The End of the Line.

After twenty months and eight seasons in the land of kimchi, my time here in Korea is almost over. I have three weeks prior my GRE exam, six weeks prior to my defense,  and eight weeks before I get my new passport so I can travel again. From there, I have to face the million dollar question that is Where to? 

But before deciding my next step, it is highly fitting to look back on one of the best decisions of my life.  This is one of my greatest feat in life. You see, two years ago, I was a whiny employee who hates every single day of the week that isn't Saturday, Sunday or a holiday. I hated my job. I always thought that I was too good for that company and that I wasn't a fit in an environment that does not encourage class and etiquette. I worked in a company where my father was once a top boss and I hated living under his shadow. I had all the excuses. I was too proud of myself. I knew that something was wrong with me and that I needed a change. 

The opportunity to study in Korea came just in time but nevertheless, it wasn't an easy decision to make. I had to persuade my parents to let go of their daughter. It was difficult for me to pause my career clock because I know years of experience matters a lot in my field. Two months prior leaving, I was still going to job interviews and job hunting because I wanted to know if this is the right decision for me. But like they said, you just know when you found the one. So I trusted that gut feeling, grew some woman balls and took that plane to Korea. The rest, my friends, is a long and wonderful journey.

I was able to send myself to grad school in a good engineering university without any financial support from my parents. I survived a country that speaks a different language and I learned the language! I met a lot of people -- great people, if I may add -- and these people opened my eyes to the world. And most importantly, I learned a lot of life lessons. I finally have my own story. The great adventure of Heidy. The girl who grew a set of balls. The girl who followed her guts. The girl who fell in love in a foreign land. Yes, I fell in love with a Korean man. But that is another long story for another post (It's going to be legen- wait for it!)

But it's now time to go. I have to decide on whether I go home, find my luck here, or go forward to the direction of my original dream. My life is in a limbo right now. I haven't seen any opportunities either here, home, or in another country. Zero. I'm just moving through my days with faith, hoping that God will show me the way. Add the anxiety that decision-making at 24 is not as easy when I was 22. I'm not getting any younger. I can't just blindly follow my passion. Adult responsibilities are tailing me and I can't escape it anymore. I have to consider my career. I have to consider the near future of settling down and the stable career that I need to sustain a family. I have to consider my gifts and talents that will fuel my determination to succeed in life. I have to go somewhere that will add more value to my life.

But God has a plan. He has a better plan. Everything will be alright.... everything will be alright....
I'll see you at my next starting line.

My Korean Friends

Next week marks m y 8th month in Korea and for the nth time I want to say that time really flies so fast. Weather is becoming really cold these days and the foliage is getting to its peak. It’s beautiful. And just as the leaves are starting to change its colors, my life as well has been changing drastically when fall arrived. The pressure to deliver good experiment results doubled, if not tripled, as we prepare for several conferences wherein we will present our study to the research community. My professor is demanding more results which meant more time to spend in the lab. It’s tiring. 

I haven’t spoken about the Koreans that I mingle with everyday coz my judgment might be wrong, but after eight months of being with them I can now say that I genuinely like them. They cannot talk to me so much, but they try their best to be nice in whatever way that they can and it’s enough. I have become good friends with three Korean people who have helped me during the first months that I was struggling in Korea. And until now, whenever we get miserable with our experiments, they are my go-to people. We eat together, go to the lake together, drink together and all that. These might not be too much for them, but for me it meant the whole world. 

Having few people in the new city, you'll genuinely love them for showing you their town, for taking you in to their hearts, and for looking out for you. Which they will. Being the outsider, you'll rely on locals to aid your transition in adjusting to the new city, and their self-less kinship will warm your heart. Turns out, you can't rely on everyone, but someone will always be there for you. 

The sudden shift on the weather and the increasing stress made me realize that all my hardships in my research became very bearable because of these people. They cannot speak their minds but they let me feel through their actions that I have a friend in them. All those little things like buying donuts because they know I haven't had lunch yet, giving ginseng tea because I have cold, those beer nights because they want to cheer me up will never be forgotten. I am so glad that I am realizing these things as early as now. We might not meet again after graduation but I will do my best to cherish these people with the little time that I have.

