- The biggest fish market in Korea, Jagalchi.
I'm Chris, this is Yellow Productions.
I do travel guides that are fun,
informative and entertaining,
and in this video I'm gonna be giving you
a quick tour around this market,
and tell you everything you need to know
to visit this market.
First things first.
It is in the city of Busan in South Korea.
How do you get here?
You can take the subway to the stop Jagalchi
that comes out about three blocks
from this fish market.
This fish market officially is open
from 2:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., a wide range of hours.
But the best time to get here is in the morning.
Fish markets are morning places.
Best time probably around 8:00 a.m.
If you're curious what the prices are,
they've got signs in the middle of the market
that'll tell you the average price
in the market for those things.
Some vendors might be a little more.
This vendor, he says his prices are less.
They've got all sorts of seafood here.
This vendor has abalone,
sea cucumber and sea worm.
They've gotta keep the seafood fresh,
so the vendors, you'll see them
putting water on top of them.
Sometimes the fish or the eel jumps out,
and so they've gotta put it back inside too.
This vendor's got shrimp, crab, lobster.
Every stall has a sign to tell you
where the particular seafood is from.
I mean, you have to read Korean to understand it,
but if you do, you'll know that
some of it's from Russia, Japan,
or what's the local specialty?
This vendor has all kinds of shrimp,
including huge tiger shrimp.
Look at those shrimps.
So up here on the second floor
you can see there's a row of restaurants.
Each one's got a name and it's got a number.
It's well organized.
So I mentioned earlier you can get
your seafood downstairs and bring it up here.
The way that kinda works is you basically
pay a table fee, somethin' like $4
to sit at the table, and then if you
order soups and things like that,
that costs more.
Now if you order the seafood from here,
where does it come from?
They go and get it downstairs, to cook it for you.
And I don't know.
If it were me, I would probably just do that.
I would order from them, 'cause I would think
they'd probably be able to pick
the better looking one.
'Cause I don't know what a good
sea cucumber even looks like.
But what's also really neat, the view.
Take a look at the view outside that window.
I mean, it's amazing views of the harbor from up here.
You don't usually have that in a fish market.
The other half of the second floor,
the side without the great view,
has vendors that sell dried fish.
So the fish market's really big.
I mentioned the first floor is the fish hall.
We were in the second floor,
it's the restaurants, but there's more things up higher.
Offices on the third and fourth floor.
By the way, that's food delivery.
They deliver that food to the vendors right there,
up on their head.
It's pretty neat.
But back here, the fifth floor
is home to a seafood restaurant, like a buffet.
The sixth floor is a wedding hall,
and the seventh floor actually has guest houses.
You could stay up on the top of the fish market.
So when you're done exploring inside the fish market,
explore the neighborhood outside the fish market.
You can see how they deliver the seafood.
They come in these little trucks right here,
and they're in these little, almost like
water aquariums that they've got the seafood
in those trucks as they deliver it to the fish market.
So the inside was interesting, but there's fish markets
like that all around the world,
like Tsukiji in Japan.
I really think this outside is even more interesting,
'cause I've never been to fish markets
that are anything like this.
And by that I mean outside and so low-tech.
I mean, I think it's pretty classic and interesting
to walk around this outdoor market.
So make sure you walk down this street too.
You really never know what you're
gonna find in this market.
I've never seen such a big octopus,
that one in particular.
It's got a huge eye.
Sometimes the octopuses get away.
This guy's tryin' to make a break for it.
(woman speaking in foreign language)
Yeah, get back there, octopus.
Teach him, yeah.
And if none of the restaurants on the second floor
struck your fancy,
well the whole neighborhood outside the fish market
has tons of seafood restaurants.
And some of these restaurants like here,
you can see that seafood is literally see food.
You see it and then you eat it.
This is the food that they'll be cookin' for ya.
Those crabs right there, they really wanna get out.
I think he wants you to pick him.
A very traditional food to eat in Korea,
and Busan in particular, is fish cake.
There's this place called Goraesa Fish Cake,
and the way this works is you start,
you pick up a tray and you get some tongs,
and then they have all these counters
that have all this fish cake.
You pick your fish cake and then they'll heat it up
and cook it for you in the back if you so desire.
Or you can take it home cold, just like it is.
And this thing, this is pressed octopus fish cake,
spicy pepper fish cake, square fish cake,
fish cake with chives,
and they've even got samples right here.
So you can sample and you can see
how you like this, how it tastes.
Mm, pretty good.
Roasted cheese fish cake,
roasted bacon fish cake.
I mean, I've never been in one place
to see quite so many fish cakes.
So now you can see, if you come to Busan
this Jagalchi market is a must visit,
not just for the market, but the
whole neighborhood around here, frankly.
And so if you are coming to Busan,
you might enjoy watching some of
my travel vlogs on Busan.
We visit some temples, some historic sites,
some great restaurants.
You'll find links right here,
or in the description below.
I won't say goodbye, because I'll see you
in one of those videos.