Children's Day may have long been over, but this will always be Yue's favorite Korean holiday. After all, he has been part of this occasion for two years running.
In Korea and Japan, Children's Day is celebrated
every 5th of May. Parents often give presents to their children, as well as spend quality time with them. More often than not, the children are taken on excursions to zoos, museums, parks, and other venues with kid-friendly entertainment.
Last year, I took Yue to
Seoul Forest, where he fed deer by hand, went bird-watching, and enjoyed the beauty of nature as we strolled around. This year, we chose to go to the
Lotte World Mall because we heard there'd be lots of fun activities on
Children's Day. And true enough, there was already a great buzz happening when we arrived at the place. Kids were crowding around the mascots that made a surprise appearance at the
Lotte Department Store!
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| Miniso mascot, and the Miniso pop-up store at the first floor. |
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| Dokkaebi! |
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| Snorkmaiden! |
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| Playful Moomintroll! |
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| The house-cleaning hamster, Ebichu! |
More Children's Day photos after the jump!
Yue did not miss the chance to take photos with the mascots, especially Snorkmaiden and Moomintroll, whom we are huge fans of. After the photo op, Snorkmaiden ushered us towards the
Moomin Shop, where some of the toys and collectibles were on sale.
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| Wooden toys. |
The plushies were on sale at just
8000 won if I remember correctly, and I told Yue he can get anything from the pile. He chose Moomintroll, of course!
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| Plushies! |
We then continued our mini-shopping spree at
Uniqlo, where we bought UTs, and at the
Nike store to check out the latest Jordans and Kyries. Too bad they didn't have the Kyrie 3 pair that I wanted!
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| Uniqlo - always the place to go, even in South Korea. Haha! |
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| Jordan 6! |
Then we headed over to the
Miniso at the third floor, where we bought a few items - including these BoniCrew plushies.
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| Gotta get 'em all! |
They weren't available at this particular Miniso store when we visited last winter during the height of
Goblin's popularity, so I was more than thrilled to see all five characters -
Mr. Buckwheat, Grim Reaper, Dokkaebi, Tricat, and
Poipot - in-store, waiting to be purchased.
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| From L-R: Tricat, Poipot, Mr. Buckwheat, Grim Reaper, Dokkaebi. |
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| Yue checking out the RCs. |
Satisfied with our purchases, Yue and I made our way to the nearby
Lotte World Tower, the 123-floor building which officially opened a month before our spring trip to South Korea. We were hoping to visit the
Observation Deck and get a majestic view of Seoul, but alas, there was a long and winding queue at the super-speed elevator heading up to
Seoul Sky. Yue knows I hate waiting in line, so he suggested we go to the park in front of the tower because he saw a lot of kids heading that way.
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| Photo credit: Korea Times. |
Turns out, there's a
Lego Festival, and Yue was beyond the moon when he saw the life-size Lego creations displayed all over the park.
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| Motorcycle built with Legos! |
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| Not-so-micro Microfighter! |
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| Lego fan is happy! |
The festival also featured activity areas, where kids can play with bricks and display their Lego creations. More than four million Lego parts were made available to visitors during the festival, and kids and even kids-at-heart can build to their hearts' content.
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| Yue getting ready to rumble! :) |
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| Lego geek. :) |
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| Some of the creations displayed at the park. |
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| Big bricks! |
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| Families enjoying Children's Day. |
We stayed at the activity area for about an hour or so. Yue did not want to leave without finishing his own version of the Lotte World Tower, haha! It was a good thing we stayed at the park long enough to catch Lego Batman and Joker doing rounds at the festival. Yue had his photo taken with them, of course!
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| Batman! |
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| And Joker! |
As we made our way back to Jamsil Station, we chanced upon these musicians and mascots parading around the department store. They stopped near the Avenue L exit
(or entrance, lol) for a performance, and for photo ops with the kids. Yue made his way through the crowd so he could get closer to the mascots for his own photo op. Because there's no such thing as taking too many pictures, haha!
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| Parade of characters. |
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| Happy monkeys! |
Yue enjoyed his second Children's Day celebration in Korea so much that he's looking forward to the festivities next year. I wonder where in Seoul will we be celebrating next? :)
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| Good night from Yue and Moomin! :) |
To get to
Lotte World Mall, take the subway to
Jamsil Station (Subway Line 2),
Exit 1, 2, 10, 11.
Lotte World Mall
05551, Olympic-ro 300, Songpa-gu, Seoul(Sincheon-dong 29)
Tel. +82-2-3213-5000
20 replies:
That LEGO festival sounds awesome! I've successfully turned my nephew into a LEGO geek, and he would have had a blast checking out all the displays, like the motorcycle. :) Who wouldn't want a chance to sit on a LEGO creation?
Getting to see all of those mascots must have been a blast too! I hadn't heard of Moomin before, but I want to find the books for Kit now. Thanks for the info!
Oh my goodness! This is seriously the best place! I love the Lego surprise as well! I bet your little guy had such a great time!
It seems like the place to be for kids
How fun! I'm not a child, but would've really enjoyed this. They say happiness is like living through the eyes of a child.
I've never been in Korea but I will saved this mall, those photos are amazing and he look had fun!
Yue is such a lucky kid to enjoy those things. I especially liked the lego festival where Yue can participate in building legos. I love the motorcycle built with lego, it's so amazing!
Who wouldn't enjoy this holiday! I think it's awesome and it's definitely a holiday that the kids will love aside from Christmas! Good to know that you had so much fun! --Marceline Dementori
Wow Lego! Definitely, my girls would go crazy mad if they get the chance to se this!
This is fantastic! And the LEGOS too :) ah I wish we have this here on Manila. So that our fellow kababayans will enjoy it too.
I think that to say that I am envious would be an understatement. I am hoping to save enough so that my son and I can go to different countries every year. I would like for him to grow up with an appreciation for traveling which is something that I did not have.
Wow ang saya! Reading your posts make my sole itch to get on with traveling. CAn't wait for our first international trip as a family! :D
I wonder the US doesn't have Children's Day. We actually celebrate Cinco De Miyo on May 5th. Yue looks like he was having a lot of fun on Children's Day at Lotte World Mall.
Great reveiw on Lotte world as I always wanted to visit. I love how you show Lotte department store, it has all of the characters that I can dream of. The black bear is the Japanese Kumamon bear also a city mascot from Kumamoto city Japan. I am using that black bear as my pen name for my blog.
This is my first time to learn more about Children's Day and it is definitely a fun event to celebrate.
It's nice that we were able to celebrate a bit of the Children's Day unintentionally since went to grab some stuff from Uniqlo last May 5th.
What a happy coincidence!
Love how children spend this day outside and in nature. :) Love the Lego festival, I think any child would be happy to be in his place at the time. :)
Wow! I never knew about children's day! I think this is such a great concept. I know parents provide for their children everyday, but this seems like a great way for them to connect and really invest in quality time. Yue looks thrilled with his day/gifts!
Absolutely love this place! Perfect for children, I think as an adult I would also enjoy it :)
That children's day sounds amazing! My 5 year old loves Lego, So a lego festival would be a huge hit with him.
Wow this looks so fun! my son is a huge Lego fan, he would love to visit.
Beautiful post! I've been to Korea twice now and miss it so much. So great to have a blog sharing these experiences in English so I can enjoy it :') Thanks for the share!
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