Korea Travelogue: Day 13 - The Min's Cafe
Moving on to our last stop for the day - The Min's 더 민스 located in Apgujeong. You can find the first half of Day 13 here. This cafe is owned by 2AM member Changmin and I have to admit that I didn't know he owned a cafe until the girls said they wanted to go here cos BTS went there before *insert cricket sounds* You go to a 2AM member's cafe to see what the Bangtan boys had. Right...... so anyway we went la because fangirls are like that lol. We walked over from our dinner venue because it was quite near, about 15 minutes away.
Directions
Take the metro to Apgujeong Rodeo station and exit at Exit No. 6. Walk straight ahead and turn left at the 3rd road. Head down and turn right at the 1st right turn. Walk ahead and you will reach the cafe on your right.
Address for reference:
서울특별시 강남구 압구정로 330
The cafe is quite small in terms of its seating capacity but you can choose to seat either indoors or outdoors. We took the largest table outdoor as there wasn't a table large enough for our group of 6 and it was alright because the area is sealed off and we had the heating system right beside us. Changmin's mum even brought out blankets for all of us and personally put them on our laps to fend off the cold weather.
Menu for The Min's is very cool because it's actually handwritten in several languages for the benefit of international fans so no worries if you cannot read Hangul. I don't know if it was the idea of Changmin and his parents or fans who had contributed to this multi-lingual menu but it's just so thoughtful! Add alot of points for this cafe lol.
Yup, Changmin signed all the handwritten menus.
Changmin's mum came out to recommend to us which drinks to order and ade is actually one of their specialties. The bff ordered an ade despite it being the middle of winter and it tasted pretty yummy in my opinion. Would have made a fab drink for the hot summer!
Interior of the cafe is very simply furbished with autographed copies of idol group albums. They are all addressed to Changmin on most of the albums so this is definitely from his own personal collection. The cafe sells their own tumblers so you can pick up one of them if you like as a souvenir!
Close-ups of BTS and Seungri's albums ^^
The Min's collaborated with this Belgian chef to supply a range of Belgian desserts like waffles and meringues so you can pick them up at the cafe to accompany your drink. We ordered a pack of waffles to share and it was decent but not mind-blowing. Maybe it requires some heating with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and chocolate source. Yum!
With Hyunju ^^ Thanks for the treat here chingu~
And then we took these pictures to recreate the BTS pics here even though we didn't have enough people FOL. I just looked grumpy HAHAHAHAH!
So after that we were just sitting there chatting and sipping on our drinks when suddenly Hyunju hit my leg and my jaw dropped because....
... Changmin walked into the cafe, said hi to his parents then promptly came out with a drink and marker to give out autographs to us!
Oh my god thank you fangod for being good to us that day because we didn't expect him to turn up T__________T
Stella had actually bought several tumblers from his parents when we were ordering our drinks and our guess was they told him we were fans of his (sorry oppa, my bias is Jo Kwon >_< I just came cos the rest wanted to come) when he went in so he came out to the outdoor seating area without us asking to sign on all her bottles. I always thought K-Pop idols were all very aloof and didn't like being bothered by fans but this experience totally changed my mind. You're totally inching up the bias ladder in 2AM now haha.
Even though the rest of us didn't buy any tumblers he still signed on the beverage sleeve for us with our names on it (Thank you fangods really T____T) and even took photos with us.
HE IS JUST WAY TOO NICE! Nicest idol I've ever met up-close and Changmin speaks very good English. I actually asked for a selfie after we took the individual pics, expecting him to decline really but he was sooooo obliging to say okay to the selfie. And then everyone started to ask for selfies too lol.
He left awhile after giving us autographs and then his mum came out again to ask us if we were happy to meet him lol. Yes, thank you omonim for asking him to come out for us! She said he was very stressed then as he was participating in a musical then and practice was actually nearby so he just popped over to see his parents by chance.
All I can say is Changmin's parents were the stars of the cafe hands down because their hospitality is just top-notch! Their care and concern towards us was very genuine and you can really feel that they appreciate fans making the effort to come to their cafe despite the language barrier. Thankfully Hyunju was there so I asked her to tell Changmin's mum that we really enjoyed our stay at the cafe in Korean just cos... it was just such a surreal and awesome experience.
I'd say you should make a trip down whether you are an IAM, Army or just a passerby because it's just so nice to sit there and chill with your friends at this cafe. I would totally go there often if I lived in Korea.
Left the cafe after almost 2 hours there. We walked to Apgujeong Station which is quite near too as it was more convenient for us to get back to Myeongdong, walking by Kona Beans (owned by Lee Teuk) accidentally so... *writes down on next trip's wishlist*
Parted ways with Hyunju in the train and then we went back to our guesthouse.
It was our final full day in Seoul the next day and we crammed alot of cafes during that day so stay tuned for my next entry!