Seoul part 6: On the ineffable (and toilets)

I always have a hard time talking about my trips. Seeing new places and meeting new people, having unfamiliar experiences, trying out things you never tried before: none of this translates very well to words or even pictures.

In a paradoxical twist, the experiences you’re aching to tell everyone about are the ones they wouldn’t really be able to fully appreciate. You simply had to be there: no description will be able to make up for that.

Still, just in case you’re planning to be there, or wondering whether you want to be there, or even just fantasising about being there, here’s a couple more things from my trip that I think are cool.

Nori Bang (노래방, literally “music room”) is probably best known to westerners as Karaoke.

It was one of the most fun things I did during the trip. This has definitely to do with the people I was with, but I have no doubt Nori Bang itself was a brilliant catalyst for the night.

People go to Nori Bang in groups and each group gets their own room. This is great as it makes singing much less stressful than if you were on a stage, with a bunch of strangers in the audience.

This illusion of privacy was shattered for me when I got out of the room to go to the loo. In my short walk across the establishment I could clearly hear all patrons, in their “private” rooms, screaming Korean lyrics at the top of their lungs. I could even hear my friends, bellowing out English songs from the other side of the building.

I guess it’s good that, by that point, fun and music and beer had obliterated most of my self consciousness: I just couldn’t wait to go back in the room, soundproofing be damned.

Speaking of beer: buying drinks will sometimes buy you more time in the room, though the laws governing this are still mysterious to me. I feel it has more to do with whether you are a regular and how much money they expect you to dump in there.

Smoking is allowed in rooms, which is probably not the best choice for singing. It’s also very unusual, as South Korea has banned smoking in public places at the beginning of 2015 and they seem to be pretty strict about it.

Finally, the music selection in the room was completely baffling. Along with the usual suspects like Queen, Michael Jackson and that-Grease-song-I-never-remember-the-title-of, the selection included some unlikely metal songs from bands like Gamma Ray, Rhapsody and Angra. Not sure if Koreans have very high pitched voices or if this is the result of some metal invasion from the Western world in past years.

Toilets are a topic you’ll often encounter, if you’re planning to go to Korea.

Before going, I had heard a lot about squat toilets: there’s a heated debate between people who love them and people who absolutely loathe them. In my mind, this debate is only rivalled by the never-ending conflict over toilet paper orientation.

In all my time in Korea, however, I saw exactly zero squat toilets, so all I can say about them is that they are not as prevalent as people think.

Something else you’ll hear a lot is how you’re not allowed to flush toilet paper. Plumbing in Korea is very old and toilet paper can very easily create clogs, with thoroughly unpleasant consequences.

Instead of flushing, you throw the paper away in a bin, next to the bowl. While this may sound absolutely disgusting, in practice it’s not that bad — as long as you’re not the one who has to empty the bin — and many other places in the world use the same system.

Public restrooms are everywhere and to my experience they’re all clean and free. Most Metro stations have public toilets, which is especially nice if you’re a tourist.

By the way, I’ve personally seen the term “restroom” used more frequently. In fact, I received a couple of odd looks from people I asked for the location of the “toilet”. That may have been lack of familiarity with the English word, though.

The weather was brilliant while I was there, in the first half of October: sunny and mostly warm, with temperatures only dropping at night. My understanding is that this was a bit atypical for the season, which is usually chillier and more rainy.

There was a haze that made it hard to see in the distance. This was particularly evident from viewing spots like the Seoul Tower or Inwangsan. It’s not clear to me if it’s caused by pollution or it is just a natural phenomenon. The distinct lack of wind (especially compared to London) could account for it.

Finally, a small thing that I found incredibly endearing: instead of beeping annoyingly, reversing trucks play Beethoven’s Für Elise.

I’ve seen one of those trucks in the streets of Seoul and I’ve heard the same music being used for electric people movers at Incheon Airport, so I’m inclined to think it’s a thing.

This is the last part of my travel diary. I hope you found something interesting in its pages.

If you want more, the previous chapter was on size.

If you want a lot more, why not start again from the beginning? The first article I published was on beating jet-lag.