So you’ve landed and are living alone. Now what?

When I first got to where the IES Abroad students are staying, Wecostay Type B in Myeongdong, my first impressions were that it was really nice, clean, and aesthetic. When you look up Wecostay and look at the VR tour, they don’t show just how much storage is provided but I’ve included some pictures to help visualize. Wecostay also provides us with certain things, such as some utensils, dinnerware, toilet paper, laundry detergent, and other things that can be seen on their site.

My cohort consists of 14 of us from various parts of America on various floors, a couple on the 3rd or 11th floors and 1 person on the 4th and so on. Regardless of that, we all are in a WhatsApp groupchat and text each other to hangout. We’re all only an elevator away at most after all.

IES Abroad provides a dinner the first night everyone lands, but gives the day to us to do as we please. Many of us went to Myeongdong to check out the Daiso to pick up anything we might’ve forgotten or planned to get here, like notebooks or etc. since we had the time and the exchange rate favors the US dollar. The dinner was at Seoul Tower and it was a great dinner and beautiful view, though some friends and I chose to walk down from there and it was not a walk for the weak is all I’ll say about it.

The following day was IES Abroad's orientation and that was pretty long, but did end with a nice dinner. In the opinion of many of my cohort who are of Asian descent, certain parts of the orientation were less applicable to us but was helpful to those not of Asian descent. Since certain social/cultural norms can be shared amongst many Asian countries, those of us who are of Asian descent already have a base understanding of things such as why we take off our shoes before getting into the main part of our apartment in Wecostay or eating food “family style” (sharing food in a more implied manner than intentional manner).

Orientation also covered what to do during emergencies, how to navigate public transit, expectations, basic Korean, and some other things as well. Overall, I would saw that while it was long, if you go in knowing nothing then you’ll come out all the better and if you go in knowing some things then you’ll know when you don’t have to pay so much attention.

The following day was the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone). It was very interesting but hard on the body as we walked down one of four tunnels South Korea’s found that North Korea made into South Korea. It was steep and then a small, narrow, short straightaway. I’m 5'6” and I had to hunch my back forward a bit during the especially short parts but could stand up straight occasionally. There was also only room for 2 people walking side by side, one going forward and the other back and we were often told that if we had claustrophobia or a medical history that could be impacted by going into a deep tunnel that we should sit this part out.

The first time on Yonsei’s campus was to pick up our student IDs and we learned that the commute is often closer to about 30-45 minutes rather than the 20 minutes IES Abroad may state. Orientation the following day was short and went over the basics of Yonsei (their expectations and facilities provided) and some clubs meant for international students (Mentor’s Club and IYC).

The first two weeks are both a lot yet had their moments of calm. It can be a hard adjustment, but I have enjoyed my time here so far and from what I’ve seen so have all my cohort so far. Classes are a whole other thing for another post.