a couple of such restaurants remain. In front of the restaurants, sample dishes are displayed with Japanese tags.

When I asked Tanaka what he wanted to have, he answered “shigol babsang.” It is a kind of sampler menu that comes with dozens of small dishes, yet it is far cheaper than the formal Korean dish set (hanjeongshik) and more refined than just regular set menu (baekban) provided at small town restaurants. After searching the alleys for a shigol babsang restaurant, we ended up eating at the “Maetdol Sundubu Jib” — Maetdol means mill stone.

Tanaka said the Japanese generally prefer soft tofu and that Japanese use ginger or Chinese pepper to provide a hot taste, which Koreans only used before hot pepper was imported. When hot pepper became popular among Koreans, they put it in every food, including kimchi. Nevertheless, Tanaka ordered hot seafood sundubu with hot pepper oil topping, whereas I ordered rather bland yet deep flavored perilla seed sundubu. When it came to the taste, our nationalities seemed to be reversed.

It was time to look around Myeong-dong. Where to start? Myeong-dong guides were ready for the tourists. Wearing red vests and straw hats, they help tourists for directions. This service, provided in Japanese, Chinese, and English, began in March this year. As of early July, 3,000 Japanese, 350 Chinese, 50 South Asians, 160 English-speaking foreigners, and 800 Koreans have been helped out by the guides. Although more Chinese tourists are beginning to visit Korea, most of them tour in groups with their own guides, so they don’t need public guides’ services. On the other hand, Japanese tourists travel freely, mostly in groups of 3 or 4, and are more likely to ask for directions, particularly for new sites to visit.

The “walking information” said that tourists were most interested in beauty items, including cosmetics and massage services. Famous cosmetic brands include Etude House, Missha, The Face Shop, Aritaum, and Innisfree. Foot massages, body massages, and saunas are also popular with tourists. When I entered one cosmetic shop that was promoting its brand with a Japanese make-up artist and transvestite model “Ikko,” it was completely packed with tourists. The prices were affordable, mostly between 10,000 and 20,000 won. Tanaka said these cosmetics were usually just for presents or general use, while most tourists purchased one or two high-priced cosmetic items at duty-free shops.

The second most popular item is food. Most Japanese want to eat gyoza, samgyetang, bibimbap, bulgogi, samgyeopsal, and galbi at resaurants. On the other hand, they buy gim, kimchi, soju, and makgeolli as presents. The third most popular thing to do in Myeong-dong is clothes shopping. Especially, lower priced clothes and shoes are best items. Socks sold by street venders are also popular. These items are popular because they provide good quality for the price, and tourists sometimes buy several of the same items for souvenirs or presents.

The guide took us to Myeong-dong Theater. Originally it was a movie theater built in 1934 in the Baroque style, named then Myeongchijwa. In 1959, the name was changed to National Theater, but in 1975, the building became the property of a private bank. Finally, after 34 years, the old national theater was restored and re-opened in June 2009 under its original name. With the theater’s restoration, Myeong-dong has recovered its reputation for artistic performances as well as for shopping.

The hoof-shaped theater is found on the second to fourth floor and has 558 seats. In Myeong-dong Theater, the maximum distance from the seat to stage is 13.5 meters on the first floor, and 16m on the second floor, a good distance for performers to interact with the audience.

A series of inauguration performances is currently showing, in which veteran and established actors play together. The “Actor’s Platform,” the Seoul International Performing Art Festival is scheduled for the fall. There is a cafeteria is on the first floor and a restaurant on the fifth floor.

Coming out of the theater, we went to a foot massage salon where Tanaka had been a couple of times before with other Japanese tourists. There, we encountered a Japanese couple, the Nakatas (both 66) coming out of the salon after a massage session. They said they initially planned to go to Hokkaido, but ended up choosing a 3 night package tour in Seoul because of the affordable price. They also explained why they came to the foot salon, saying that they took a foot massage at another place yesterday but were not fully satisfied with the service. In Ms. Nakata’s bag were shoes, a T-shirt for her grandson, and walnut cookies for presents. They said grilled meat and seafood with salt were among their favorite dishes, and said it was great to eat cow tongue. Unlike Koreans, they said Japanese consider cow tongue especially delicious.

The last stop was the Seoul Center for Culture and Tourism which has a lounge, cultural experience center, and a small theater. There are a few outdoor benches on the way to Myeong-dong Cathedral and a small stage in front of Myeong-dong station, but it can be hard to find a place to sit and rest here. The roads in the commercial area are too narrow and crowded to even stand for a while. So we took some rest on the chairs in the center, discussing how to continue our tour with the help of the guide there and the maps and guide books provided.

The main district of Myeong-dong is surrounded by large-scale department stores. Major hotels are located nearby, and cheap yet good quality items can be found everywhere. Moreover, the streets are always bright, safe, and fun for foreigners.

Myeong-dong Theater: www.MDtheater.or.kr

*Program

Now showing — until July 26: “When and Where Shall We Meet Again?”

Actor Chang Dong-hwan, who is famous from the TV drama “An Autumn Tale,” stars as a Buddhist Priest, and actress Park Jeong-ja Park stars together. The story is based on an old tale about the tragic love story between a fool and his wife “Pyeonggang Princess.”

Ticket Prices: A - 20,000 won, S - 35,000 won, R - 50,000 won

Contact: 1644-2003

Dates: Tue. Thu. Fri. 7:30 p.m.

Wed. Sun 3:00 p.m.

Sat 3:00, 7:30 p.m.

