The Arrival Store Blog

Today’s blog post comes from Nate Finch. Nate and his wife moved to Hanam-si, Korea. They most recently come from Chicago, IL, and blog about their time in Korea at http://twoseoulmates.com/ 

Hey everyone!

We know that there is a time and a season for everything. Travel, on the other hand, well, you’ve got to take advantage of it while you can!

We wanted to get you a few links to some low-cost carriers in and around South Korea. This is by NO means an exhaustive list, but we wanted to make sure you at least had a head start on planning your next getaway. Living abroad is such an amazing experience, and there are dozens of countries that you can get to from here. Time is short, and you might not have this opportunity again. Check out these carriers, and let us know if you know of others that we can add to this list.

(Low Cost) Carriers in East Asia

• Korean Air (we had to put this one in here for obvious reasons!)
• Jin Air (subsidiary of Korean Air)
• Jeju Air
• Air Asia 
• China Southern (not really low-cost, but not too unreasonable)
• China Eastern (same as China Southern)
• Peach Airlines
• Tee-way Air
• Eastar Jet
• Air Busan (you might want some help with this one)
• Eva Air (Round trip to Bangkok for less than $500)

Low Cost Carriers for South East Asia

Not all of these leave from Korea, but you can at least check them out if you’re bumming around South East Asia.

• JetStar
• Tiger Airways
• Cebu Pacific 
• Zest Airlines

Today’s post comes from Arrival Store Rep Kelsey Phillips. A California gal, Kelsey brings her years of experience and adventures in Korea to connect with expats coming over to live an work in Korea. One conversation with her, and it’ll change your life! Kelsey occasionally blogs at http://chroniclesofkels.blogspot.kr/

After living in Seoul for years and traveling back and forth multiple times, I’ve been asked to give advice to people of what to do and where to go in this incredible city a lot. Naturally, I thought I should go public with all the info I’ve compiled, so more people can benefit.

Of course, it’s coming from a female perspective, but hey… I like baseball too!  

• Samcheong-dong (Anguk Stn. Line 3)
• Insa-dong (Jonggak Stn. Line 1)
• Myeong-dong (Myeong-Dong Stn. Line 4)
• Dongdaemun (Dongdaemun Stn. Line 4/Line 1 intersection)
• Gangnam (Gangnam Stn. Line 2)— this is to the main gangnam station
• Apukjeoung (Apgujeong Stn. Line 3)— considered in Gangnam, but in a different ‘dong’… ritzy area
• Hongdae (Hongik Univ. Stn. Line 2)— gets crazy at night, but is really cute during the day and is a great place for dinner

• Manicure (everywhere!)
• Massage “Healing Hands” Itaewan // their location can be found here. Also… prices are more than reasonable and their English is great! YAY!) 070-7504-8090
• Shopping in Myeong-dong (outside area) or Dongdaemun (clothing import hub: from myeong-dong just tell at taxi driver “dong-day-moon doo-ta” and he will take you to this massive building that has tons of awesome stuff in it called “Doota”… the areas around the building though are where you find the nitty gritty deals, the building itself is well-priced ritzy stuff) here are some fellow-foreigners comments on it.
• Samcheong-dong: super cute. Windy alley ways, tradition homes, lots of art museums and cafes. Impossible to hate. A must see.
• Gyeongbokgung Palace: right next to Samcheong-dong and Insa-dong
• Souvenir Shopping in Insa-dong!

• Baseball Games: these are cheap and fun! Koreans are awesome fans to people-watch on a nice day. You are allowed to bring whatever food or drink in that you want to… so you can have a mini-picnic!! I would recommend seeing the LG Twins or the Doosan Bears (in Seoul).
• Seoul Tower or Namsan Tower (same thing): Seoul’s major landmark, great views (go on a clear day/night) lovers bring a lock and decorate it then lock it to a fence on the top to signify their love forever. Koreans like to think this is their idea, but its really based upon an talian book, where the lovers locked their lock on a bridge in Rome and threw the key into the ocean. Still pretty cute. IF you can’t go with your your friend (or date! haaay), I definitely recommend doing it on your own during the day… its easy to get to from any of the locations I named above in the “Places to Visit” section.
• Eat some (actually legit) non-Korean Bistro food at “Craftworks”… it gets crowded here, but its worth the wait (if you like good brews and quality food). The only way you will be disappointed is if it’s too busy to get a seat. Directions to Craftworks

• KTX Train to Busan: (2 hours from Seoul) Busan is the second largest city in Korea
• Bus to the East Sea (4 hours max I think): not such a big city, easy just to roll in and grab a hotel on the beach. I recommend Sokcho or Gangneung area… definitely the second if you are looking for less people.

