Busan is South Korea’s second-largest city, with a population of over 3.5 million inhabitants. Known colloquially as “Seoul by the sea”, Busan is equal parts glamorous, down-at-heel, charismatic, and anonymous. It prides itself on being the earthier, more honest counterpart to the posh and sometimes superficial capital. It is the economic, cultural, and educational centre of southeastern Korea, and is home to the fifth-largest container port in the world. It is the nearest of South Korea's six largest cities to Japan (from Busan to Tsushima Island, Nagasaki Prefecture is just 50km), and on a clear day by the shore, you can see it on the horizon.
Jagalchi, the country’s most renowned fish market, is here, as well as Haeundae, a modern seaside oasis for the Korean urbanite. Busan also boasts the world’s largest department store, Shinsegae (“New World”) Centrum City.
Absolutely none of this was on our minds as we trundled, tired but elated, into the city proper in search of accommodation for the next few nights. Ordinarily we’d beeline it for the town centre, look for hotels, and try our luck. But Busan is a bit different from most places we’ve stopped along the way, not only because it’s much larger, but also because it’s incredibly hilly. Geumjeongsan, with a peak of 802 metres, is the highest point, but the local landscape is peppered with steep hills that we simply don’t have the inclination to climb. We had idly dreamed of rewarding ourselves with a fancy beach hotel, but on seeing the local geography, we soon thought better of that.
Instead, we perused a cluster of motels not far from the end of the trail, on the western outskirts of the city. It’s fair to say Busan’s status as a port city was in evidence here, with the area having a decidedly seedy (by Korean standards) feel to it. Still very safe, and certainly nothing that would cause concern to our Berlin-dwelling selves, but noticeably more dodgy than anywhere we’ve encountered so far, with its dubious-looking bars and their desperate-looking clientele. Our seach wasn’t looking promising.
But all of a sudden, we came across the Number 25 Hotel*, which looked brand new. There were two women in charge of the front desk, and the younger one immediately switched to impeccable American-accented English when she heard Jess struggling in Korean. We paid 50,000 won per night for three nights, and the kind lady helped us carry our bags to our room, apologising that it wasn’t as “big” as something one of the other motels might have offered.
If only she knew the standards of accommodation we’ve made do with in places like Burma, she wouldn’t have anything to worry about. As it turned out, the room was as charming as the welcome. We gave silent thanks for a clean room which had all we needed: a comfy bed, hot shower, a Western-style toilet, and neither bed bugs nor monks chanting throughout the night.
Searching for the Number 25 Hotel now yields zero results (there is in fact another Number 25 Hotel located in Busan, but it’s more inland than the one we stayed in), and it makes us wonder if we dreamt the whole thing up. In any case, get off the bridge onto the mainland and head north - x marks the spot, it’s right next to Eden Park. Otherwise, there’s more than enough places to stay in and around the area.
*[EDIT June 2023] Thanks to our wonderful reader, Christine, we can confirm that the Number 25 Hotel in Busan can actually be found under "Busan Hadan No 25 Hadan" on Google Maps. If you’re using Naver, it’ll show up as "Number 25 Hotel Haden Branch", and on both Kakao Maps and Naver as “넘버25호텔 하단점”. Thank you, Christine! ❤️
“That’ll do me rightly.”
Can’t argue with it.
After a quick rest, we headed out again to see what this city was all about, quickly discovering two things:
The underground stops running around midnight, and doesn’t start up again until 5 AM. If you’re caught in between trains and can’t walk home, it’s either an expensive (relative to the price of a subway ticket) taxi ride, or you can get your head down at a jjimjjilbang (sauna) for a few hours. Or keep drinking.
Because of the mountains, the underground system is a little circuitous. It can take an inordinately long time to travel around Busan. From Hadan Station, by our hotel, to Seomyeon, where all the nightlife action was happening, took 17 stops - almost an hour. It drove Neil mental and made us reassess every plan we made over the next days. We ended up only stopping by our hotel to sleep.
After days of quiet countryside, we had forgotten what it’s like to be in a big city. Emerging from Seomyeon Station, we felt immediately overwhelmed by the cacophonous bustle. It was enough to induce a sort of tunnel vision in Jess as her brain whittled the sensory overload down to a manageable level. The result of this was a near-miss as, dazed by the blaring lights of the surroundings, she almost walked into the path of a passing car.
Seomyeon is loud and garish, and immediately reminded Neil somewhat of another Asian port city, Hong Kong. Certain more notorious parts of Bangkok might have drawn inspiration from here too. It’s people watching gold, and we’re always up for a bit of that. Let’s see what the hip young things of Busan have to offer.
The city is split into three main areas - Jung-gu near the port, Seomyeon in the center, and Haeundae in the north - and right here in Seomyeon is the crossroads of it all. The local subway station serves two lines and is one of the busiest in the city, with vast underground shopping arcades selling primarily clothing and footwear, and a little bit of pretty much everything else imaginable. There are numerous boutiques selling local products, and restaurants galore that are open round the clock. No wonder it is recognised as THE shopping and entertainment district.
In another interesting tidbit, it is also home to "Seomyeon Medical Street", the area encompassed by a 1 km-radius around Lotte Department Store in Seomyeon and the Buam subway station. This district includes a total of 160 medical clinics, specialising in cosmetic surgery, dermatology, ophthalmology, and dentistry. All you need to find your true best self (which probably looks just like a lot of other people’s best selves).
We ended up spending all three nights in this area once our day’s activities were over. Partly because it was convenient, with a direct underground line between here and our hotel. But also due to the fact that there was just so much to see and do. There was more than enough here to keep us occupied, and if you venture into the side streets, you can find delicious food for cheap - on average, we spent around 33,000 won for gut-bursting dinners.
Tonight, we feasted on Korean BBQ at one such restaurant, where the kind waiter took the time to walk us through the menu in English and kept the beers flowing. He later thanked us for the opportunity to practice his English and wished us well during our stay here.
Bring it on!
There’s not much of a bar scene as we would recognise it in Busan (nor in most parts of Korea as far as we can tell), as drinking is heavily associated with eating or singing karaoke. However, there are a few scattered here and there if you know where to look. The Savoy caught our eye due to its uncanny-valley recreation of a 19th-century London pub, which gave Neil major throwback memories to his youth. We went in and sat amongst the clatter of young Koreans on a night out.
Generally, we would frown upon travelling halfway across the world only to end up in a place just like what we’d find at home, but there was a novelty factor to this which made it really fun. The bar had a vast collection of vinyl records lining one wall, and Bing Crosby of all things crooning away in the background. Around us, people were tucking into those famous Korean dishes, bangers and mash and fish and chips. It felt like an episode of The Twilight Zone, where inhabitants of the most technologically savvy country in the world paid money for a nostalgia trip to a time and place far away. We couldn’t get over how weird it felt. Suppose the grass seems always greener on the other side after all.
Two full days of Busan await us, and we’re excited to get stuck in.