Seoul Center for Culture and Tourism

Located on the 5th floor of Myeong-dong M Plaza. The center provides convenient facilities including lockers and a cafeteria. You can charge your cell phones and use the internet here. For foreigners, there are lectures about Korean crafts (paper craft & folk painting craft) and the Korean language. Foreign language lectures are also provided for people who work in the area. Various concerts and events are held in the center’s multi-purpose auditorium with 200 seats. A variety of tour-related materials are prepared, and guides are ready to help you. Contact: 02-3789-7961

2009.07.17

News Clippings

NYT
July 17, 2009

Today, after a $384 million recovery project, the stream, called Cheonggyecheon, is liberated from its dank sheath and burbles between reedy banks. Picnickers cool their bare feet in its filtered water, and carp swim in its tranquil pools.

The restoration of the Cheonggyecheon is part of an expanding environmental effort in cities around the world to “daylight” rivers and streams by peeling back pavement that was built to bolster commerce and serve automobile traffic decades ago.

In New York State, a long-stalled revival effort for Yonkers’s ailing downtown core that could break ground this fall includes a plan to re-expose 1,900 feet of the Saw Mill River, which currently runs through a giant flume that was laid beneath city streets in the 1920s.

Cities from Singapore to San Antonio have been resuscitating rivers and turning storm drains into streams. In Los Angeles, residents’ groups and some elected officials are looking anew at buried or concrete-lined creeks as assets instead of inconveniences, inspired partly by Seoul’s example.

By building green corridors around the exposed waters, cities hope to attract affluent and educated workers and residents who appreciate the feel of a natural environment in an urban setting.

Environmentalists point out other benefits. Open watercourses handle flooding rains better than buried sewers do, a big consideration as global warming leads to heavier downpours. The streams also tend to cool areas overheated by sun-baked asphalt and to nourish greenery that lures wildlife as well as pedestrians.

Some political opponents have derided Seoul’s remade stream as a costly folly, given that nearly all of the water flowing between its banks on a typical day is pumped there artificially from the Han River through seven miles of pipe.

But four years after the stream was uncovered, city officials say, the environmental benefits can now be quantified. Data show that the ecosystem along the Cheonggyecheon (pronounced chung-gye-chun) has been greatly enriched, with the number of fish species increasing to 25 from 4. Bird species have multiplied to 36 from 6, and insect species to 192 from 15.

The recovery project, which removed three miles of elevated highway as well, also substantially cut air pollution from cars along the corridor and reduced air temperatures. Small-particle air pollution along the corridor dropped to 48 micrograms per cubic meter from 74, and summer temperatures are now often five degrees cooler than those of nearby areas, according to data cited by city officials.

And even with the loss of some vehicle lanes, traffic speeds have picked up because of related transportation changes like expanded bus service, restrictions on cars and higher parking fees.

“We’ve basically gone from a car-oriented city to a human-oriented city,” said Lee In-keun, Seoul’s assistant mayor for infrastructure, who has been invited to places as distant as Los Angeles to describe the project to other urban planners.

Some 90,000 pedestrians visit the stream banks on an average day.

What is more, a new analysis by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, found that replacing a highway in Seoul with a walkable greenway caused nearby homes to sell at a premium after years of going for bargain prices by comparison with outlying properties.

Efforts to recover urban waterways are nonetheless fraught with challenges, like convincing local business owners wedded to existing streetscapes that economic benefits can come from a green makeover.

Yet today the visitors to the Cheonggyecheon’s banks include merchants from some of the thousands of nearby shops who were among the project’s biggest opponents early on.

On a recent evening, picnickers along the waterway included Yeon Yeong-san, 63, who runs a sporting apparel shop with his wife, Lee Geum-hwa, 56, in the adjacent Pyeonghwa Market.

Mr. Yeon said his family moved to downtown Seoul in the late 1940s, and he has been running the business for four decades. He said parking was now harder for his customers. But “because of less traffic, we have better air and nature,” he said.

The project has yielded political dividends for Lee Myung-bak, a former leader of construction companies at the giant Hyundai Corporation. He was elected Seoul’s mayor in 2002 largely around his push to remove old roads — some of which he had helped build — and to revive the stream. Today he is South Korea’s president.

Even strong critics of the president tend to laud his approach to the Cheonggyecheon revival, which involved hundreds of meetings with businesses and residents over two years.

A recent newspaper column that criticized the president over a police raid on squatters ended with the words “Please come back, Cheonggyecheon Lee Myung-bak!” — a reference to the nickname he earned during the campaign to revive the stream.

The role of Seoul’s environmental renewal in Mr. Lee’s political ascent is not lost on Mayor Philip A. Amicone of Yonkers, a city of 200,000 where entrenched poverty had slowed a revival project. Once the river restoration was added to the plan, he said, he found new support for redevelopment.

Yonkers has gained $34 million from New York State and enthusiastic support from environmental groups for the river restoration, which is part of a proposed $1.5 billion development that includes a minor-league ballpark. The river portion is expected to cost $42 million over all.

A longtime supporter was George E. Pataki, who helped line up state money in his last year as governor, Mayor Amicone said. “Every time he’d visit, he’d say, ‘You’ve got to open up that river,’ ” he added.

Part of the plan would expose an arc of the river and line it with paths and restaurant patios that would wrap around a shopping complex and the ballpark. Another open stretch would become a “wetland park” on what is now a parking lot.

Mr. Amicone, who has a background as a civil engineer, said the example of Seoul’s success had helped build support in Yonkers. In an interview, he recalled the enthusiasm with which Mr. Lee, then Seoul’s mayor, toured Yonkers in 2006 and discussed the cities’ parallel river projects with him.

“Whether it’s a city of millions or 200,000, the concept is identical,” Mr. Amicone said. “These are no longer sewers, but aesthetically pleasing assets that enhance development.”

News Clippings