Okpo traditional market but named the Okpo International Market!
Okpo International market was named just the Okpo Traditional market (KR: 옥포시장) before. But nowadays they changed it to the Okpo International market (KR: 옥포국제시장)
Picture of Okpo Market in 2015.
Credit Picture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4u33F54Xd4s
If you couldn’t read Korean or you don’t have Korean friends, you wouldn’t know that Okpo’s traditional market sign in Korean is the International Market.
Now is Okpo International Market (2020).
The sign in Korean at the market says Okpo Gugje Sejang (KR: 옥포국제시장 Okpo International Market), the next corner from the market you will see the parking building has both signs in Korean and English said “Okpo International Market Parking”.
Wouldn’t you be confused, are they the same market?
We never parked inside the parking building.
We park our car on the side of the street, there will be a yellow jacket guy that will run to give us a parking ticket, we normally pay about 1000won per hour (this is quite normal to park the car in public in Geoje city).
**If they run to you and ask something, you can say “Han si-gun” (한시간) for 1hour parking and hand them 1000won, or you can try “sam-sib poon” (삼십분) for 30 mins with 500won**
There is no product of international food in the market. I think the name was changed because this area is filled with foreigners. And the sellers are very friendly to foreigners!
Okpo International Market is just the about right size for a small city. If this is your first time to visit the market, don’t be surprised if you couldn’t find the market!
Like our first time to try to go to the market, we drove past the market many times because it was a quiet and small market!
There are only 2 gates for the market. When you walk into the market you can see the other end of the market, it’s quite a short walk to walk from gate to gate.
Gate2: the other side of the market
*Elizabeth loves to shop at this market so much
The market is quite small, but the market has most of the things like the other traditional markets in South Korea, Seasonal Fruits, Fish, Seafood, Kimchi, Pork, etc.
Enjoy taking the picture for some Local Seafood which we couldn’t think of how to eat!
The Spoon Worm or Penis Fish (개불) is the most naughty seafood that makes us laugh anytime when we saw them at the Korean traditional market!
There is a big grocery shop “SALE MART (KR: 세일마트)” that you can access from the main road (next to the Pizza Hut), or you can just walk in on the market road.
The shop is bigger than what you see from outside.
I like this shop because they do have pork/chicken/beef and they can cut and grind it for you!
Seriously, we have a hard time finding ground beef or ground pork in the shopping mall!
Some clothes shops and fabric shops are also located in the market.
The small business could be changed anytime, so it’s hard to expect that you would find the same shop when you visit the market in different years.
From the market, if you walk to the main road and cross to the other side. This is the main road for Okpo city, we would mention this road as Starbucks Street. Yes, there is a Starbucks shop here.
Next to the Starbucks shop is Daiso (or what we call a Dollars Store). If you haven’t been to any Daiso shop before, you should make the first trip to visit Daiso shop!
They have everything you need for living (Kitchen, bathroom, decoration, toys, pets stuff, gadgets, garden, tools, etc) and they are prices between 1000won – 5000won (~$1 – $5).
Daiso in Okpo is 4 stories building, which means I can spend time up to 4 hrs here!!!
K2 is good if you are looking for hiking gear.
If you walk up to the end, it’s OKPO PARK up on top of the hill. If you ever heard about Okpo Park or Abandoned amusement park, that was where it used to be (they are building a new hotel by Welliv, year 2020 there now).
In Geoje Island, there is a bigger market “Gehyeon Traditional Market (KR: 거제고현시장)” , it’s about 10 mins drive from Okpo.
SAN FRANCISCO STREET IN OKPO?!?
The fun thing for us (Tim and I), we were moving here at the end of 2019 together. But we’ve been told different things about San Francisco Street in Okpo.
Tim was told that the hill that brings you to UJ Smokehouse/Spoons is called San Francisco. While I was told that the hill to Starbucks and Okpo park is called San Francisco.
*Tim’s San Francisco Street in Okpo.
It was funny that I was worried that Tim would be the only one who’s wrong about it. And Tim worried about me to mention the wrong street for San Francisco.
*My San Francisco Street in Okpo.
So I posted on Geoje Expat group to find out more info. Luckily, there are not only 2 of us that have been told about it in different streets. Many foreigners have the same 2 different streets to mention about San Francisco street in Okpo too!
Now when I talked to Tim about Starbuck road or Okpo Park, I will call “My San Francisco Street” and when Tim mentions about meeting at where UJ Smokehouse is, he will say “My San Francisco Street” as well ha ha ha…
Read more about where we like to eat in Okpo (coming soon!)
Read more our trip in Geoje: https://www.somethingjam.com/south-korea/geoje-island-south-korea