• “Galbi” means meat in Korean… eat lots of it! Especially the BBQ!
• “Galbi Tong”: Beef soup
• “Dok-Galbi”: chicken meat stir fried with vegetables and thick rice noodles in spicy red sauce
• “Kimbop”:  Korean ‘sushi’
• “Bim-im-bop” : Korean salad-esk thing (not a salad, but not far off… rice based)
• “Mul-Nang-Myeong”: cold buck-wheat noodles served in an icy broth (only during warm weather)
• “Dok-bokke” popular street food.. super spicy but very Korean and usually pretty popular with the foreigners.

• “Ma-ko-lee” korean rice wine… nothing like wine, but I like it!
• “Soju” korean rice liquor… careful, its strong!
• Hite or Cass: Korean beer (both are rice based beers). I don’t drink beer, but my friends would call them “Shite” or “Ass”… but hey, they still drank them, so they couldn’t have been too bad!

• “Nori-bong” Directly translates to ‘singing room’. You and whoever can rent a private room anywhere (literally, these are everywhere) and sing your heart away for as long as you want to. Relatively cheap. Drink some Ma-ko-lee then sing your heart away  This is a picture of an awesome one in “Hongdae” (see places to visit) where you can have your own mini performance to the street below! It’s called “Luxury Noribong”
• “Jim-jil-bong” a public sauna. Women and men go their separate ways, then you walk nude freely among strangers of your same sex. I only went twice in my whole time there. They kind of gross me out, but they are definitely an experience! IF you are interested, I recommend calling the ‘secret weapon number’ and asking for a good one in the area near you.

• don’t tip (ever… no one, at any time. sometimes Koreans actually get offended when tipped. I know, its weird, but awesome!!)
• two-hands is better than one (when handing something to someone, giving it to them with two hands is more polite/shows more respect and care)
• if someone offers you food, they are just trying to show you they accept you. so just eat it
• when using public transportation, some Koreans may push/shove/cut in line (usually the really old people)… don’t take it personal, its not you.
• a Korean’s ‘bubble’ or space-awareness is way smaller than ours, so if someone is standing really close to you, even though its not crowded, don’t worry.

• “Hello”: an-young-ha-say-yo (i know, its long)
• “Thank you”: come-sahm-knee-dah
• “Yes”: nay
• “No”: ah-knee-yo
• “Same”: same-same
• “Ok”: ok
• “Left”: when-joke
• “Right” oh-ren-joke
• “Straight” jook-jin

Today’s blog post comes from Nate Finch. Nate and his wife moved to Hanam-si a few months ago. They most recently come from Chicago, IL, and blog about their time in Korea at http://twoseoulmates.com/

I should also say that I am NOT a speaker of the Korean language. I can order up to three kimbaps, two mandus, and a partridge in a pear… Anyway, as I’ve been struggling to knuckle down and learn this language, I’ve found and received recommendations for some helpful resources that I think everyone trying to learn Korean could benefit from. These are resources that you can use on your own time, and go at your own pace, whether you’ve got a full-time or part-time job, work mornings, afternoons or nights.

English: The Chinese characters “한국어, 조선말” meaning Korean, (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Resource #1: Discipline!

This is obvious to anyone trying to learn a language. To hear and understand, speak and write any language takes discipline. There is the daily discipline of learning vocabulary and grammar (see resources below), and the discipline of making yourself listen to and produce the language you’re studying. If there’s one thing Megan and I have found in our short time in Korea, especially living so close to Seoul, you can go all day without having to speak or read a word of Korean. Signs are in English everywhere, more than a few strangers speak English, and body language can go a long way. Putting myself in a situation where I am forced to comprehend and produce Korean will be essential to language acquisition  And, since these situations are something I can easily avoid, it takes discipline to get in there and speak what little I can right now.

Ok, enough of me pontificating; to the language resources!

Resource #2: Talk to Me in Korea (TTMIK)

TTMIK is becoming a phenomenon, riding the KPop and Podcasting tide and arriving in the hearts and MP3 players of the masses. In just four years, they racked up over 15 million downloads of their content, and over 100,000 followers, so you know they’re doing something right!  TTMIK currently has nine levels of Korean, with around twenty-five lessons in each level. Each lesson is about 10-15 minutes long and is typically a combination of audio (the podcast) and a information sheet about the lesson (in PDF format that can be downloaded along with the podcast. I typically listen to these podcasts and follow along on the PDF in the morning before I head out to work. It’s a fun and refreshing way to start off my Korean days.  Hyunwoo, Kyeong-eun and the other teachers are very conversational and make Korean seem a lot easier than it actually is (which can be difficult to do. You can subscribe to them in iTunes here, or find their YouTube channel here.

