korea life

안녕하세요, 애슐리예요~

So I've lived in Korea on and off for around a year and a half now.

During my time living here, I've experienced a lot.
Culture shock is real.
So as I write this blog post in a small city of Daegu, I want to reflect on the past year and a half so that I can always remember & reflect on the good, the bad, and all things in between.

What I love about Korea:

I could write so many things here but i'll attempt to make it brief.

FOOD —— I'm a foodie. Typical Korean food is typically a culmination of sweet & spicy. Tteokkbokki is a good example of this. Plump, chewy rice cakes swimming in sweet, spicy red pepper goodness. The occasional green onion, fish cake and boiled egg inside.

My favorite Korean dishes are - Galbi-jjim (갈비찜), Jjajangmyeon (짜장면), Samgyeopsal (삼겹살), Gamjatang (감자탕) and of course, Korean Fried Chicken (치킨).
The portion sizes in Korea are huge & typically you would always order family style and share the dishes. I also loved how cheap the food is there! You don't tip so you can go out to eat often & not spend a fortune.

People —— Korean people are generous. They're also polite, clean, & respectful. I rarely had bad experiences with people living in Korea. The occasional rude taxi driver, but other than that, it was a rare occurrence.
Young people are very respectful to older people, giving up their seats on the bus, carrying heavy things for them, and speaking in honorifics. I loved to see that :)

Safety —— In the last year and half, I have never once felt unsafe. It's difficult to describe how different I felt in terms of safety from living here and in the Bay Area.

a few examples,

24-hour + 빨리 빨리 culture —— I cannot stress enough HOW MUCH I LOVED THIS. I'm a night owl and I work a lot. Being able to go to the gym anytime I want, work at a cafe till 2am, and grab a snack at the convenience store on the way home, felt ✨life changing✨ 빨리 빨리 (ppalli ppalli) is basically like going fast, working fast, etc. For example, going to the doctors can take easily 1/3 of the time or more because of this. Going out to eat is fast, getting services done (beauty, grocery, etc), and just generally my life felt so much easier without constantly waiting around for things. It made me realize how slow we are in the US, lol.

What I don't love so much about Korea:

Societal Expectations —— Sometimes I felt a lot of pressure to look a certain way. Maybe thats a 'me' problem, but people always look their best when they go out and given that i'm a foreigner living in a town without many foreigners, I had eyes on me a lot and it made me feel self-conscious at times. Especially if I just went out in my pajamas to take out the trash or run to the convenience store.
Girls are touching up their makeup at the cafe when they're studying, guys hair is always clean cut, shaven and looking like a kpop idol, even if they're at the gym!

Diet culture —— as a women, it can be quite triggering sometimes to be bombarded with the diet culture in Korea. Being skinny is seen as more beautiful and feminine. I remember one time being so sad listening to the girls next to me at the cafe, who couldn't have been older than 15/16, talking about how proud they were that they skipped x-amount of meals that week. Their friends were proud and supportive of this and it helped me understand more about the culture here and why there is an expectation to look a certain way. If your friends are encouraging you to become skinnier and lose weight, or diet, than you're more likely to do so.

I recognize i'm generalizing here and not everyone is like this here in Korea, but it was just something I noticed often.

Few more small things —— Nunchi (눈치), lol.
IYKYK. Nunchi is basically the art of reading the room. This is a small thing because I completely understand that in Korea there are just some things you shouldn't do that might be normal in the US. And if you do those things, you are said not to have 눈치, or inability to read the room and it feels like everyones judging you with side eyes. For example, bringing outside food to a cafe, gestures like casually pointing your finger at something or someone, directly addressing someone without knowing if they're older than you, and even things like eye contact (i'm always curiously looking around at people in the US but in korea it can be seen as rude).

Lastly, a few
honorable mentions:

- Healthcare is so cheap (thankfully i could get health insurance) and just quick and easy compared to the US
- Korean skincare >>>>>>>>>>
- ALL THE COUPONS —— albeit you need a korean phone number to get most of them but you can save on almost anything here
- Fashion —— i learned a lot about fashion here. Although sometimes people tend to follow the same trends and then i feel really out of trend if i'm wearing 'last years' outfits lol
- kakao bikes are everywhere (electric bikes) and its so convenient to get around

- BREAD 빵 —— oh man, the 빵 in korea is unlike anywhere in the world. bury me with a red bean bun please.
- Baskin Robbins —— tell me WHY baskin robbins is a million times better in korea. ITS SO GOOD. I had it way too often that i think I developed a lactose sensitivity lmao
- Health & fitness —— I added this one because it was just such a joy to see how healthy and fit people are! even older grandma 할머니's and grandpa 할아버지's. I have a lake nearby and everyone is always exercising, walking, dancing. at all times of the day!

let me know on x https://x.com/heyashleybee, or email ashleyha0317@gmail.com if you want a part two or have any topics you'd like me to share :)

with ♡, ashley 애슐리