The experience from my first reunion trip back to my birth land actually started while I was still in Sweden. Already at the Swedish airport to be exact. At the check-in things didn't exactly improve when we ended up standing in the same que as many other South Asian people. The first flight to be checked-in in our line was a flight departing for Shanghai International Airport, Shanghai - China. This was also our flight as we were to transfer Shanghai to Incheon International Airport - Seoul.
The second time it happened was on the plane as the flight crew was Chinese since it was a China Air plane. On the plane they handed out some sort of immigration declaration, I became a little nervous by this but since my dad was seated next to me he told the flight attendant that he could take my form as well. The flight attendant seemed to get surprised as she responded with; oh you're together!? My parents and me decided to fill in the form for Immigration Declaration, even if none of us were would have to since we were to transfer to Incheon , Seoul.
When we were to take the transfer flight from Shanghai to Incheon International , Seoul the plane was rather small, enough to make me feel a little anxious. Again the flight crew was China Air crew and as expected they did hand out Immigration of Declaration this time too. As we had arrived at Incheon International we headed for the luggage area and when it finally arrived my parents decided that we would take the subway to our hotel. My parents believed that it wouldn't be far away from the Central Station for one and second that people would know the directions for our hotel. The subway lines wasn't finished yet, so we had to transfer several times. The location of the hotel wasn't close to the Central Station at all. People couldn't help us with directions since they couldn't read Romanised Korean.
After several transfers and running up and down with heavy luggage a nice Korean gentlemen decided to help us carry our bags. He insisted on speaking Korean. I am ethnic Korean so he presumed I knew, and since I was with my parents they also knew Korean of course.
When we finally had made it out in one piece from the Central Station all three of us was pretty tired, exhausted and hungry. The nice gentlemen, dressed in suit was still around and before leaving us he gave me dad a black plastic bag. It took us a few minutes before we realized that he had donated his lunchbox with leftovers to us. As it had taken us several hours to get from the airport to the Central Station we soon made the rational decision to take a taxi to our hotel. We thought the taxi driver would know the location of our hotel for sure. They didn't, none of them knew - the first one decided to ask his collegues for directions. Because of Hangul they generally don't know Romanized Alphabet that well. The first driver had already taken our luggage in his car when one of the other driver's said he knew the hotel. We ended out sticking to the first driver. As we ended up going back and fourth we soon understood the driver didn't know our hotel as he had to stop to ask someone...
When we finally arrived at our hotel dad payed the driver as mum and I went inside, dad asked for the key and all three went up to our room. We were three people yet the room only had a double bed. Mum and I stayed in the room while dad went down to the recepionist to get another room; one with three beds. By know we were so tired, exhausted and hungry that we didn't even change our clothes before diner. The time had become 9PM so not many restaurant's was still open so we decided to settle for Kentucky Fried Chicken. As we had finished dinner we went back to our hotel room to sleep and unpack...
The next day we woke up at around 9 - 10 the adoption agency's location. I had recieved a map and as we tried to find the location we didn't realize that 24hour store was a SevenEleven. My mum had been in Seoul and at the agency 20 years ago so it wasn't surprising that she didn't recognizthe city anymore. In the end a nice biker ended up taking us to the area of the agency. I remember that I was being overwhelmed by the feeling of being in a crowd with people just like me. Even though the likelihood of me bumping in to one member of my birth family. The thought of it being unlikely but not imposible made me look carefully at the woman as I passed them. And I almost asked a Korean woman if we were related... Imagine if I had...
As we stood outside the agency I noticed an elderly Korean man pacing back and fourth looking at the entrence. Before we knew it a smartly dressed Korean woman hurredly showed a Swedish couple with a child to a wan. We finally had brunch at Donkin Doughnut before we took the subway to Dongdaemun Market. My parents got a Donkin Doughnut mug because they ordered food for a specified amount that qualified for a mug. We were a little disapointed when most of the stores was closed but mum still managed to find some nice summer clothes when we were at Dongdaemung. When we had finished our shopping we decided t have a Swedish coffe break at Coffee Bean And Tea Leaf before taking the subway back to the hotel.
All three of us were really tired and we ended up resting for a few hours, and when we woke up all of us were hungry but the the time had passed 9PM again. We decided to have a late dinner at a bar since it was the only open restaurant in the area. After that we went back to hotel to sleep and seemed like we would need it since tomorrow was the big day.
♥ 챠금은안녕. Bye for now. ♥
© Taste of Kimchi, Elle
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