홓대 is good, but the park is riddled with foreigners on the weekends. It's an art school, so it's pretty diverse. Go to Queen's Head pub for a half-decent beer.

Also, if you can find it you should eat at 새마울식당, it's tasty.

i'll be in hongdae tomorrow night. i'll TR it if anything useful happens... if my date is boring.

what is wrong with there being a bunch of foreigners in the park? also it's safe to assume that this guy is new to korea since he's flying in and asking where is a good place to go...so why are you giving him suggestions in hangul and with no directions to the place/a description of what it is?

and yes you can play in korea on stars as has been posted like a million times in the thread. also, FTP, ongame, party, revolution, merge, bovada, and iPoker are all open to players in korea.

Because I'd assume he isn't traveling to Seoul to meet up with a ton of foreigners. As previously stated, he wanted to meet up with students. More often than not, a good amount of foreigners are acting immature and falling into the stereotypes many Koreans already believe. Last time I was there, I saw a few of them climbing the trees with a beer in their hands.

As for the restaurant, would you rather me give it in English? If he wants to write the characters down, he can find it. It's a BIG restaurant and it's not like it's advertised in English. Hongdae isn't terribly big and it's near some of the more popular locations.

Thanks for the info, but that didn't answer my question about money transferring to my American account.

COEX poker room is still operating despite the misinformation posted in teh thread. climbing a tree with beers in your hand sounds fun though? the guy is traveling and visiting seoul for a week; i doubt he wants to spend the whole time in a hanbok and doing a temple stay while practicing his hangul. if you search the guy's posts he seems like the type that would enjoy partying. and most people aren't looking for students while on holiday so they can study at the library with them...

i see plenty of photos on my korean friends' facebook if them getting ****faced drunk in public places. i used to see korean guys passed out on the street all the time. hell, i've seen people passed out drunk IN urinals more than once. and usually i'd see **** like that on weeknights. let me guess, you're a white guy who teaches at a hagwon...when's the last time you spent a night talking only in korean? congrats on being able to type in hangul mad hard skill that takes a good 2 days to learn.

god these horrible foreigners wanting to visit the country on holiday and have some fun....

um, hongdae is a ****ing confusing place with all the sidestreets. i've had trouble finding bars and clubs with english names even with my friends giving directions. korea in general is hard to navigate with the lack of street names and it isn't easy finding your way around. honestly, how do you expect the guy to find the place or spot it without knowing the language?

an analogy since you seem to be pretty obtuse: if you asked where to check out in taipei, someone said to eat at "阜杭豆漿" gave no directions or description of it, and then no further details when pressed would you consider that person helpful?

hard to answer questions you don't ask bro! you can wire from your korean account to your US account obv or sell to people for KRW. and of course you can't cash out from your stars account to the US. the site doesn't allow US players. yvw.

This is where I stopped reading.

You're wrong and you're not terribly interesting.

(No, I'm not in the military)

Carry on.

well being interesting wasn't the goal of my post..was just calling you a donk. and i'm sure you read my whole post even though you said you stopped reading 50% of the way through...where i answered the stars question that you didn't ask in the original post.

wasn't trying to disrespect hagwon teachers btw (i used to be one) i just don't think knowing some basic korean is impressive and randomly "showing off" isn't helpful to someone visiting for a week. enjoy having fun looking down on fellow outsiders while doing whatever it is the **** you're doing for a living though! and sick brag that you're not in the military...i'm sure the americans stationed in korea willing to risk their lives thousands of miles from home to protect an ally from the madman to the north recognize how much better you are than them.

Sadly I agree with everything Djz said

That is until we come to this hummdinger.

Seriously hope that's a level bro.

why sadly?

and i never level or troll on the internet...i just don't understand patrick's comment that he's not in the military as though it's a good thing...then again he just seems to be a tool!

고마워!

Have a good weekend gents.

FYI, you shouldn't write words like 안녕 or 고마워 when asking for advice on a public forum. It's informal.

yea this too unless it's forum full of small children...

FYI, I don't care about the lot of you, so there's no reason to be formal.^^

Just another disrespectful foreigner living in Korea then

tl;dr online bickering

Think it's much better for the guy to meet some foreigners @ hongdae as well as some locals, why is that a bad idea? You're forgetting that fluent English speakers hanging out there can be useful and show him around. That's pretty huge. I've def. had some trips that were a lot more fun because someone was able to talk with me and guide me around.

It sounds like the dude just want to show off his contempt for other foreigners living here and picked a very inopportune time to do so.

Anyway, Hongdae will be the place to go. Lots of bars, clubs and restaurants. Lots of young people, lots of English speakers and although there will be a lot of foreigners the crowd will still be 97% Koreans.

appreciate the advice guys. just blew 26k in the last 3 hours so i'm definitely booking this flight tonight lol gotta get the **** outta here.

looks like hongdae is the top recommendation for me, i'll see you guys there very soon

any tips or things i should know before i get there? will buying a phone to use internationally be a problem after arriving? are you able to pay with a visa debit card at most establishments? any hotel you guys would recommend?

again i appreciate it guys i'll gladly buy you a drink(s) for helping me out

cash is king in seoul. while visa debit will likely be fine most places it's usually just better to have cash on you. i'm sure there are small instances of pickpocketing around the city because duh but i'm not concerned about it at all.

the subway system ceases running from about ~12-5AM depending on where you need it to go so that might be something to keep in mind if you're relying on using it as your primary mode of transportation, which as a tourist you probably will want to.

if you want to see the highest concentration of drop dead gorgeous women go to kangnam station and walk around. it's kind of a tourist trap these days because of the psy song but there are a ton of smoking hot, albeit professionally altered in many cases, women.

there are all kinds of people in every profession. i'd be happy to hang out with anybody here and i'm in the military. i'm not out raging all the time and picking fights. i'm genuinely enjoying the country for a second go around. it's an amazing city to live in and stereotyping any person in it, while possibly accurate at points, is wrong. live a little. meet people.

When in doubt just use formal language unless they are much younger than you.

Only real crime I've experience in Korea besides traffic accidents is theft of money/items. It's a bigger problem than most like to admit. Most ATM's are open all night so I wouldn't be flashing a ton of cash around.

1 teacher I know had money stolen from her apartment as she was cleaning it. Another guy had 600,000 won stolen at a bath house. Why he had 600 bucks on him was insanity.

not to sound arrogant but I think having 200-1k is very reasonable

Really, I usually carry $50-100. The only time I ever carry more than that is when I'm going out to play poker.

i agree with this. i rarely carry any cash in the states but it's just as rare i have less than 200,000won on me at any time in seoul.

Just got in Seoul a few hours ago, badass city!!! I'll be in this guesthouse near Hongik Uni for the next 2 days while looking for apartment.

Anybody down to go out for a drink of something?

Not coming to Busan?

I'm playing in a 1/1 game bow in which a guy shoved $100 in pre with K7s and got called by K9s and Q3s. Lol.