Week 2: Cafe Hopping in Korea

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Korea does cafes like no other country. You can literally find them in every corner in Seoul. On top of this, many café’s are unique and have fun and interesting themes.

You can find animal cafes like cat, raccoon, sheep and many others. And then they have cute and colorful cafes, book/manga café, study café, traditional (hanok) style café and many, many more!

In every café, you’ll find Iced Americano and it’s always the cheapest on the menu. Koreans love Americano so you will find it everywhere. It’s my least favorite drink on the menu and not to my taste. Students also choose this drink when they go to café to study as it’s the cheapest drink and affordable. You have to buy at least one drink or food if you’re going to spend time in a café, otherwise you’ll be kicked and rude to stay if you’re not getting anything. If you’re accompanied by a friend and only, they are drinking, it would be fine in America but not so much in Korea. Although it makes sense why it’s like that in Korea. Students here spend many hours taking up the spot in café to study and they only want a customer that’s buying. So if you’re going staying inside a café, buy a drink.

My experience with cafes is that they can get quite expensive so I would limit myself to few a week or month. This is especially if you don’t enjoy Iced Americano. Any other drink can range from KRW 4500 to KRW 9500 whereas the Iced Americano can begin anywhere from KRW 1500 to KRW 5000. The food/bakery can be just expensive as one drink so not exactly on affordable side either for students. They are chain cafés like Mega Coffee or ‘The Venti’ offering affordable options and large sized drinks. You should be easily able to find them near any of universities easily. The chain cafes also have many varieties of drinks from coffees, teas, smoothies, ades and many other drinks.

I also noticed that you can seasonal drinks at café. So, for summer, it’s melon or watermelon. These will be off the menu after summer so enjoy them while they last. For other seasons, it is strawberry for spring or mango for Fall from what I heard.

One of my best cafés I had been to was in Daegu called “romance papa”. It has a nice, relaxed atmosphere that’s perfect to hang out with a friend. This was Hanok style café with really tasty treat and drinks. It’s in a very quiet and hidden corner in center of Daegu. Despite the hefty pricing, the quality of drink and food matches. I would highly recommend going here if you stop by Daegu on the way down to Busan or Seoul. On the side note, Daegu is surrounded by many great mountains and has amazing views of city and nature. Be sure to not miss out Daegu while you’re in Korea.