Daiso & Ikea: During my first real week out and about in South Korea, after settling into our apartment, my roommates and I went to a nearby Daiso, which happened to have 7 floors worth of items, and took a trip to Ikea outside of Seoul to purchase home necessities such as cleaning supplies, desk organizers, a clothing rack, snacks, masks, bedsheets, and pillows. The trip to Ikea took about an hour by metro and bus transfer as it was located in Goyang. The Ikea was ginormous and it was a maze to go through everything. We were excited to eat at Ikea's famous cafeteria. There was a variety of food but we all ended up ordering the Swedish and vegetarian meatballs (which they're most notably known for there) with French fries. We also ordered a blueberry cheesecake which was really good as it was not too sweet. My meal ended up being very inexpensive as the vegetarian meatballs were only about 3,000 won. After eating, we went to explore the maze that was Ikea in search of bedsheets, desk organizers, laundry baskets, extension cords, pillows, and a clothing rack. We wandered around Ikea for about 2 hours looking at everything they had to offer. My advice for going to Ikea is that if you intend on buying big things such as a clothing rack consider the option of having it shipped back to your house instead of taking it on public transportation. Yonsei University: This week I also paid a visit to my campus for the first time to pick up my Student ID and Certificate of Enrollment with my friend, Nick, who will also be attending Yonsei University with me this semester. Aside from going to the bank to pick up our required documents we visited the campus bookstore/merch store since we were there and took photos in front of the iconic area of buildings towards the back of the school where some K-dramas' filming took place. The bookstore was quite big and had an array of textbooks, school supplies, and very cute campus merchandise such as crewnecks, varsity jackets, tote bags, t-shirts, and hoodies. The day we visited campus was apparently graduation day for Yonsei students so there were a lot of graduates on campus in their cap and gowns taking photos. It was really heartwarming to see everyone and I was glad to have come across it by chance. While we were on campus for the first time we wanted to visit the Central Library as well as the business building but because the semester had not officially started yet our student ID's weren't activated so we couldn't use them to enter the buildings. We'll be back of course, so look out for an update soon about the campus library, business school, and cafeteria. Myeongdong:
To end my first week out of quarantine, today, I went to Myeongdong, a popular shopping district. From Hongdae, Myeongdong is only a 25 minute train ride on Line 2. Our first stop after getting off at Euljiro station was the Lotte Department Store. Unintentionally, when we got to the department store I saw that there was the Star Avenue where Kpop artists such as BTS, EXO, and TXT have their handprints on the wall so that was exciting to run into. The department store was 14 stories high. At the base level of the Lotte Department Store we discovered that there was a very large food court, so my friends and I ended up eating there for lunch. There were so many appetizing booths as well as a few bakeries with delicious looking pastries but we ended up deciding on conveyor belt sushi as we hadn't had fresh fish in a little bit. After eating lunch, we walked around Myeongdong's underground shopping mall, the Lotte Young Plaza which is another department store but more on the affordable and younger style side compared to the Lotte Department Store down the street, and the above ground Myeongdong shopping street. At the underground shopping mall I ended up stopping by CT Records, a Kpop album booth and bought a few The Boyz albums as they had just made their comeback while I was in quarantine. If you are interested in cheap Kpop albums CT Records is truly the place to go :) After a day of exploring Myeongdong, we headed back to Hongdae. For dinner, I ate KBBQ in Korea for the first time at Saemaeul Sikdang. Before heading back home, we decided to walk off some of our dinner by going to the Line Friends store in our neighborhood. This week we walked around so much that my quarantine body was not used to the exercise it was getting. That being said, there was so much to do in the Myeongdong area that I am sure I need to pay it a few more visits before heading back home to Hawaii. Bye for now ☆
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FREEDOM! This morning my 14 day quarantine ended and I moved into my new home for the next 4 months with my roommates. The quarantine facility discharge process was pretty straightforward. Everyone designated to leave today was released at 12pm to come down to the hotel lobby and find their own modes of transportation to get to where they needed to go. My friends who I quarantined on the same floor with and will be rooming with this semester all met in the lobby and had to call ourselves a taxi to get to our airbnb accommodation (a detailed post about housing options and things to consider will be coming soon!). In Korea the most popular app used to call taxis is Kakao Taxi. We stayed in the hotel lobby for approximately an hour and a half past 12pm as we couldn't figure out which type of taxi to call initially, how to call it when we did decide, and wait for it to arrive after asking the hotel staff to call one for us. There was 3 of us and 7 suitcases to fit into one vehicle so we didn't know if we needed a large taxi or a jumbo taxi. We ended up calling a jumbo taxi just to be safe and ensure that everything and everyone can fit but since Kakao Taxi did not offer the bigger jumbo taxis we had to have the hotel staff order one for us as there, as we learned, is a separate number to call for it. Our taxi ride to our apartment from our quarantine location cost about 40,000 won.