Dad in Seoul

I thank the Lord for giving me a father who supported my dream even if that meant that he had to let me go. For a very selfless father who is willing to give everything that I need even if I am already an adult. For a very strict father who raised me with such morals and principles. For a very smart dad who taught me everything that I am now. For a very loving daddy who crossed the ocean just to visit me.

All those times that my dad and I were walking down the streets of Seoul, I was silently and sincerely thanking the heavens for my family. Four days with my dad is a very short time but it's enough to refresh my soul on the feeling when someone is taking care of me. I have been looking out for myself for quite some time so I tend to forget what it’s like to have someone who got my back.

However, the trip has allowed me to realize how good it is for me to live away from my family. Don’t get me wrong; our vacation was one of the best weekends of my life but I realized that it’s not good for me to come back to that kind of comfort and dependence again. From time to time, I will always need their help and support but I will never be the spoiled daddy’s girl anymore.

Every single day, I thank the Lord for all these learnings.

The End of First Quarter.

It was Monday morning and I was drinking coffee, browsing journal articles, and skimming for possible explanations for the result of my last week's experiment. I was busy making my lab report that contains unexplained data and silently praying that my professor will not have any bizarre idea for my next week's task. I was supposed to write a rant post about the never-ending failures of my experiment. 

But then I looked at my calendar that says "August 25" and realized that hey, it's my 6th month in Korea! I've lived for exactly half a year, two seasons, twenty four weeks in the Land of the Morning Calm. 

And in that span of time I have experienced many first times:

- my first snowfall. It was almost two in the morning and I was on my way home when that first drop of snow hit my face. I had fever that time but I spared a minute to enjoy my first ever snowfall. 

- first spring. Cherry blossoms are beautiful. I have no words for it! Pink trees all over the pavement, flowers blooming everywhere.. thank God for all of it. 

- cooked my first Adobo and Chopsuey! I never knew how to cook anything when I was in the Philippines. My recent weight gain due to excessive frying motivated me to cook healthier and more delicious food other than fried eggs. 

- bought a phone entirely on my own money. And it felt five times more expensive. 

- got lost in a city and had to get my way back by... taxi. Of course.

- cried in the subway. Hey I was lonely, stressed, frustrated, and emotional so I was very fragile. Cut me some slack haha. 

- cried involuntary in the lab. With my labmates with me. Good news: I wiped the girly tears right away. Sad news: They saw the red eyes. 

- became good friends with students from different parts of the world. And boy have I learned a lot of things. 

So many things have happened to me and surely more things will continue to happen. Whenever I think that I have lived this length of time away from home, it motivates me to go on and live more. To bear more. To learn more. My story goes on. Six months done, eighteen precious months to go. 

Moment of Weakness

For the past three months I have been continuously thriving and adjusting to the new way of life, trying to make new friends and keeping up with the lifestyle. Yes, there are a lot of good sides but I will be a hypocrite to say that there was never a time when my life here sucked. I’ve had moments of weakness.There are days that I feel the huge disadvantage of living in a country where I cannot communicate properly. You cannot imagine the feeling of not being able to access through the school portal because it’s in Hanggul, or the feeling whenever I cannot order a pizza for delivery. Sometimes I ask help from a middle school student because all the buttons on the laundry machine is in Korean. It’s disheartening to live like this, like a handicap, and sometimes it just gets to me, inside me. There are days that I feel just like floating in a sea of gibberish, wanting to understand but sadly I cannot. I want to make a lot of friends here but sometimes I feel that I will never be one of them. I’m always “the” foreigner. Always an outcast. Someone who can never understand. 

Oh well, there will be better days. Cheer up.

Two Springs

I have awesome friends back home who have so much life and career ahead of them. I have a family who is very willing to support me in every endeavor I make. And that’s it – they are all of my happiness. I’m not saying that they are not enough for me but sometimes I wonder if I depend much of my happiness on other people that I forget to be happy with myself. Now I’m away from all of them and I’m trying to be as happy as my photos seem to be but remove all the cherry blossoms, good views, the coats and scarves …I have nothing. I have no one. I’m alone in this. I’m just a struggling student in a public university trying to learn as much on this dignified researcher / post grad stint that will only last for two springs. After two years, more of my friends would have been married, started a family, got promoted and what not. My brother would be getting his first job and my sister will be in high school by then. All of the big moments will happen when I’m out of the picture and it scares the shit out of me.

