Sightseeing part 1

Yesterday, Latanya and I decided to take a Saturday trip into to Seoul and see some sites. Latanya left it up to me to pick our destination. I wanted to see Itaewon, and then go to the N Seoul Tower. Itaewon is a district full of western amenities and the N Seoul Tower is just like any large needle in the sky, it is in the geographic center of the city with gorgeous panoramic views. We woke up at the same time we normally do to go to work at about 7am (Dad now I know why you still wake up yearly on the weekends). We took our time getting ready and I mapped out our route, which included our bus to the subway and then our walking trail. Let me first say just like any map the distance between anything appears to be closer than they are. Also, the geography of the mountainous terrain in Seoul appeared to be smaller on the map than in reality, which we would soon find out.
By the time we left it was about 9am made our way to E-Mart and hopped on the bus 165. {A quick side note: The other day we were at our normal subway station Donong and we attempted to take our bus home when Lt's co-teacher neglected to tell us, that the bus 165-3 was not the same as the 165. Logically, I thought that it would eventually branch on to another route. But I thought that it would do that after our stop. This was not the case and we ended up practically in North Korea. We got off and grabbed a taxi back home. So from now on we know only to take the 165 without any dashes. }
The bus arrived after a few minutes. We took it to our subway stop, which was about 10 minutes or so of a ride. Once at Donong station we hopped on to our train, now with a T-Money card . The T-Money card is used for the Seoul's public transportation. It's good for the subway and buses. Basically you add as much money to it as you want and swipe it either when you enter the bus or the subway station. And as you exit either one you swipe it again and it subtracts a certain amount of money, depending on the distance of your trip as well as the amount transfers you made. The card makes traveling so much more efficient and less stressful, at least for us.
Our subway line kind of took us where we wanted to go. It was a twenty five minute ride from our station to Hannam station. Hannam is located near the Han river and just south of the area we wanted to see, Itaewon. Our map does not have every street on it and provides only a basic over view of the city, with little landmarks pointed out. So with my great sense of direction we began to make our way.
In the direction we were going there were numerous homes and buildings nestled into the mountainous landscape. It reminded us of San Fran. Well knowing that we were headed in the right direction we began climbing the hills. As we were making our way we heard people talking in English and were suddenly feeling a little happier. We finally made it up our first big hill, which took about 15 minutes or so. Once at the top we saw the Itaewon Hotel, and we knew we had arrived at our first destination. Latanya saw some signs in English and was relieved. We saw all sorts of non Korean restaurants, such as, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, French and many American chains. We made the decision to make our way towards the N Seoul Tower which was my main objective on the day. After the tower we would come back and take a stroll through the district.
From our vantage point we could not see the tower but I knew the general direction. With no signs for the tower we chose a worthy street and started another incline. We zigged and zagged up different streets hoping to arrive at the top soon. The incline became steeper and the houses much nicer. It was like climbing the Hollywood hills. Every house was big, built into the hillside and had primo security. The cars that drove by were all luxury. Typically the average Korean drives a Hyundai, Daewoo, or Kia but all the cars we were seeing were BMW, Mercedes or Lexus.
After walking up the steep Korean Hollywood hills we made it to a plateau where we saw the Grand Hyatt hotel. This was good to see because from the train station earlier we were able to see the Hyatt and knew the tower was in the distance behind it. We kept walking and arrived at yet another hillside, except this one was all forest. The hillside was no longer a hillside instead it was the Namsan mountain home to the N Seoul Tower.