In march 2007,I visited Seoul for the first time since I moved to US.
It was raining and damp chilly but how can I complain???
I WAS IN SEOUL!!!!!.

I checked in hotel room and opened the curtain.
I kept staring at city view of Seoul for a long time.

This hotel room is more than I expected.
Very clean built in kitchen. (Better than my home kitchen…)

And chic trendy bathroom. (Of course, cleaner than my home bathroom..hehehe)

The most importantly,this room is “Ondol” room.
“Ondol” is traditional Korean heated floor system.
The water pipe runs underneath floor and heat the floor by increasing water temperature.
Few years ago, E! channele was showing a house of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston
talking about exclusive heated floor installed in the house.
In Korea,every house has heated floor system and it is not that expensive at all.
I really miss my tiled bathroom floor warming my feet while taking shower.

Spacious closet and a TV with Korean programs…
(Yes, I can watch Korean drama every night!!!)

Next morning,I headed to a subway station and found this coffee vending machine.
(Coffee machine is everywhere in Seoul) This is quite advanced version of what I am used to.
The vending machine only had 4-5 menu options and it was only 300won.
Now it has become mobile Starbucks in terms of menu variety and price.

Got off from subway and where am I ?
This is Ehwa Women’s univ. area. It is about 10:00am and the street is quite empty.
This whole area in front of university is known as a heaven for shopping
filled with so many fashion stores,restaurants,and beauty salons.

This is entrance gate of Ehwa univ. There seems to be construction going on inside of school.

This is one of main alleys in front of school and it gets very crowded from the afternoon
with hundreds of people (Mainly beautiful girls).
Oh, how many times did I walk on this street up and down with friends.
Although I didn’t graduate from this school,this place was my second home,
a major place for hang-out and shopping.

This restaurant “Gami” has been in business since 1975
and its tasty food and low price have attracted many of college students
and people like me who needs quick lunch between shopping.
Everybody knows this restaurant and the name of restaurant “Gami” means “Flavoring” in Korean.

As you can see, menu is very easy to understand and I am very pleased with price.
It seems like they have added few new menus and I ordered Gami udon.

Um….looks so yummy!!! The noodle soup broth is made with dried anchovy…just the way I want…
But I immediately sense something is not quite to my taste.

Both main dish and side dishes are RED, RED, RED..!!!!..:-(…
I DO love spicy food and I HAVE craved for this fiery,bloody,hot Korean food everyday living in US
but I don’t like every single food on table smothered with red chilly pepper powder.
I love red cabbage Kimchi and I love Kimchi-jjigae but I don’t like eating them together.
(Am I too picky?)

I felt the need of balancing this red food with non-red food and ordered this whity rice ball.
It is made with sweet rice which is a lot more stickier than ordinary Korean rice.
When you bite into it, ground beef stuffed inside will surprise you with unexpected flavor and texture.
The black ribbon outside is “Gim”(A.K.A Nori).
It is really tasty as it is or you can dip it into yellowish mustard vinaigrette shown in the picture.

Overall, it was very good lunch.
The rice ball and red soup noodle went very well together.
If you happen to be in this school area, I strongly recommend you try this restaurant for lunch.
Restaurant is very clean and waitresses are kind.
Especially,if you want to experience what it is like to be totally surrounded by beautiful, young, and, sophisticated Korean girls,
there is no better place to go.

Tags: asian food, Ehwa women't university, kimchi, Korean food, Korean Restaurant, noodle