It’s 9:30 right now. I’m tired and spent a few hours crying. I just feel so overwhelmed and sad and hopeless. Covid really is not going away in the states anytime soon and I wish that the pandemic would end. I want to go home and change my visa and come back. But that doesn’t seem possible anytime soon. I’ll be back by September, probably. I want to stay in Korea. I want to feel like I belong. But I also know I need to really improve my Korean in order to do this.

Today I was so embarrassed in a restaurant. Usually I go out to eat with friends, but today I went to a new place where they sell tonkatsu for less than $3. It’s served with rice, miso soup, and salad and it is definitely worth the money. But when the server asked me what I wanted, I just froze. Being a non-Korean Asian gives me so many disadvantages here, but I also know I’m privileged to be a US citizen. Identity fluctuates and depends on your environment and the people around you as much as how you self-identify. And here I may look like I fit in at first, but I’m still very much an outsider. It’s a different type of feeling than being a POC in the US, but here… maybe a little more lonely because I don’t have friends and stability. If I could stay here longer and knew that I had a future here, I would feel better. But nothing is guaranteed. Nobody knows what is going to happen. No relationships are going to escape being impacted by covid.

I used to be really against teaching English abroad, but the more I learn about the Korean education system and the role that English plays internationally, the more I want to live abroad. I’m getting TEFL certified, doing an internship with a local non-profit in NY, helping a Korean nonprofit with their annual report, doing a externship with AT&T, and trying to figure out what I can do this fall.

I’ve decided I will do the semester online. I’ll graduate next semester and I can’t imagine going back to campus. I need to figure out how to ship my stuff back home though and I know that will be expensive. I have relied on my friends to help with storage, but I need someone else in my college town who I trust (and has a car) to help me ship the essential things back.

Now that the semester is over, it’s nice to have more free time. But it’s also hard without a structure in place. I want to sleep all day, but then I feel guilty for not being productive and I know that I have work to do. I signed myself up for so many things but I also feel so worthless.

I want to travel and have my friends visit and explore and be with my family and feel like I’m doing something right with my life. But I don’t know what I’m doing and I feel selfish for wanting to stay here.

In the beginning of the month, I took a trip with my language partner to her hometown in Ulsan. We also took a day-trip to Busan and Gyeongju. Once you’re outside of Seoul, you don’t hear much English. None of the local transportation had any English announcements/signs and many residents are older, so they don’t have as much of a need for it. Being outside of the city also made me realize how many older people there really are in Korea. I knew it was an aging population, but it was surprising to me since I had been around mostly young people in Seoul.

The seaside in Korea is beautiful, though. The water is clear and there are both rocky and sandy beaches. Lots of beautiful places to walk around and a lot more traditional markets. My language partner’s mom owns a cat cafe right by the sea and so I was able to have so many delicious snacks and beverages. Her family was really kind and generous. Her mother’s boyfriend talked to me in English and was very proud of it. They always ate good food and would stay up late and drink. I’m not a huge fan of alcohol, so I usually had juice. There were 15 cats in total that live at the cafe, so it was nice to cuddle with some animals. I miss them already. It seems like a really peaceful life.

I don’t know what I want to do with my life, but I know I want people around me who make me feel like I belong. I know I want to love and be loved and feel like what I’m doing matters. I get that here, but I know that I could get that in the states as well. It’s just not where I want to be right now, though. But during my college years, I’ve learned that I’ll be okay wherever I go. I may not be happy with it at first, but I adapt. Everyone has to adapt to live in their circumstances.

I moved to a new place and the landlady is really nice. She’s 65 and very active. She goes on walks and attends church every Sunday. She only knows Korean, so I communicate in my broken Konglish and translate on my phone. She is very patient and kind. She also cooks for me and the other 3 girls here. Sometimes she secretly cooks me a meal. I think she believes I can’t cook for myself. Whenever I cook, she always adds things to it and although I appreciate it, I feel so self-conscious about it. Today when I came back after working at a cafe, she gave me some homemade grape juice and potato pancakes.

The other girls I live with are funny and interesting as well. One girl is from Japan, but she recently got laid off because of covid, so she’ll be returning next month. 😦 One girl is from Norway and her boyfriend is Korean. She’s attending a Korean language program here so she can go to school for psychology. One girl is from Singapore and she is in her late-twenties/early-thirties. She graduated when she was 25 and worked, but not is studying Korean at Sogang like the Norwegian girl. Her boyfriend is back home and she doesn’t really know when she’ll head back yet.

This blog post doesn’t really have a direction. My mom just commented that I haven’t posted in a while and I felt like I should. I’ve started a new checklist system and it stresses me out, but also feels good to look at my priorities written down.

Questions that I’m thinking about:

• How much student debt is reasonable to pay off? How do I even start that process?
• What is a good salary? What’s the minimum I need to make to be happy and stable?
• What kind of job do I see myself doing?
• What makes me happy?
• What is a reasonable amount for me to spend on myself? On this semester? On my cost of living?
• Who can I surround myself that will support me unconditionally? How can I do the same for them?
• Why do I feel the need to be validated by outside relationships? Am I uncomfortable with being alone?
• What motivates me? What makes me feel good and hopeful about life?
• How will I be doing my courses in Korea? Will the time difference really throw me off?
• Why do I view food so negatively? I am okay with my body, but I still view food in a good/bad binary. I need to focus on nourishing myself and thinking about my health.
• What are the pros/cons of going abroad? What would retirement look like? I’m only 21, but I have no idea about that process.
• How to manage stress when it constantly feels like I’m being suffocated? How do I live in the moment? How do I go to a cafe and work without worrying about the money I am spending there? But isn’t it healthy to think about money? What is normal? How do I budget when I also know I have student debt waiting to be paid off?

Goals:

• Stay off social media. Take a break/decrease screen time
• Study Korean for an hour a day
• Work on my internship. Project is due by August
• Finish my TEFL course outline. Ideally by the end of the week.
• Work on the annual report and analyze other non-profits’ as examples
• work on the externship (last week!)
• Calm down and enjoy my time here
• Don’t think too much about the future, but also take care of myself/my future…. How???
• Continue calling my mom and sister
• Continue doing yoga with the interns I met from DC
• Go out to eat with friends and don’t feel too guilty about it
• Set a schedule for myself: Wake up, eat, exercise, shower, work, social time, bedtime, etc.

This was just a whole lot of unconnected thoughts and I haven’t proof-read it at all. I just needed to get some things off my chest.