Category: Myeongdong

Girls Day Out at 'Rest With Coffee & Books' - A Dr. Fish Café and So Much More!

1/28/2013

***New location as of 5/25/1013 - information at bottom of post.***

I am just going to claim it.
Rest With Coffee & Books is my hands down FAVORITE café I have been to so far.
I loved EVERYTHING it had to offer.
Books, internet service, a computer for people to use, comfy chairs, FREE bread and coffee, nice background music, waffles, coffee drinks of all kinds, gelato and of course, Dr. Fish to chew the nasty off your feet.

The main room:

Need a book? They have bookshelves full.
They were all in Korean, so if you can't read Korean then bring your own book.

Self bar.
Gotta love it.

At the self bar you can have all the free bread and coffee you can eat and drink.
As long as you order 1 item from the menu.
They even have toaster ovens to toast your bread
AND
They give you butter and jam when you place an order at the counter.

Sampling of the free bread:
It taste better than it looks.

Girl said the hot chocolate is THE BEST she has EVER HAD.
In fact it was so good that she ordered a second one.
She told me that she wishes she could make hot chocolate this good.
Give her time and I'm sure she will.

She is just so cute I couldn't help snapping a ton of pictures of her.

Don't worry, I'm not posting all the photos I took, only a few of my favorites.

She really is this sweet too. She is a great daughter and sister to her brothers.
Plus she has an amazing heart.

I tried something new, a cinnamon honey latte. It was very YUM.

I'm not sure if I have told you this or not, but Koreans are WILD about waffles.
Just not for breakfast - they don't want them for breakfast.
They only want them for dessert.

When girl and I were finished warming our souls and filling our bellies we were ready to dip our feet in a tank of little fishies to get our 'poor mans' pedicure.

First the lady comes over and washes your feet off.

And then it is time to dip your feet!

Ahhh, sweet little fishies. This is no big thang. We have done this before. It tickles, but it is a good tickle.

And then....we decided to switch tanks.
OH MY GOODNESS.
I have NEVER seen Dr. Fish this BIG!
And ready...with mouths OPEN WIDE!

Sticking my heel in.

Oh my goodness. This TICKLES and FREAKS me out a bit!
But I think I can do it....

...I only lasted for a little while before I had to take a breather....
I mean check them out.
Savages.
I'm kind of afraid they will take off a toe.
Girl doesn't want to have anything to do with this tank.

Going in again.
This time all the way.

OH MY GOSH...

This is really FREAKY!!
AND TICKLISH!

I can't take it much longer!!

Feet out.
Relaxing.

Oh my gosh ~ that was crazy fun!

UPDATE as of 5/25/2013
NEW LOCATION:

***I went to the new location. It is not nearly as nice as the old location and the big fish are gone. They only have the little fish. They still have food - sandwiches, coffee, pastries and beer. Still a fun girls day out. :o)***

We spent about 18,000 won on a latte, a hot chocolate, a chocolate waffle and 2 doctor fish.

There hours are 10AM-midnight everyday.
Credit cards are accepted.

I hope you have as much fun as Girl and I.

I think this would be an awesome place to have a date night.

12 Comments

A Birthday Adventure Like No Other

12/5/2012

4 Comments

You guys got the memo a long time ago. We LIKE birthdays in our house. One could even say we LOVE birthdays in our house - heck one could even go as far as saying we are cuckoo for birthdays in our house! Girl's 11th birthday was no different. From the moment she heard that Hubby and I stumbled upon a Cat Café she knew this is where she wanted to spend her 11th birthday and who am I to say no? (Plus it is WAY EASIER than some of the home parties we throw!) Girl was allowed to bring 4 friends with her on this adventure as I wasn't sure I could handle more than 5 of them on the streets of Seoul.

The girls arrived to our house at 9AM on a Sunday morning back in October. I had a plan. Cat Café, lunch, a little shopping, doctor fish and then back home for a little birthday cake! Sounds like a good plan - right? Well it is good until you arrive at the Cat Café & realize they are CLOSED on Sundays!! (Yes, I checked before we went, I knew they opened at 10AM, but I guess my Konglish isn't as good as I thought because I didn't get the "we are closed on Sunday" memo.)

So THIS is as close as my girl got to playing with the sweet little kitties.
But don't worry, this EPIC FAIL is going to be restored....we still have doctor fish, lunch and maybe one of the other 5 Cat Cafés in Myeongdong will be open. Failure is NOT an option.
Plus, the stop at Dunkin' Donuts helped ease the pain a *tiny* bit.

On our quest to find another Doctor Fish these sweet young Korean college students wanted us to take a survey for their English class.

Now, I had read in multiple blogs about the Dr. Fish in Myeongdong - the only problem I ran into was that NOT ONE single person could give the location of this mysterious Dr. Fish. Many places said to look up and you will find it...it is on the 2nd or 3rd floor of a building. I was confidant in my ability to find it - maybe a little too confident. Finally we stopped at the Global Center to ask for directions. This is where we were informed that the Doctor Fish I was looking for closed a few months ago, (EPIC FAIL #2 of the day) but not to worry there were a couple of other locations in Myeongdong for Dr. Fish. At that point I ask if any of the Cat Cafés were open on Sunday - the answer was shocking - out of the 5 Cat Cafés in Myeongdong NONE of them open on Sunday. I guess cat's need their rest. I was informed that the Dog Café opens at noon. You should have heard the squeals that came from the 5 girls in my group. (Epic fail restored!)

