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Operating at a determinedly breakneck speed amid a cartoonish mayhem of lights and sounds, Seoul (서울) is like some kind of gigantic, endlessly fascinating pinball machine. Visitors quickly find themselves acclimatizing to the balli-balli pace of this high-rise, neon-soaked, open-all-hours city, careening between barbecued meat joints, rice-beer bars and open-air markets as though there weren’t enough hours in the day, while racking up bonus points for coping with Korea’s famously spicy food. It’s also a joy to see the city’s other side – palaces, temples, royal tombs and ancestral shrines provide picturesque evidence of Seoul’s five centuries as a dynastic capital, and you’ll never be far from a mountain to race to the top of. This mix of ancient history and modern-day joie de vivre gives the city an almost unmatched vitality, and the temptation to throw yourself in at the deep end is impossible to resist – Seoul is a city that really never sleeps.
While Seoul itself is home to around 10 million people, the city has more or less swallowed up the neighbouring cities of Suwon and Incheon, giving it a combined urban mass of more than 25 million inhabitants – one of the largest on Earth. Ethnic Koreans dominate the population, with only 300,000 registered foreigners living here, two-thirds of them Chinese.
That Seoul exists at all constitutes a minor miracle, since the Korean War saw it laid to waste in the early 1950s. The city sits just 30km from the border with North Korea, one day’s march should the DMZ separating the countries ever be breached, and until the mid-1970s, Seoulites were poorer than their counterparts in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. The city’s transformation since then has been nothing short of incredible – just a few generations down the line, it’s one of the most modern and prosperous cities in the world, a major financial centre whose skyline is continually being enriched with gleaming skyscrapers.
But for all its nonstop consumption, Seoul is also a place of considerable tradition and history. Six wonderful palaces in the centre of the city proclaim its status as a seat of regal power from as far back as 1392 – the year that Seoul became capital of the Joseon dynasty, whose line of over two dozen kings ruled over all Korea until the country’s annexation in 1910. Elsewhere, the tiled roofs of wooden hanok houses gently rise towards the ash-coloured granite crags north of Seoul, and the ancient songs and dances of farm hands and court performers are clashed out in a whirligig of sound and colour along Insadonggil, a traditional and tourist-friendly road in the palace district.
It’s impossible to talk about Seoul without mentioning Korea’s wonderful cuisine. Received Western knowledge tends to start with dog meat and end with kimchi; today, however, few Koreans eat dog (though some curious foreigners manage to hunt it down), and kimchi is a mere – if ubiquitous – side dish. Indeed, those in the know can barbecue marinated beef at tables inset with charcoal briquettes, stuff themselves with the dozens of side dishes available at a royal banquet and take their pick from a bewildering array of super-fresh seafood. In addition, Korea boasts Asia’s best selection of indigenous alcoholic drinks, including the delicious milky rice-wine, makgeolli.
Seoulites themselves are a real highlight of any visit to the city: fiercely proud, and with a character almost as spicy as their food, they’re keen to welcome foreigners. Within hours of arriving, you’ll probably find yourself racing up a mountainside with new friends in tow, lunching over a tasty barbecued galbi, throwing back dongdongju until dawn, or singing the night away at a noraebang. Few travellers leave without tales of the kindness of Korean strangers, and almost all wonder why the country isn’t a more popular stop on the international travel circuit. Tourist numbers are, however, rising – the secret is well and truly out.
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