5 Best/Worst Things About Life in Korea

So, I'm leaving Korea on Wednesday. While I'm excited to be going to Germany next (and going back to the US on leave for a few weeks), I am sad to be leaving. I figured I'd let you know what I've found to be the best and worst things about life in Korea (from the perspective of someone living on a military base). Here goes:


5 best things (in no specific order)

1. Kid friendly environment: People here LOVE kids! Anytime a baby (especially an American baby) is around, people of all ages (both males and females) will come up and touch the baby, want to hold the baby, talk to the baby, etc. Also, they have wonderful parks for kids in strange locations. You'll be walking among houses which are basically nothing more than shacks and suddenly you come upon a beautiful new playground!

2. Friends: I have made some of the best friends here in Korea (and gotten to know others much better:)). I think this stems from being placed in an environment outside my comfort zone. Thanks to everyone who has made my life so much better and taught me so many new things about life.

3. Public transportation: I lived in DC and the metro was great, but the public transportation in Korea beats it all. You can take buses almost everywhere, the subway system is great (and in both Korean and English almost everywhere), and ITT on base has buses and trips of their own. I wish more cities in the US where like this!

4. Historical culture: Korea has a wonderful wealth of cultural exhibits, relics, historical villages and the DMZ. Since most countries have been in existence much longer than the United States, they do have somewhat of an unfair advantage when it comes to historical attractions, but Korea still takes the cake!

5. AFN commercials: This one made it on both my best and worst lists. For those of you that don't know, AFN stands for Armed Forces Network. Basically, it's military cable that has random programs at random times and tries to give us some semblance of American TV. The reason it's on my best list is because the commercials are really educational and hopefully help direct people to the resources they need.


5 worst things (in no specific order)

1. Pushing in airport/lines: No matter where you are, if there's a line, people are pushing. It’s as if they seem to believe that they will win a prize if they can just shave a few seconds of their waiting time. This perplexed me at first; in most other situations the Korean people seem much more laidback than Americans. However, I've come to realize that my recognition of the pushing/rushing is more due to the infringement of my personal space. I don't think Koreans (and many other cultures around the world) seem to have the need for personal space; however, I am truly American in that respect!

2. Driving: In four words, KOREAN DRIVERS ARE CRAZY! So I don't seem prejudice against Koreans, the drivers in Thailand and China are also crazy. I mean this in the nicest possible way. Here it is truly the "survival of the fittest" on the roads. Street signs are optional, stop signs/stop lights are only suggestions. You get my point. I have found, however, that the pedestrians strictly obey the cross walk signals, not walking one second before the walk signal changes. (This is probably b/c they know that the drivers may not stop for the crosswalk and they are taking their lives in their hands at any crossings!)

3. Space available patients: This is no end to frustration with this. Long story short: there are many Americans living in Korea with military contacts who are entitled to some military care (like emergency care) but are supposed to have a primary doctor (civilian Korean doctor) to oversea the majority of their care. However, due to the language barrier, financial costs and the feeling that the military should provide for all their care, most do not get a civilian doctor. This leads to many problems: serious medical problems go untreated, meds aren't taken or refilled, etc. These people are often then seen in the ER when they're in crisis leading to admission to hospitals which they often need to front the costs for and then get reimbursed. People on all sides of this issue then complain about this. From the medical prespective, it's frustrating because I see people who aren't getting the real care they need (whether because of the system of by choice).

4. Living in base housing: Think college dorms, but w/ mold. Now you're probably thinking that I should just do my dishes sooner/clean my room; however, the mold I speak of is not mold in the dorm rooms, it's mold in the common areas (hallways, common room, etc). There is a simple explanation and solution for the mold problem; stop the raining from the ceilings! Yes, you read this correctly. In the year that I have lived in the dorms, on a normal day there has been water dripping from the ceiling somewhere in the dorm. Housing’s solution to this problem is to place a bucket under that area of the ceiling that is dripping. When the bucket overflows, the carpet is left to absorb the rest (that is until the carpet is saturated and mold begins to form). Just so you don't think that I'm biased, I'll add that this isn't just an isolated problem in my dorm. I discovered about a week ago that in the control room of the emergency department, there is a bucket in the ceiling (yep, you heard me right, IN THE CEILING above the ceiling panels) that fills with water that leaks from above (apparently NOT from the sewer system which is where we were initially told the water was coming from). The bucket is changed out every couple of weeks. Apparently this has been going on for about 6 months. Instead of fixing the root of the problem, they just change the bucket! Does anyone she a problem with this?

5. AFN commercials: Like I said before, these are both good and bad. The "never shake your baby" commercial may drive me to shake a baby if I had one. Then there are some commercials that just don't make sense. I still don't fully understand the "Let's talk about talk" commercial. It tells me that I can talk about stuff and I'm protected but then I can't. Yep, doesn't make sense to me. If you're interested in seeing samples of any of these commercials, you can get some of them on youtube.com by searching for AFN commercials.

Well, that's it; I’m done with my ranting and raving. Feel free to chime in with you own thoughts on this!

All in all I've had a wonderful time here and have had many great new life changing/growing experiences!