Korea, 28 Oct 2010, Day 1, Highway Rest Stops & Toilets

After leaving Imjingak, we headed for Sokcho, where we were spending 2 nights.  En route, we ate at a food court at one of the highway rest stops.  This was one of three highway rest stops that we ate at on our trip.  They serve standard fare Korean food at reasonable prices (3000 to 4000 KRW for a bowl of ramyeon).  We were quite pleasantly surprised by the food standards, having had to bear with those at the Malaysian highway rest stops.


All the rest stops had clean wheelchair-friendly toilets. The toilets usually have electronic bidets with heating for the seats -- that is, if you know how to use them. Instructions are only in Korean and the icons were difficult to decipher. We fiddled with them for quite some days in our hotel rooms and at the public toilets to no avail until we checked in at one hotel which had English instructions.


Even trying to flush these toilets proved to be a challenge. At our first stop, no matter what we did, we couldn't get it to flush. Finally, in exasperation, we thought we had to do the unthinkable -- cover the WC and leave the cubicle, and hopefully locate the cleaner. But, the moment we put down the cover ... it flushed! Voilà!!

We were also pleasantly surprised that, unlike Singaporeans, able-bodied Koreans do not use disabled toilets. Even the seniors do not use such toilets. They would rather queue at the common toilets.