Seoul Bound and Subways

We were getting a little stir crazy in our tiny hotel home, plus Kevin has quite a few use/lose days, so Kevin took Wednesday- Friday off. We decided to branch out and explore Seoul.  Kevin found an apartment to rent on booking.com and booked it.  The room had a bed for all the older kids and we would just bring our port-a-crib for little Monster.  Since we don't have our car yet (It's somewhere on a boat in the Pacific Ocean) we have to rely on public transportation to get there.  There are busses here that take the military members from one base to another in South Korea.  We paid about $22 for our entire family to take a one way ticket from our base to Yongsan, the base in Seoul.

It took us about an hour to get to Yongsan.

We brought little Monster's carseat, so he could sleep on the bus ride there.

As we rode the bus it was so neat to look out the window and see the super tall apartment buildings and the fields. When we arrived at Yongsan, we went to the travel office and got directions to the nearest subway.  We walked down and out of the gate and entered Seoul for the first time!

First Look at Seoul!

Before we left for Seoul, I had done some research on the subway system.  I had downloaded the Seoul Subway app, and found out that the easiest way to take the subway, if riding it multiple times, is to get T-Money cards and pre-load money on the cards.  By using T-money cards, the kids get a discounted rate and we don't get charged for transfers.  We bought T-Money cards at our local convenience store and loaded 30,000 won on each card.  I was super worried about the kids loosing their cards, so I punched a hole in each of the kids' cards and put them on a lanyard to wear around their necks.

As we find the subway, and walk up to the card swipe entrance, Kevin swipes his card and walks through.  M&M swipes her card, the machine makes a loud "Meeeeah" and as she tries to walk through, the entrance door closes and won't let her through.  Big Sis also tries to swipe her card, gets a loud "Meeeah" and her doors close too.  I try to get through and my machine says "Err" on the card swipe section, and I am getting my doors closed also.  Little A is under the height restriction so she just walks right through.  Here we are with half our family on one side and the other half on the other.  We keep trying our cards, keep getting closed doors and the machine is speaking to us in Korean.  The entrance is also the exit and people are swiping and exiting.  We are causing a bit of a back up, so some people are swiping their cards to get us through.  During this hullabaloo, a station worker leaves his room and comes out trying to talk to us, as we look completely confused, a little Korean stops and interprets what he is saying.  This little Korean angel stays with us for about an hour as the worker is trying to figure out what is wrong.

Our little Korean Angel

Lesson #1- Never punch a hole in your T-Money card!  Any damage to the card will break down the card and it will no longer work.

After a few phone calls and a lot of translating, we find out that the kids' cards have broken down and no longer work due to the hole.  The worker gives us an address and tells us we can try the T-Money company to get our money back, but he highly doubts we will.  At this time, I am close to tears because Kevin is frustrated, the kids are starving and I just lost us 90,000 won.  We have no idea how we are going to get out of the subway, as our kids now have no way to exit the station without a ticket.  We came all this way to only spend our vacation stuck in a subway tunnel and die from starvation, (at least it felt that way).  Then our little Korean angel takes me to a machine where I can purchase a one way ticket to our hotel for all the kids!  We get our tickets, thank the worker and our angel a million times, and are able to continue on our journey with our one way tickets, and directions to the T-Money building.

Station Workers and our Angel

Lesson #2-   Seoul subways are NOT stroller friendly!!

When we finally enter the subway, we are met by a million and one stairs.  We have to go up, then down, the up, up, up, then down and up and down again.  All the kids are carrying a rolling suitcase, I have little Monster in a stroller (which I have to carry), Kevin is also carrying the port-a-crib, and Big Sis has little Monster's carseat strapped to her rolling luggage.  The poor kids are having to lift and carry the luggage through all these stairs.

At one point M&M makes it down three stairs then just sits right in the middle of the staircase and announces she can no longer continue forward.  I leave little Monster in the stroller at the bottom of the stairs with Big Sis and run up and grab the suitcase and bring it down the rest of the way.  A few times, a Korean would just grab the suitcase and carry it down or up for the girls!  They would always try to say, "It's OK, I have it", but of course, the Korean would not understand and would help them (which I know the girls' appreciated!)

After a few stops, one transfer and more stairs, we finally make it to our exit!  As we try to exit, M&M is scared of the machine and swipes her card as fast as she can, and attempts to exit.  To her dismay the machine beeps at her and won't open.  M&M had swiped her card in the enter machine instead of the exit machine!  She attempts to swipe the exit machine, but it now won't work as she had just swiped it.  I also cannot get my card to work, since It was not the card used to let me in the subway.  There is no handicap machine, so the stroller is not able to get out either.  Kevin gets out and then we lift and carry everything, including kids, over the exit doors, and are finally out of the subway!  Kevin walks out stating, "We are never taking the subway again!" and of course, we are met with one last set of stairs up out of the tunnel!