Hello everyone!
It’s my third week of my Seoul internship already—time is starting to fly by…
I’m back with my regularly scheduled updates:
This week, the rain has been forecasted everyday. It makes the temperature drop though, which I am a huge fan of! However, I am not a fan of walking around the city with an umbrella. It’s very busy here—everyone has an umbrella in their hand at the smallest droplet of rain which makes the city even more congested. Since we’ve entered Korea’s expected rainy season, at least I’m not surprised at the change in weather and am prepared to stay as dry as possible.
Last weekend, I went shopping in one of Korea’s largest underground shopping malls—the Starfield Coex Mall in Gangnam—which was super fun! I went a few times last year during my study abroad semester, so it was nice to return and see the famous Starfield Library again. Other than that, I ate a lot of good food and sweet treats, as well as spent a day with some friends in Seongsu, which is popular for its cute shops and cafes. One of my favorite crafty activities that I recommend people try when in Seoul is to decorate a phone case! There was a place in Seongsu and in Hongdae which were quite inexpensive and had a ton of different colors, charms, and beads to use while DIY-ing!
As I’ve been living in South Korea, I’ve realized some little difficulties that I have with the culture here. In general, Korean people don’t seem to care much about personal space. Seoul is very densely populated, so often buses, subways, and sidewalks tend to be very crowded. Everyday, there is at least one moment when I am packed into a space, which I am not a big fan of. Elevators are always filled with a max amount of people, and I have had to squeeze my way between people on the bus to get off at my stop after work every weekday. It is something that I have gotten used to, but not something that I have grown very comfortable with still. Also, Korean people tend to walk in an unsystematic way on sidewalks. Where I walk often, the sideways are fairly wide, but the pattern is either nonexistent or there are three or four lanes of people walking in both directions. I noticed that there is a flow of people passing each other on both sides of the sidewalk, but going the same direction and then there is a flow of people in the middle weaving in and out. It’s never an easy, efficient walk and that is something that I always find frustrating. Now that I have witnessed their crazy (in my opinion) sideway phenomenon, I found that it actually never gets easier!
As for in the office, I was expecting to come face to face with more of the intimidating Korean business culture stereotypes like overtime and a strong in-office hierarchy. However, my company is small and my supervisor—and also CEO of the company—is very warm and approachable. The more difficult thing I have had to assimilate to is the indirect communication about work tasks. I find that my tasks can be very broad and nonspecific, so I was always worried about doing something wrong because of clarity issues. However, I believe that the indirect communication style is more so because my task isn’t a very important or pressing one. Other than phone calls with our Korean clients for the company’s English study services, my research tasks don’t have much of a timeless or set guideline, so I believe that the uncertainty there is not necessarily all related to cultural differences. Another aspect of Korean culture that I was worried about was the lack of a healthy work-life balance. This is not very true for me, because my supervisor often has me and the other employees take coffee breaks, go for walks, eat a long lunch, and still get off at the same time as everyone else does. I will say, though, that I leave work at 6pm and 7pm depending on the day, which seems a little late compared to the typical 5pm that the US does. But since I don’t have prior experience with the normal full-time work experience format, it doesn’t make me feel wronged, especially since I don’t have any overtime work to complete. All in all, I have pretty much adapted to all these differences as my work here continues strong.
I am looking forward to another week here and can’t wait to see more of Seoul!
