Busan Bound
Busy. Away. A total of 8 hours of flight.
Finally I have arrived in Busan.
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Finally I have arrived in Busan.
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There is this 'Discovery Year' program in my uni that I have to undergo during my 3rd year and I chose the Study Abroad Program because I thought I want to experience living outside the country. Totally out of my comfort zone. Traveling alone is different from living alone outside the country for a long period of time. Massive difference okay!
The DY prep took me around 2 months before departure. Going back and forth to my uni to settle everything and Alhamdulillah everything went well. Tickets were bought a month before departure and alongside with my husband's ticket. I made the right choice of telling my husband to come along so at least we can have our honeymoon there. That's just because I'm arriving way early for school so why not spare a few days to enjoy alone time with the husband? haha
We took a flight with Royal Brunei to Kuala Lumpur for transit to Busan and transfer to KLIA 2 later using Airasia.
RB : 18.35pm - 20.55pm (2hr 05m)
Airasia : 01.15am - 08.30am (06hr 15m)
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| In flight meal : Beef in soy sauce with butter rice and curry vege. Crabstick salad and some espresso cake I suppose. |
Arrived KLIA 1 and directly went to KLIA 2 because apparently the shops there are more promising hahaha and lots of restaurants too! hehe Had our boost fixed and some Texas Chicken, then we got our luggage checked in and ready to depart!
No lies, at this point I was pretty excited just because I thought that I'm only going to be in Korea for my honeymoon and not for studying. (sigh)
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| Busan here we come! |
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| The undefeated Nasi Lemak Pak Nasser only on Airasia! |
Arrived and have to get down from the plane and hopped onto the bus to get to Gimhae International Airport Terminal (reminds me of the old LCCT procedures).
So the first thing we want to do is to get a line / sim card but the prepaid sim for KT telecom were sold out. We do not really understand how things work here in Korea and the language barrier here is the biggest struggle. Apparently we didn't check the whole airport and thought that is the only floor at the airport LOL but NO! haha of course there's a departure hall on the 2nd floor! *face palm*
(mind you there's no ground floor in Korean buildings, the G is the 1st floor)
Instead of getting a simcard, the husband rented a pocket wifi which we thought might be convenient for us but no (I'll talk about why is it not convenient later). Anyway, we rented the pocket wifi for 27,500krw which is about BND33.90 for 5 days. You can actually book online and pick the pocket wifi (they call it egg wifi here) at the airport. I regret for not getting the tourist sim at the airport just because I thought it would be easier to just get it at the convenience store (again, I was wrong). Also regretting of not changing my money at the airport (sigh).
Done with wifi registration then we went straight to our Airbnb apartment using taxi. Mind you! The people in Busan doesn't really speak nor understand English so you have to have proper & exact address of your location. It took us almost 10 minutes to explain our Airbnb apartment, frustrating but no choice.
Almost an hour drive from the airport, we finally reached our Airbnb apartment in Haeundae. We chose to stay there because the website says its the famous spot for tourist. haha The taxi fare from the Gimhae International Airport to our apartment cost us around 34,000krw if I'm not mistaken so it was around BND42, expensive though.
We booked our accommodation via online at Airbnb and it was self-check in so no hassle there. Easy peasy. It was located right in front of Pale De Cz condo and behind Hotel The Mark, Haeundae.
Our home was just like what we expected and it was quite spacious for 2 person. It was clean and comfortable, of course clean toilet as well. Didn't get to take a picture of the toilet but it was small tapi enough for me and the husband. We did not have the beach / ocean view though so it saddens me a little. The apartment cost around BND63 per night including taxes and other services (like cleaning and stuff).
Still couldn't believe that we're actually in KOREA.
We rested for a bit and plan on finding the 'T money' card that everyone told us to get which can be used in various places not only the subway but the buses, taxis, convenience store and etc. So you see how useful is this card while in Korea right? We actually got ours at the subway station at Haeundae, went to ask the information centre and the ahjussi was really kind enough to show the steps of buying the card from the vending machine (not to forget, he speaks English too!). You also can recharge it at the subway station itself or the convenience store.
The real struggle came afterwards when we wanted to exchange our money from USD & SGD to Korean won.
.... and I'll talk about that in my next blog post.
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| The arrival hall at Gimhae International Airport, Busan. |
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| Efficient enough? |
(mind you there's no ground floor in Korean buildings, the G is the 1st floor)
Instead of getting a simcard, the husband rented a pocket wifi which we thought might be convenient for us but no (I'll talk about why is it not convenient later). Anyway, we rented the pocket wifi for 27,500krw which is about BND33.90 for 5 days. You can actually book online and pick the pocket wifi (they call it egg wifi here) at the airport. I regret for not getting the tourist sim at the airport just because I thought it would be easier to just get it at the convenience store (again, I was wrong). Also regretting of not changing my money at the airport (sigh).
Done with wifi registration then we went straight to our Airbnb apartment using taxi. Mind you! The people in Busan doesn't really speak nor understand English so you have to have proper & exact address of your location. It took us almost 10 minutes to explain our Airbnb apartment, frustrating but no choice.
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| A lot of high rise buildings! |
We booked our accommodation via online at Airbnb and it was self-check in so no hassle there. Easy peasy. It was located right in front of Pale De Cz condo and behind Hotel The Mark, Haeundae.
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| Right over there at the red point. A minute walk down the beach, 7-10 minutes walk to Haeundae station. |
Our home was just like what we expected and it was quite spacious for 2 person. It was clean and comfortable, of course clean toilet as well. Didn't get to take a picture of the toilet but it was small tapi enough for me and the husband. We did not have the beach / ocean view though so it saddens me a little. The apartment cost around BND63 per night including taxes and other services (like cleaning and stuff).
Still couldn't believe that we're actually in KOREA.
We rested for a bit and plan on finding the 'T money' card that everyone told us to get which can be used in various places not only the subway but the buses, taxis, convenience store and etc. So you see how useful is this card while in Korea right? We actually got ours at the subway station at Haeundae, went to ask the information centre and the ahjussi was really kind enough to show the steps of buying the card from the vending machine (not to forget, he speaks English too!). You also can recharge it at the subway station itself or the convenience store.
All in one pass card
The real struggle came afterwards when we wanted to exchange our money from USD & SGD to Korean won.
.... and I'll talk about that in my next blog post.
Love,
W
W
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