An Introvert's Guide to Seoul
- Tom Nicoll
- Jun 9
- 7 min read
Updated: Jul 8
Intro - Why I'm starting this blog
Well, there's two reasons...
Firstly, if anyone is scared to solo travel, trust me, if I can do it, anyone can! I have been a nervous wreck in foreign countries since I was a little kid. When I booked my first solo trip to the far east, I trawled the internet for every piece of information about travelling solo, and it was all written by incredibly outgoing influencers shoving a camera in stranger's faces, as they trot through foreign land after foreign land, so I wanted to share the travel advice I wish I had found in the first place.
Secondly, picture the scene...
You've just come back from the trip of a lifetime. You've spent hours capturing bucket list pictures on your needlessly colossal camera setup you dragged with you. You sit down and edit for hours, saving five different versions of the same picture because it's just not 'cinematic' enough. Then you finally think you're ready to post, and your timeline is flooded with stunning snaps that put yours to shame.
'What's the point?' you cry, as you throw your laptop out of the window...
Well, that was me, until a content creator I'm a big fan of said something that really resonated with me:
'Photography should be fun.'
Sounds stupid, I know, but I had truly forgotten that. I realized I'd forgotten why I do what I do in the first place. I'd forgotten the feeling I had holding my Canon 1200D in my hands on my 14th birthday. I'd forgotten the hours spent dreaming of one day owning a lot of the insanely expensive camera gear I now take for granted.
So I'm digging out the old photo folders (and cringing slightly at the horrendous teal and orange edits I used to do) to focus on the memories behind the photos I have taken on the many trips I have been insanely lucky to have been on in recent years. Because somewhere down the line, I forgot who I took these photos for.
Me.
Seoul, South Korea - 10th-14th Nov 2023
Whilst going through my photos from Korea, a lot of my favourites are actually phone photos! It just goes to show what a powerful 'EDC' a phone truly is...
Where it all began...
I remember the feeling of stepping into the Heathrow departures hall with a hiking rucksack on my back very clearly. The idea of flying over 5,500 miles to a foreign land on my own hadn't quite set in yet.
Shockingly, it didn't set in until I came up the escalator at Hapjeong Station, overwhelmed by the maze of low-hanging electrical wires. You can view all the YouTube travel guides you want, but it never hits you that these places are real places with real people in real houses and real jobs until you take your first steps there. It's a weird feeling that's impossible to describe.
This photo sums up my first few steps on the streets of Hongdae perfectly. Even though the hostel I was staying in (shout out to Bryan and Jina <3) was the most sociable hostel I've ever been in, I had to take some time to myself to allow my brain to catch up after a 12-hour flight. Hongdae is the student district of downtown Seoul, and I was thrust into a sea of intense neon lights, lines of arcades, and students flooding the 'chicken-beer' bars lining the streets. It truly felt like its energy would never die.
One of the reasons I love taking a camera travelling so much is it takes some of the anxiety out of walking around strange places. It gives my hands a purpose, and it gives me an excuse to stop and take things in.
The vibe never dies
There were K-pop performances on the street, and I've never seen crowds like it. It must have been about three times as big as I had seen for any busker in London. Sitting at the front was a row of very serious-looking middle-aged businessmen, who from context I would assume were agents or talent scouts of some kind. The young performers gave absolutely everything into these ultra-rehearsed lip-syncs of Korean pop songs, while the panel crouched in front nodded with approval.
The Friday Thursday Party
Something you hear quite often about South Korea is that it's quite difficult to eat out solo, as a lot of the cuisine involves sharing large pots of food. Because of this, I was living off of convenience store food until I could drum up the courage to go out for a meal. On the second night, though, I was kindly invited out by some very friendly fellow travelers. It was an amazing hotpot-style dish of rice cakes (tteokbokki), noodles, and thinly sliced meat, with a follow-up visit to a shaved ice (bingsu) cafe nearby. I must say, I think I miss the food from Seoul more than any other city I have been to, not just because it was amazing, but because of the milestone it represented in my traveling journey.
After a quick trip to the café photobooth, one of the party mentioned going to join the others at 'Thursday Party'.
'Thursday Party?' I thought to myself... 'I'm pretty sure it's Friday...'