Resource #3: Live Mocha

Live Mocha is an online language learning community that encourages collaboration and constructive feedback from its users. It’s social networking for language learning. You can sign up for free, and there are plenty of free language levels and units. For Korean, there are four levels with ten total units of language. They are all broken up into four sections per unit: Learn, Review, Write and Speak. You cannot move on to the next unit until you have completed all the sections. The kicker is that you can write out your exercises and record yourself and other Korean speakers in the community will review your work and give you pointers. You can also review others’ English (or whatever language you speak proficiently) and earn tokens for use on the paid language levels. It’s a great community for helping and being helped along the way in your language acquisition.

Resource #4: YouTube

There are a TON of resources for just about everything on YouTube. With tens of thousands of new videos uploaded everyday, there is always a new take on learning Korean, and plenty of people making their presence known. Once helpful place to start is here to learn the alphabet. Follow the links to learn more about writing the alphabet, double consonants, and complex vowels (yes, Korean is a whole new world of fun, even in the way letters are combined!). Let’s face it, audio is good (see resources #2 and #3), but video is typically more engaging, and you can find plenty to learn on YouTube, from how to say “Hello!” to tell people that you can’t speak Korean (in Korean… Haha… Get it?!)

Resource #5: Anki Flashcards 

If you’re interested in learning ANYTHING (but especially Korean) you will  have to do some memorizing. Anki Flashcards is probably the best program out there for flashcards and memory repetition. Create your own flash cards, or download from thousands of shared decks. I flash through these guys pretty much every day, and I’m surprised at how well the repetition and algorithm work, even when I feel everything I’m learning is leaking out of my brain! Note: Anki is free for use on desktops and Android mobile devices, but is a paid application on iOS devices.

The last thing I will say is that language learning is HARD!  This leads us to…

Resource #6 (Commisurate with) Others!

“No man [sic] is an island” and “misery loves company” are essential phrases to remember for learning a language. While you might from time to time, talking to yourself is not the best way to learn a language. You need others to chat with, correct you, encourage you and get frustrated with you. Language is about communication; arguably the most important part of learning a language is to understand–and be understood by–others. Whether you’re hitting a wall in your learning or frustrated beyond imagination (or both), other people will help you along the way. This last resource might not be free, and definitely might not be on your own time, but it will be worth the bill and travel time.

Have fun!

Related articles and resources.

• 7 Ways to Learn Korean for Free
• Let’s Learn Korean
• Learn-Korea.net

Today’s blog post comes from Nate Finch. Nate and his wife moved to Hanam-si a few months ago. They most recently come from Chicago, IL, and blog about their time in Korea at http://twoseoulmates.com/

Whether you’re  new or old to Korea,  or whether you’re  new or old to the smartphone experience, apps are ubiquitous and here at The Arrival Store, we get a lot of questions about apps: “How do I download them?” “How do I delete them”  “Which one’s should I get?” and “My battery drains SO fast with these apps, what can I do?!”

 We put our heads together here, and came up with answers to the last two questions, as they are more particular, less intuitive than the other two. You can definitely look on YouTube for the other two questions. These apps are especially relevant to anyone with an Android based phone, but if you’re running iOS5 or iOS6, take a look at these apps as well. These are all free, by the way^_^.

 Essential Apps:

AppKiller This app is for everyone who has wondered what to do about their battery life, especially Android phones. When I got an Android-based phone recently, I noticed my battery life was about as good as my three-year-old, well “loved” (well used) iPhone 3G. I would charge to 100%, and then see myself at 30% around lunchtime. What the heck? Apps that are heavy (like games or video) and others that constantly run in the background can drain your battery. I was advised to get an “app killer” program. While there are a few out there, Advanced Task Killer is the app that I use. I have it set to kill apps when I lock my phone, and I can manually kill apps as well. Victory. Last night, I still had 20% battery left as I plugged my phone in before I went to bed.
Kakao Talk If you have a smartphone in Korea, you don’t have a smartphone until you get Kakao Talk. It’s like saying you’ve been to Paris and missed the Louvre, or Chicago and didn’t eat a deep dish pizza (for shame!). Kakao Talk allows you to send texts, group chat, call phones with Kakao Talk on them, and play games, meet new people, shop, etc. all over the data network. This allows you to use the data network to do most everything you need to for communication out of one app. And with the plethora of WIFI hotspots available to SK, KT, and LG users, why wouldn’t you?

Jihachul If you live in  Seoul, Busan, Daegu, Daejon, or Gwangju, you should probably get this app. Jihachul (“Subway” in Korean) has maps and route information, time tables and route planners in Korean, English and Japanese. Even if you don’t live in one of these majoy cities, you will probably visit them at some point. This app is so handy!

Dodol Everyone wants to be able to track the usage of their minutes, texts and data. Dodol is probably the easiest way to keep track of all this. If you know your carrier and plan, there are options for that and it will automatically update. You can also set the dates for the beginning and end of your usage period (TAS bills from the first to the end of the month). It’s pretty good at minutes and texts, though it combines data and WIFI usage (**so your actual data use may be misrepresented).

