Korean Job Discussion Forums

[earthbound14]

I'm a big fan of traditional Korean things, from tea to homes, but I find it actually a little hard to find or learn about. Seems so much of what is being offered is a cheesy touristy copy or an extremely over priced item to fleece tourists and weathly Koreans. Other stuff just seems to be bland, boring copies of something you get the impression must have been good at one time or at least based on something good.

If you know where to look though you can find authentic things that are really good.

For example: Tea

At first I bought the green tea sold at the local shops....it's more like brown flavourless tea. Not bad, but not really what I was looking for and I don't understand why this stuff seems to be the prefered tea (or why its called green tea when it is really brown). Then I bought some extremely expensive tea (Iseul Tea and Green tea from Jeju) from Insadong. It was good, but at those prices it was more of a luxury than a daily tea. So still interested in finding good Korean tea, I headed out to Boseong to the tea plantations. The tea house was a real let down, the tea restaurant simply sold green tea dong-kass, but the fields and the tea did not disappoint. Lovely and picturesque feilds and I could buy really tasty green tea for cheap. 5,000 won for a big bag of leaves.

So here is my list of cool Korean things (authentic, affordable and down right cool).

Boseong tea - buy in loose leaf in a bulk bag

Andong Soju - From Andong (costs about 15,000 won a liter, but this is 'real' soju)

Iseul Tea - Soerack Mountain Buddhist temple. You have to hike up to get it and the tea is pricey still, but the area is lovely and the tea is grown in the mountains there apparently.

Incense - there are two types in Korea the cheap stuff Koreans seem to like (found in most stationary shops) and the good stuff used in ceremonies. Buddhist shops around Seoul will sell the good stuff. Most Koreans don't really like it because they associate it with boring ceremonies, but us waekguk-in seem to like it. This stuff comes in stick form in a box.

I'm still looking for nice lanterns, bamboo products, pottery (not the expensive celadon stuff, but more for the every day), furniture and a good resource for art.

Got any tips to share?

[typo]

What doyou consider expensive? a medium sized desk lamp with traditional korean paper drawings or calligraphy goes for around 50k. is that cheap or expensive?

A couple of these places exist in even the markets in remote areas of incheon, and personally I found the price to be reasonable. I've bought 2 as gifts, actually.

[joshua7choi]

Generally Korea Post Online Shopping would be quite helpful to get traditional products without worrries. It's trustworthy.

http://world.epost.go.kr/

cheers,

Josh

[CA-NA-DA-ABC]

Insadong?