Upon arrival at our apartment, my roommates and I lugged our baggage up 3 flights of stairs as our accommodation does not have an elevator which was absolutely exhausting so I highly recommend not doing that if you can avoid it. Just kidding but not really. I did learn from this experience though that I should have packed a lot lighter. That being said, after the extenuating exercise of the day we settled into our apartment then headed out to explore our neighborhood, Hongdae, which was a lot livelier than we anticipated it to be. Hongdae is a popular area in Seoul known to be filled with young adults and students, shopping, tasty restaurants, and cute cafes. It is near Yonsei University, Ewha Womans University, and Hongik University. After leaving the house, we of course had to go eat proper Korean food for lunch. So we went to a restaurant on the main street in Hongdae and ordered 비빔냉면 bibim naengmyeon (cold noodles), 치즈돈까스 cheese tonkatsu (fried pork cutlets), and 비빔빕 bibimbap. The food tasted great and the restaurant owner was super kind to us. After we ate we stopped by a CU, a popular convenience store chain, to purchase our T-Money cards, public transportation cards. You can use T-Money cards on the bus, train, and to even pay for things at some places. After securing our cards we ended the day by going window shopping around our area, visiting Brand Market (clothing store) and a Kakao Friends store. Condensed Lessons Learned: 1. Kakao Taxi only has two car type options: large/venti and regular 2. You can pay in cash when ordering taxis off of Kakao Taxi you just need to bypass the credit card screen to select the pay in person option 3. Do not overpack! That concludes move-in day! We were so exhausted by the end of the day but starting tomorrow I'll be making attempts at crossing things off my Korea bucket list left and right! So please sit tight and look forward to more posts filled with activity! Bye for now ☆ To be able to enter South Korea and stay for a few months, foreigners have to undergo a mandatory 2 week quarantine. For my quarantine I chose to follow one of Yonsei University’s recommendations and reserve my quarantine under Stay4Korea. Stay4Korea and Stay14 I’ve heard were the most popular options for exchange students to conduct their quarantine.
Stay4Korea specifically offered a free sim card for a month, included 3 pre-determined meals a day for the entire duration, and were in close contact with the universities and government so I felt most secure with this accommodation as they could guide me through everything fairly smoothly. Stay4Korea took care of planning the transportation to and reservations for the covid testing centers so they would just let me know when I had to go, take me there, and take me back which was extremely convenient. We did have to foot the cost of the taxi there and back for both covid tests so keep that in mind when weighing the different options. Also with Stay4Korea you don’t get to pick the location of the hotel you get placed in so it really depends on your luck as some places had better wifi or provided better meals. I was thankfully placed at the Recenz Hotel as I think it was one of the better places out of the other hotel options as our meals were quite good and had normal portions (as I’ve heard some places did not give as much as my hotel did or their food was sometimes almost inedible). I thought it was nice that they gave us Korean cuisine for at least half of our meals. Our lunch and dinners almost always had 4 options/trays of dishes and were always accompanied by a bowl of rice and soup. I do recommend bringing seasoning such as soy sauce or something so you can eat that alone with rice in the case that you don’t like any of the dishes provided for that day. Stay4Korea does give you the option to choose between normal, vegetarian, or halal meals however do keep in mind that my friend chose vegetarian for her meals and sometimes they would forget and still give her the normal meat included meals (without switching it when she mentioned she got the wrong meal). Again, from my previous blog post, bring lots of snacks just to be safe. Personally, I didn’t really have a problem with the meals. I thought they were all fine when I received them but I did have an issue with food waste as you do have to keep all your trash for the entire two weeks if you quarantine with Stay4Korea. So if you have to quarantine and choose to do it with them I recommend coming up with a game plan to deal with the trash (i.e. consistently flush the waste which we were recommended to do or just eat all of your food lol). Also, I didn’t necessarily mind this, but note that half the time I was there the hotel would have inconsistent food delivery times and there is no microwave in the room to reheat food (because I did not know we wouldn’t have a microwave). The food delivery times were designated to be breakfast from 7:30-9am, lunch from 12:00-1:30pm, and dinner from 6:00-7:30pm but sometimes they would deliver it really early or really late. Another thing to note about quarantining in Korea is that during the two weeks, you have to receive 2 covid tests and you have to update your quarantine app with any symptoms and your temperature twice a day everyday. The 1st covid test is conducted either upon arrival before going to your quarantine accommodation or if you arrive too late in the day when the test centers are closed like I did you are scheduled to go the following morning. The 2nd covid test is conducted 2 days prior to you getting released from quarantine. Both times I was just alerted the night prior that I should be prepared to leave in the morning (sometimes they give a time sometimes they don't it just depends where you go) and the results were texted to me the following day. If you have to quarantine make sure to regularly update the app and comply by the rules of staying in your room as if you don't complete it consistently or leave wherever you are supposed to be you'll either get phone call warnings to update it or