As it turns out, 'Thursday Party' is just a strange anglicized name for a bar in Hongdae and not a party they throw on Thursdays. We had an amazing night of drinking and learning about each other's travel plans, and I truly felt like I was living the 'solo travel life' for the first time on the trip.
The Trail of National Humiliation
Social anxiety has always been a big struggle for me, and if you had told me a few years ago I'd be traveling solo, there's no chance I would have believed you. One of the biggest triggers for my anxiety abroad is language barriers. I've had it ever since holidays in Europe as a kid. There's something about the blank look on someone's face trying to understand you that sends me into panic mode.
When I discovered that the metro station didn't vend tickets and I needed to go to a convenience store to get a card, I froze. I paced past a little store on the corner of a busy crossroads and rehearsed my lines. With a deep breath, I walked in to the sound of a joyful jingle as I opened the door. I darted my eyes around the snacks on the shelf to look busy. I made eye contact with the clerk, a young man around university age, and pointed at my phone displaying a picture of a transport card.
'Annyeonghaseyo... T-money?...' I asked.
'T-money... would you like it charged?' the clerk replied.
I think he would have understood my English just fine, but I mimed 5,000 won being pushed onto the T-money card just to be safe and walked out of that convenience store with a mix of numbness and confidence. It took about 15 minutes to squeak out two words, but after that, making conversation with the locals was a touch less stressful.
Final hours
I took a trip up to the Seoul Tower as I love a night skyline. I'd never noticed this photo before, but I love how the ghostly reflections of people crossing the long exposure perfectly capture my feeling of Seoul. It's impossible to find peace in this city, but this was the closest I was going to get. It was a very wet and rainy night up there, but I remember looking up at the tower and out at the city below, finally feeling like this trip was where I was always meant to be.
I took several of my favorite photos from Seoul on the walk to and from the tower, but this one has always been my favorite. I was enchanted by the colors on this canopy, illuminated with golden light from the Seoul Tower base. The three ladies with clear umbrellas marching out of frame are an unintentional bonus!
An unexpected gem
Seoul was only supposed to be a small detour on the way to Tokyo, but it ended up leaving a much bigger impact on me than I ever expected. It was the perfect start to the trip of a lifetime. I can't wait to go back and see what else South Korea has to offer someday!
Seoul, South Korea
Recommended restaurants and bars:
또보겠지 is the tteokbokki restaurant I talked about above. Make sure to bring friends (old or new)!
설빙 홍대입구역점 is the Bingsu cafe I went to.
이리에라멘 is a great place to eat solo. It's a ramen restaurant with bar seating.
For drinks, Hongdae is full of bars, clubs, and restaurants popular with the local students and young professionals. Thursday Party is actually a chain of bars, with multiple locations in Seoul, and all of them seem to be popular with locals and travellers.
Recommended accommodation:
Zzzip Guesthouse, Hongdae is still to this day, the most friendly and social hostel I've ever been to! I really set the bar high for my first hostel experience, and nothing's ever come close to the atmosphere here.
Recommended activities:
Visit a palace - There are five in Seoul but Gyeongbokgung is the largest and most famous. Day tickets for ₩3,000 are available at the gate, and there are stores around to rent Hanbok if that's your thing.
Jongmyo Shrine - Tickets cost ₩1,000 and are available at the gate. A tour is included in the price, and can be taken in English every two hours from 10am-4pm.
Gwangjang Market - If (like me) food is your main driving force for travel, this is the place for you! Most of the stalls have bar-style seating, so it's a good choice for eating alone as well.
Myeongdong Shopping Street - I just bought a couple of souvenirs here, but Korea is famous for it's beauty products, and I met a few people who were stocking up on face masks on this street.
I'm making a dedicated blog post about day trips to the DMZ, and I will link it here when it's done.
Top Tips
1) Use Naver Maps and Papago - Google Maps and Google Translate don't work very well in Korea, so use these instead. I've kept the names of my restaurant suggestions in Hangul (the Korean alphabet) to get Naver Maps to recognise them if you copy and paste them in.
2) T-money cards - They're used to pay for the metro, like an Oyster card, and are available in most convenience stores. You can top them up there too.
3) Eating solo is a struggle - Most restaurants in Seoul are 'family-style', so make some friends or do some research before going out to eat!
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