Mar 22, 2026

For today, I didn't have much planned. I actually planned it as a rest day/free day, and I planned to just spend it at a park. But I thought that it would be way cooler if I could mingle and play board games as well. I did have 1 item on my list first: which was to get my Korail pass card. I went to Seoul Station in the morning and I took the bus and then train to get there. I was surprised to see that the Namane card booth wasn't working, so I walked around. I was shocked to see some homeless people out here in Seoul station, and I went downstairs to some tunnel which had more homeless people and people sleeping in cardboard houses, which was kind of a shock to me. I eventually got to this hotel that had a Namane card booth and I was able to print my Korail Pass+, which wasn't needed but I liked that I have a card to commemorate my trip. I took a few pics but then went straight to that cafe along Cheonggyecheon or something. I was hungry so I stopped by and initially planned to have a quick bite to eat. I ordered 3 pieces of chicken at this store and I had gizzard too. It was definitely too much for just 1 person and I saw 2 dudes at another table point and look at me, and then said “aigoo” which was super funny to me. I ordered the chicken for take-out and wrapped it in a bag myself. I was in a hurry because I wanted to play board games anyway. I then went to the cafe and got my ticket and a drink. I went downstairs to find some people playing board games and a table was nice enough to invite me to play with them. We played Da Vinci Code at first and it was this weird board game where you had to guess the numbers. I didn't initially get it at first, but the guy was super nice and friendly in telling the mechanics. I played at a table with 3 people: Chloe, who was a Korean nurse, and the couple who were also Korean and the guy was studying law. It was fun to play with them and, after that, we were joined by another guy named Solomon, who was some kind of engineer at Incheon Airport. I played board games with them and then we moved to the next game, which was Codenames. I feel like I've played this game before, but I don't have a clear memory of it. Then, as we were playing, it hit me that we already played this in Dice before. I was partnered up with the guy studying law and Solomon was teamed up with the girls. We often kept winning because I was able to guess the words that the guy was trying to link. The girls failed a few times, especially by getting the card that made them immediately lose the game, which was funny because it happened multiple times. We were joined by another woman, who was by herself. Then Chloe had to leave and another guy from Greece named Nick joined in. We played this other game next, which was Spyfall, and it was kind of a headscratcher to play because we kind of didn't get the mechanics at first. But we soon got the gist as we were playing. It was fun because we were all multilingual, but we tried to deduce who was the spy in our playthroughs. I never got the spy card, though, which was sad. Then we played Flip 7! I actually got my drink at this time because I had to ask it, but it somehow wasn't served to me, so that was cool. We kept playing, but I often got greedy with getting cards up until the point where I get a duplicate and end my turn. I think the lawyer guy won in the end, so that's cool. He was so lucky, too. Sadly, the couple had to leave after this game, but Nick, a new joiner named Sara(?), and the solo Korean lady still kept playing. We played The Island next and it was such a long game, but it was a fun one. One other Korean dude came to our table, but didn't play, and he said that it's his favorite game. It was a long game, but we eventually finished it and Sara tapped out at this point. So it was just us 3 at this point: the Korean lady, Nick, and I. For our next game, Nick picked Camel Up which was this camel betting game, which was fun but also hard to play. I didn't fully get how we were playing, and even until now I don't get it. But Camel Up was fun because it was a chill game we could play. For our last game, another Korean lady named Olivia joined in on our table to play Cascadia/Harmonies. Cascadia was actually the name of the board game in French, and the board game was in French because it was just donated by someone else to the cafe. We didn't get it at first, it was kind of confusing for me, but Nick got it quickly and Olivia had been playing it for a while, so she already understood it. I just played along and I saw how much fun the others were having and I was struggling at this game. It was fine, but our round took so long to play out. We were actually the last group to leave the cafe, and Nick took a while to tally our scores. The cafe owner was even looking at us haha. But it's fine, us 3 (Nick, Olivia, and I) as well as the guy who liked The Island from earlier tagged along with us for dinner. Too bad the other lady didn't join us, unfortunately, and no one got her contact, too. We continued for dinner and we went to a place that Olivia recommended. Nothing much happened, it was mostly Olivia asking Nick about Amsterdam and stuff, and a bunch of other things. We ate some food at a restaurant that Olivia recommended, so that was nice. I exchanged details with them but after that we parted ways. I took the bus going home and I even passed by Cheonggyecheon so I took more pictures of it. I passed by down this creepy alleyway, and the bus back home took a while since it had 44 stops or something. I eventually arrived back to my hotel room at around 1:40 a.m., which led to the next day. Overall, today was kind of a mixed bag. This was totally an unplanned part of the trip and I kind of regretted it a bit because I never really got to connect with someone here, even though I tried my best at this social event.