health officials or the hotel staff (depending on if you follow a organization like Stay4Korea or if you do it independently) will come knocking on your door to check in on you. That being said, to me the quarantine process truly went by in a flash. It probably helped that during my first week of quarantine I was still finishing up an online summer course I was taking (accelerated Korean language) so I didn't really feel the need or desire to leave the room. Then during the 2nd week I was preoccupied with registering for classes that quarantine was over before I knew it. Some things that I really liked about quarantine was the view that I had from my hotel room. It really helped being able to open up the blinds to see the sun and beautiful buildings of South Korea looking back at me. The hotel staff were also really responsive and helpful whenever I needed help with anything so that was a plus. This is a random tidbit but I loved watching Korean TV and music show broadcasts everyday while in quarantine. I felt that it helped to keep me sane and was a nice way to practice my Korean listening and comprehension skills. Some things that I really disliked about quarantine was of course the food trash accumulation but also the absolutely terrible wifi. If I had to name one thing I hated the most about quarantine it would be the wifi. It was extremely slow so taking zoom classes and registering for classes was incredibly difficult and stressful as the wifi really only worked in one corner of my room near the TV. It also made it difficult to communicate with friends and family via facetime, zoom, or anything really. So I recommend putting in the free sim card (with 15G) that they give you for the month right away and not wait like I did. All things considered, I'd give my quarantine experience a 4/5. It could have been a 5/5 if I had slightly better wifi :( but I am still grateful nonetheless for coming out of it with my stomach, health, and sanity in tact. Now that I am preparing to leave my home for the past 2 weeks in the morning, please look forward to touristy posts in the near future!! Bye for now ☆ After a 10 hour flight we officially landed in South Korea at Incheon International airport!! It was so surreal to actually be in Korea even if we were just at the airport.
When we landed I felt a rush of nerves and excitement for what the next 4 months had in store. However, before I got too far ahead of myself I had to get out of the airport. The group that I flew with made up about more than half of all the Shidler students studying abroad in South Korea for the semester so it was a very fun and lively time as we were all excited to be embarking on this new endeavor together. As far up cloud 9 I was about finally arriving in Korea, I instantly was met with reality as soon as I got off the plane and saw the line right outside that we had to wait in for covid-19 test result checks. I thought the entire airport arrival process was only going to take maybe 1 or 2 hours to get through the covid-19 regulations, immigration, customs, etc based on other students' experiences but I was terribly mistaken. If I recall correctly I stayed at the airport for approximately 6 hours after arriving which I should actually be thankful for because some other students that I flew with ended up staying longer than 6 hours as we were waiting for the designated taxis to drive groups to the quarantine hotels to drop them off then come back to retrieve the other remaining groups. So shoutout to Kelli and JJ for letting me leave first as they knew I had an online summer class the following morning <3. The average arrival process includes getting our covid-19 negative tests checked, immigration, customs, quarantine location proof checking, installing the mandatory quarantine tracking app and waiting for quarantine taxis to come and take us to our hotels. Upon getting off the plane we were immediately put into a line to get our covid-19 negative tests checked which took approximately two hours. The airport staff asked for our passport and a copy of the negative test which they kept. After we got through that line we thought we got past the worst of it but we ended up waiting for another 2 and a half hours to download our quarantine app as well as get our quarantine accommodation proof checked. After those two main lines we got through the remainder of the immigration process pretty quickly. We got our baggage and went through customs, ending with us finally getting outside of the gates. From there we again thought we were home free but we were struck with more waiting yet again for at least an hour as we had to wait for our quarantine taxi to come to the airport to take us to our designated hotels. Even though the process was quite lengthy, the airport itself was very organized throughout which I really appreciated. Additionally, the wait for the taxi wasn't too bad (for me at least, my fellow study abroad peers may beg to differ) because they did let us leave to go buy snacks at an indoor convenience store. Looking back I am super glad I was able to do this because I absolutely needed those snacks during quarantine. I often found myself wanting to snack out of boredom so if you do have to quarantine I highly recommend bringing lots and lots of snacks. Also, depending on your palette I guess sometimes you won't like the food that the quarantine accommodation provides so it is helpful to have snacks that you can eat in the case that does happen (as I’ve heard many horror stories about quarantine food). After arriving in South Korea at a little under 7 pm, I finally arrived at my hotel at 1:30 am. The staff at the hotel were extremely friendly and worried about us as they sent our dinner directly to us as soon as they could so I was thankful for their kindness during a slightly stressful time. Now that I’ve settled into the hotel a bit, bring it on 2 week quarantine !! Bye for now ☆ |
Sharon ♡Thank you for checking out my blog! For live updates about my time abroad you can follow my instagram Archives |