Google Translate Since Word Lens is not available in Korea (yet!), you will probably want something that is just as effective. Google Translate has already saved me some surprise a few times, form translating “Do Not Enter” to “Sold Out” so that I didn’t look like a fool, or get into trouble (thanks Google Translate!). It requires a basic knowledge of the Korean alphabet and how to type it out. It’s very easy to read and write, even if you can’t speak Korean.

Some Other Apps to Consider:

Aenipang ( 애니팡 ) If you’ve ridden the subway or bus, or have ever interacted with a Korean about their smartphone, you’ve probably been exposed to Aenipang. It’s a basic puzzle game with a Korean twist. For the quick fix and extended play. You’ll get addicted!

Chrome If you use Chrome for your main browsing purposes on your desktop or laptop, then you might want to get Chrome for your phone. Syncs your bookmarks and is just as fast, intuitive, and all-around great web-browsing experience, even on the phone.

AnkiDroid Flashcards If you’re interested in learning ANYTHING (but especially Korean) you’ll probably have to do some memorizing. AnkiDroid Flashcards is probably the best program out there for flashcards and memory repetition. Create your own flash cards, or download from thousands of shared decks.

iTourSeoul Even if you don’t live in or around Seoul, you’ll probably come and visit sometime! iTourSeoul is a basic travel guide with information on the sites of Seoul. Neighborhoods, transportation, restaurants, whatever you need to make your time in Seoul a memorable and well-informed time!

Craigslist Whether you need a used camera, a bike, or some more stuff for your “furnished” apartment, Craigslist might be a good option for you (especially if you’re in Seoul). I tend to look here first, as there are some good deals, and I’ll most likely be dealing with other expats. It’s no GMarket, for sure, but it beats HomePlus and EMart prices almost everytime!

There are of course tens of thousands of apps, and these are all for Android phones. Ask others what apps they use, and  add your own experience. Maybe even make your own app?

What apps do you use that you have found most helpful for life in Korea?

This post comes from the Megan and Nate Finch. They live in Hanam-si, just south east of Seoul. They thought they would share their experiences of moving in. Many expats are shocked to find some Korean apartments so dirty. This post is quoted directly from their blog: http://twoseoulmates.com/ . Enjoy, but don’t lose your lunch!

So, you might have noticed, but there has been a significant passage of time since our last update. That’s simply due to the fact that 1) I am lazy and 2) I was dreading the next entry. It is an experience that I never hope to relive and I have nightmares about if I dwell on too much. Trying to dredge up the horrible memories took a good deal of gearing up and mental preparation. So here goes nothing.

THE MOVE.

As the spoiler in our last post told you, we did not get to stay in our big, beautiful apartment. The situation, in brief, was that my school was originally renting it out to a a bunch of students who went to the school. The students all left and the school was left with a huge apartment and no one to live in it. So they gave it to us, hoping we wouldn’t mind living there with the other English teacher. But that didn’t really work. Not only were we hesitant (and a little weirded out that they would ask us) to live with a complete stranger, but she was too! So while we didn’t have the guts to tell my school no, she did. (whew!) But that meant they were getting rid of the big, beautiful apartment and sticking us both in separate, smaller places. So we moved.

Now, something about moving in Korea. It’s gross. In America, when you move you have to clean your apartment or else you won’t get your damage deposit back. It is a BIG pain in the butt, but something that we all just suck up and do. In Korea, that is not the case at all. The cleaning duty falls on the new tenant to clean out the last tenant’s nastiness. It is a tradition that I could live without. But we had no choice, we had to move. We weren’t dreading it though. My school told me that they had already gone and cleaned it for us, so that we would get to skip the usual dirty-Korean-apartment initiation. Great!!! So the day comes and…

Yuuuuuuup. Lies!! It was SO dirty!

Here are the Highlights…

The bathroom walls. They were a beautiful dingy orange which required hours of scrubbing. This lovely film covered pretty much every surface in the apartment.

(Click to enlarge… But be careful… It might get ya!!!)

The hair. We got to clean the previous tenant’s thick, black hair from every crevice including the shower, the drains, and the fridge?!?!

The freezer. At first we couldn’t open it because it was broken but once that was fixed we were greeted with…a huge block of ice!! Our freezer has drawers and someone decided it would be a good idea to fill them with water and freeze it!! Because, well, why not?

Honorable mentions: We would also like to give a shout-out to the mountains for mouse poop under our sink that Nate got the joy of cleaning out and the black mold that has found its way into every crevice of the bathroom and was overtaking the fridge. And how can we forget the “baseboard” border of black dirt (soot?) that bordered our tiny studio apartment… as well as the window sills… and the windows…

Thank you to all participating forms of grime for giving us a total of 12 hours of intense, deep-cleaning fun. We appreciate all that you added to our move-in experience.

Stay tuned for the new tour!!