Where to eat around SK Global House/International House?!

Hello, sorry for the extremely long staleness on this blog.

I am safely home in Singapore and adjusting to the hectic, high-stress life as a student in Singapore. -sigh- How I wished I was still in Korea, eating my kimbaps and ramyeons...

Anyway, some of my readers now have already embarked on their journey to Korea. To all my readers studying in Korea now, all the best, enjoy yourselves, eat more Korean food (because you will miss it), and live your Korean dream!

Okay, now back to topic.

When I was in Yonsei, I constantly worried about food. See, when I was in KU, it didn't matter much to me for two reasons.

1. There is a cafeteria in the building next to Frontier House that provides meal plans.
2. Even if I didn't feel like having cafeteria food, a short trip down to Anam (which will not take more than 5 minutes walk) will provide me a variety of choices.

However, Yonsei didn't have such options! There was no school cafeteria that allows us to take up meal plans. There is a small restaurant serving Italian at International House, and other than that, was the few shops open at Global Plaza. We shall not talk about these places because you will all find out about them eventually.

So I shall enlighten all readers here living at Yonsei dorms to the places very near where we're staying, that I've discovered has food.

1. Korean Language Institute (KLI) Building
If you walked to Global Plaza, walk along GS25 and pass through the doors into the next building. Walk up the short flight of stairs and turn left. There will be a small cafeteria there.

The food served there is KOREAN. Yes, you can get Korean cuisine! From tonkatsu to samgyetang (Ginseng Chicken), you can find it there. However, the menu changes everyday so there is a limited selection per day. I personally love the Samgyetang, Soondubu JiGae, and Kalbi Tang.

The price is reasonable. Very reasonable. Trust me.

However, I'm not very sure about opening hours. All I know is that... it is definitely open for lunch, and lunch hours are very, very packed. I'm not sure about dinner. But with all school cafeterias, they do not operate on weekends.

Note: FLI Building has a cafeteria too, but I've never tried it, so I cannot write about it ):

2. Lord Sandwich
Walk down from SK Global House until you see an oddly shaped rectangular-ish grey building.

They sell sandwiches. Of course they do.
They sell them quite pricey, but the quality is superb. I've only ever eaten at Lord Sandwich once, but I know if I could, I would return for another of their delicious sandwiches.

My recommendation, as well as my friends': The Beef Steak Sandwich

Eat it, Love it.

No regrets.

3. 딸기곰(Sorry, can't remember exactly so don't blame me if it is spelt wrongly. We just call it the strawberry place)
Walk down from SK Global, pass by Lord Sandwich until you reach a crossroad. Turn right and you should see a convenience store, walk a little beyond it and at a cosy corner, you see the Strawberry Place.

Sells Korean cuisine at reasonable price. A good place for staple meal.
The Strawberry Place sells everything typical. Dwaenjang JiGae to Ddeokbokki, Kimchi JiGae to whatever it is. They have it.

They also have a mad number of side dishes, I've always felt so satisfied having my meals there during weekends. Yep, they open throughout the week!

I recommend this place, really. Especially when everything seems closed on weekends T.T

4. 칼국수 Place
Walk down from SK Global, pass by Lord Sandwich till you reach the crossroads... then keep walking straight until you see a small shop. They specialize in 칼국수, which are knife cut handmade noodles in anchovy broth. I didn't pay much attention to the entire menu, but they do have other dishes.

They didn't really leave a deep impression on me, but if you've been craving the typical chinese style soup and noodles, then this is the place for you.



These are only the umm... very limited places I've tried. That are within short walking distance of SK Gloabl House and International House. A lot of the restaurants are closed. And some I've never ventured into.

But I've always passed by a buffet place outside along the main roads. On weekends I do see the restaurant being packed, so do give it a try and do tell me how the food is! (:

There are also more popular eateries along the main road leading to Severance Hospital, so if you feel like walking a little more distance, explore the area and hopefully you'll get your bellies filled (:

This isn't a very long post, but I'll come back every now and then to post one or two about what I recall during my stay there. I'm still here! So drop me an email if you need to, alright? (:

PEACE!

Welcome home to Singapore?

This is long overdue but I am finally back in Singapore after half a year abroad in the lovely land of Korea.

To summarize my feelings, I still love Korea more. I had time to myself, I felt good about myself, and I learnt so much about myself while over there. This, I will never get to experience ever again.

But anyway, I stepped on Singapore ground again on 4 Jan 2013. It was already midnight by then, and XingCai and Lyn were with me. Since it was late, my Dad was nice enough to send them home in our car. So we were waiting outside at the entrance to the terminal, where the cars can stop to pick people up.

We were just chatting as we were waiting for my Dad to drive to us, and of course, because we're humans we move around as we talk.

When all of a sudden, as I was back-facing the entrance, someone exited with their airport cart and almost crashed into me. Fortunately, XingCai saw and pulled me away from its path. Accident evaded, and you'd think it was the end of it.

I actually wanted to turn around and apologize to the person pushing the cart. But before I could finish my sentence, he exclaimed in his righteous voice, 'Shouldn't be standing at the entrance, yo.'

-_- A simple 'excuse me' would have sufficed.
Yet he chose to lecture me as though he wasn't in the wrong at all. If I was in plain view, he could have taken evasive measures to avoid collision. Put it this way, the entrance is really wide, and I'm a really slim person. I can't possibly block the entire entrance with my presence.

Also, he has an open MacBook at the top compartment of his cart/trolley.
He was looking at his computer, using it while pushing his cart. Please now tell me how that give him privileges and right of way?
If you're pushing your cart, then look where you're going. The cart isn't a bulldozer you use to ram others down like some arcade game.

All in all, I just really felt the coldness in Singapore during my first moments back here. It doesn't matter that it is forever summer here or that I just returned from a -17 deg Celcius climate, Singapore was just cold to me at that moment.

Imagine if I were a tourist to Singapore, and some Singaporean decides to be big-mouthed and did whatever that guy did. I would definitely have a bad impression on the people here.

Because really, it still stand that an 'excuse me' would suffice. I would have turned around to apologize and there would be two happy people around.

Not saying that all Singaporeans are bad. I know many many Singaporeans who are really kind and polite. However, people tend to remember the bad and forget the good. I'm sure we can all play a small part to keep whatever fury we have in us, and be more tolerable to others, and not be quick to reprimand others. Especially when it was a situation where one could have done something to avoid it totally.

I just hope tourists in Singapore don't face such people. There are kind Singaporeans out there. Don't let the mean ones taint your view on Singaporeans.