Navigating Healthcare
A Guide for Foreign and Multicultural Families By Vibhanshu Maurya Navigating a foreign healthcare system can be a complex experience, especially for expatriates and multicultural families. This is particularly true … Read More
Category: Expat Living
The Legendary and Powerful Gotgam: How to Make Dried Persimmons
By Grace Chun Around the time of Chuseok (추석), my maternal grandmother always retells the story of the tiger and the dried persimmons, or gotgam (곶감). My grandmother’s version of … Read More
A 30-Year Love Affair: How a ticketing mistake brought me to the city of the living instead of the city of the dead
By Charles Vallerand “Why did we have to take a three-hour bus ride from Gyeongju to come to Gwangju?” asks my partner Riana. I answer: to see my friend Professor … Read More
Foraging Through the Seasons
By Grace Chun While there are some that bemoan the length of winter, the appreciation that such winters build for the coming spring is unparalleled. The fact that spring miraculously … Read More
Love That Makes You Feel at Ease
The adjustment to the new surroundings, meeting new people, settling down at a new home, and cooking were all a hassle. Also, the advanced technology they have here is among the best on the planet. Maybe, I was just drowning in darkness and wanted to touch the light and feel warmth in the cold weather at that time.
My Taste of Gwangju!
The winter vacation was long, and I tried many things, but I wanted to share some of them with you so that you may check out other programs at the ACC or other locations in Gwangju, such as the gallery, or try these delicacies. Even if we aren’t a big shot yet, and even if we’re pissed off most of the time, we can still enjoy the little things in life.
Goodbye, South Korea
You go on adventures, you talk to strangers like you have not done before, you hitchhike… The world is suddenly full of possibilities that you had not considered. They say that “the sky is the limit,” but one should add, “especially when you are abroad.” You are free and strangely bereft of the habits you had in your day-to-day life in your country of origin, which allows you to create a new “un-routinely” routine, full of exploration and discoveries.
Gwangju as an Exchange Student – Expectations Versus Reality
That is what I came looking for in Gwangju: the traditions and culture that South Korea is currently evolving from. Gwangju is not the increasingly global society of Seoul; a foreigner here can still get the experience of alterity that should go with any real travel. People can still be surprised here with your altogether “otherness,” be it the way you dress, the way you talk, or the color of your eyes. One Korean friend, in fact, told me that the blue or green color of the eyes of some of his Occidental acquaintances was what struck him the most when meeting them.