The Most Overrated Area in Seoul: Seorae Maeul (Seorae French Village)

Photo Courtesy of english.visitseoul.net

I've tried going to Seoul's little French village called Seorae Maeul on three different occasions. I wasn't really impressed with it the first two times, so I thought I would try to go one more time. Once again I was disappointed.

Let me tell you why. First, it's a hassle to get to. Express Bus Terminal is a nightmare of a station especially if you're coming from Lines 3 or 9. Getting to Exit 5 from either if those lines will cause you to lose patience because you have to go through turnstiles, go down an escalator, to the Line 7 platform, and then finally find Exit 5. Then you go up one escalator and then go up a flight of stairs. I can't stand Express Bus Terminal Station and by the time you finally get out of Exit 5, you've wasted 10-15 minutes just after getting off of the train (unless you get off from the Line 7 side). Once you come out of Exit 5. You have to cross the street and then turn right and cross the street one more time. You will pass the Palace Hotel and then keep walking for another few minutes. Then you will turn left on the main road leading into Seorae Maeul, which is just before an elevated pedestrian bridge. Did I mention that getting there was a hassle? Well, believe me. You'll see it when you experience it for yourself.

Secondly, once you're there, you won't notice many things that will remind you of Paris or France. You'll see a Paris Croissant (which is actually a Korean franchise by the way with a French baker at this location apparently). I went to one French cafe called Gontran Cherrier because I saw 4 white people inside. They were indeed French, so I thought I would stay and pick out a couple of pastries. They were pretty good, but I went to a couple of French bakeries near Gangnam Station (Maman Gateau) and Nonhyun Station (Gateaux de Voyage) that had better pastries than this place. Other than that, I saw a Vietnamese place, Korean restaurants, Starbucks (an American), a steak restaurant, and some women's boutiques. You won't find any French restaurants as far as I could tell. I ended up eating at a Korean dumpling restaurant and got manduguk (dumpling soup), which was above average. It was W10,000, but I wouldn't go back to this area just for that. It was very good, but not amazing. The best restaurant in this area is Brooklyn Burger (which is excellent by the way), so that should tell you something right there since there's nothing French about it.

I did go to one nice cafe in Seorae Maeul last year that was really good, but I couldn't find it, which is my third objection to this place. There seem to be good places here, but they're hidden and unless you know some Koreans or can follow Naver blogs, you'll have a hard time finding them. And if you do find it once, chances are that you may not find it again. It's pretty ironic since this area is very small. It's about a quarter of the size of the Garosugil area near Sinsa Station.

Finally, my last objection is how much traffic this place gets. The main road has sidewalks, but once you venture off onto the smaller streets, there aren't any sidewalks and you have to be careful and let cars pass very often. It's rather annoying and very tiresome.

Here's a video that depicts the main road of Seorae Maeul. You'll notice there's a 7-11, a T-World (Korean cell phone store), and Korean street food restaurant, a store for glasses, lots of cars, etc. You get the point. There's nothing that tells you "You must visit this place!" Actually, you really don't even need to bother. You can find French restaurants and cafes all over Seoul that are much more accessible and much better than the ones in this area.

Scott Worden (The L.A./Seoul Guy)

Instagram: l.a.seoulguy