Since we had a little time to kill and the girls were hungry they decided they wanted to eat street food instead of going to a sit down restaurant. French fry corn dogs on a stick it is!

As we were walking and eating we stumbled upon The Foot Shop and there was a sign that said "Dr. Fish" - we went in. The girls were SO EXCITED until the guy told me it was going to be 20,000 won PER PERSON!! WHAT?!?! It is typically 2 or 3,000 won per person. That is when I realized he was going to give them all foot massages & Dr. Fish. This is a POSH place, not a place to bring five 11 year old squealing girls. This could have been Epic fail #3, but I pleaded and bargained with him and finally got them all in for 20,000 won but he said they need to be 'quiet' - BAHAHAHAHA!! Did he not see that there are 5 young girls chomping at the bit to stick their feet in a tub of little fishies nibbling at their feet?!?! I mean this tickles like you cannot believe - So like any good mom would do, I agreed anyway knowing I could not hold up to my end of the bargain. I mean come on this was for the greater good of birthday girls everywhere!

And as you can see - the 'quiet' part really worked:

Next up, Dog Café!

So the dog café is pretty similar to the Cat Café except MUCH louder and much more stinky.
The entry fee is an 8,000 won drink.
The girls had hot chocolate and I had a latte.
The girls had a ball playing with the dogs.
I personally didn't even want to sit down because I saw a dog pee on the leg of a table, another one pee on the leg of a chair, I saw a dog poop on the floor. I was gagging! Now the staff was amazing and had very sharp eyes because each time a dog went potty there was a staff member cleaning it up within seconds, but really, this place wasn't for me. However I endured it since the girls were having SO MUCH fun.

By this time the streets of Myeongdong were getting pretty crowded so I had the girls form a human chain where we walked and sang to our next destination. SO MUCH FUN.

Hello ice cream! Yes we will have a foot long ice cream thank you!

These little characters were all over the place! I'm not sure what this one was advertising.

But this one is advertising a Nintendo gaming room!! How fun is that, I was up for it, but the girls decided against it - they thought this would be better for one of the boys birthday parties.

Finally after several hours 5 happy girls are back on the subway heading home to have a little birthday cake.

OH BUT WAIT...Girl wanted to stop at 7-11 and have her friends try one of our favorite Korean snacks - rice triangles filled with bulgogi and wrapped in seaweed. As you can see a couple of them were not thrilled with our favorite Korean snack, but all agree that the cider is good.

Back at home we all put on our new socks....

And sang Happy Birthday to one special girl!

So even though this party could have been a complete failure, we persevered and we ended up having a total ball!
Happy 11th birthday my sweet angel!

4 Comments

Cat Cafe!

10/7/2012

4 Comments

Last week Hubby and I celebrated 18 years of marriage! EIGHTEEN YEARS. Can you believe that? I don't feel old enough to have been married for 18 years! We have PCSed 11 times, lived in 14 home, 6 states, 5 countries, but only 2 of them together, 4 deployments and 4 kids. (AND Hubby was home for EVERY BIRTH - most military familes can't say that!) we have had good times, bad times and all sorts of times in between. We are blessed beyond measure.

On our anniversary Hubby surprised me with a little anniversary breakfast cake - he is the BEST!

We are celebrating our anniversary in style this year with a trip to Cambodia in a couple of weeks, but we couldn't overlook the day all together, so we headed out to Myeongdong just to get out when we happened upon this:

A CAT CAFE! No, you don't eat cat - you go there to love on cats. Really! I'm not kidding! A cafe full of cats!! There are cats everywhere - on tables, on chairs, on counters, up high, down low - everywhere you turn there are CATS!!

In Korea most people don't have pets for one reason or another, so going to a cat cafe (they also have dog cafes here!) is a great option for those cat lovers.

When venturing out to a cat cafe there are rules you must abide by:

Upon entering you must take your shoes off and replace them with rubber slippers provided by the cafe and you must disinfect your hands with sanitizer so you don't bring nasty germs in.

Do not pick up the cats, they can sit in your lap~ but they have to climb into your lap on their own

Do not wake sleeping cats

No flash photography

Do not disturb the kitties if they are eating

If the cat has a colored collar on he is young or is not feeling well

Hubby feeding a kitty

There are fuzzy cats, fluffy cats, short hair cats, long hair cats, and NAKED CATS!

You can buy 'special' food to feed the cats.....

This cat thinks he would like a little drink ~

Checking Facebook while hanging out with cats.

The young lady in the background is taking a nap while her friend is just hanging out with his favorite kitty.

The entry fee to the Cat Cafe is 8,000 won, but that includes a free drink. I wish I could tell you how to get here, but I cannot - but I did take this picture with the phone number on it! Maybe it will help!

We finished our afternoon stroll in Myeongdong with a little street food.....

Fried potatoes on a stick.

4 Comments

“I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you
did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
― Maya Angelou

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Hi, I'm Trish, the writer, creator and photographer of this blog. I started this blog for 2 reasons, 1 - When I found out we were moving to Korea back in 2008 I was a little freaked out and started scouring the internet for information on Korea. At that time there wasn't much out there so I am doing my part in helping families across the world not be so freaked out when it comes time to move to Korea. The 2nd reason I started this blog was to help stay connected to family members back in the states. Today it is so much more that.
I hope you enjoy our journey.

Are you moving to Korea? Do you have questions, concerns? Are you freaking out? Freak out no further - click the button to ask a question. I'll do my best to answer open and honestly.

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Girls Day Out at 'Rest With Coffee & Books' - A Dr. Fish Café and So Much More!

A Birthday Adventure Like No Other

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