My First Month in Korea

How time flies! My first month in Korea is coming up (Feb 25!). I feel like so many things have happened in the past month and I think it's the brighter side of being in a foreign land -- every day I can have lots of new stories to tell. 

After the period of settling and adjusting, my life here has been finding its pace. 

Since the weather is still very chilly and in single digits, I still cannot find my guts to run. But when I have the time to spare in the morning, I chill in front of the field, sit on the bleachers and watch the students play soccer. And take a selfie, of course. 

I have started to learn the equipment for our lab experiments. Pictures below are the extruder and the injection mold. Each has separate rooms which the school decided to scrimp on so it has no available heater. I am freezing every time I run an experiment! 

This injection mold is the pain in my ass. I used compression mold at my previous job so I know how it works. Also, I know that setting up this mold is very difficult for a girl. See that silver square thing? I literally cannot carry it to its place. I can not even move it! That's how heavy it is. This machine is hot, heavy and dangerous.  Physically challenging.

School hours in Korea is different than in the Philippines. Students can stay in school until whenever they want and nobody will care. Some grad students even bring their folding bed to sleep on for overnight experiments. Hope it doesn't have to happen to me. Heh. 

Required lab hours is from 10am to 6pm. On busy days I stay in the lab until 9pm or until my professor goes home (cannot go home before him). I don't like doing my coursework in the lab so I go straight to the library until 12 midnight. 

I sleep in on Saturdays, do my laundry, cook (wow!) and then I continue my school work after lunch. 

I spend my Sundays with my Filipino friends. We go to Yawoori -- Cheonan's Metropolitan area --  to eat, do our groceries, and just relax.  

This has been my pretty hectic life so far in the Land of the Morning Calm. 

More months to come! More stories to blog! Anyeong~ ^^ 

Heidy and the Seniority Culture

Koreans are very sensitive to age. Whenever I get introduced to Koreans, the first thing they ask is my age rather than my name. Because when someone is older than me, I have to use "jondaemal" (formal language) since it is a sign of respect. In Filipino ways, it is like using po and opo. 

By definition graduate students like me are higher than undergrad students but unfortunately, I am younger  than the two undergrad students in our laboratory. I call them unni and oppa "ate and kuya" because they are a year older than me but they feel weird having a grad student call an undergrad a senior. Because by degree, I'm the senior one. 

Honestly, if I were in the Philippines, it bloody doesn't matter. 

Don't get me wrong. I'm not a rude person. I pay respect to older people like my professors, ahjushis, ahjummas and whenever age matters when it should. But the seniority culture rubs me off the wrong way when merit issue comes in. Sometimes I wonder.. Does this country put a person's skills, knowledge and experience behind just because someone is older than him? Because with this issue, I believe age is just a number. 

Just putting my two cents worth. 

Things to Remember When Korea's Charms Wear Off.

For many people like me, living in another country is always exciting at first. Many aspects of the local culture will appear strange at its best. We notice all the better things on this country than what we have at home. 

I've been in Korea for just two weeks so I'm still honeymoon-ing with this foreign land. But of course there are times when the reality that I'm in a far, far away country sinks in on me. I get frustrated when I can't find something and I remember that it was left in the Philippines. I self-pity when I want to eat a scrumptious meal but I don't know how to cook it; and I can't resolve on eating out because that will cost me a lot of money so I end up eating whatever cereals or bread I have in the apartment. I miss my family and friends everyday and all the emotional and physical comfort they have provided to me. 

So yes, my Instagram photos didn't get it all. I'm not here for a grand vacation and every day isn't rainbows and butterflies. My stay here is a combination of harsh wind, blessed sunlight, snow and spring breeze. 

I found a very helpful article below that will hopefully help me cope when Korea's charms wear off.

Downtown Cheonan (at Yawoori)

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Allow yourself to miss things: food, clothes, being able to communicate easily. Don’t allow yourself to miss: narrow thinking, getting bored, feeling trapped.

Learn the language but don’t get upset with yourself if it’s difficult and takes time to master. Enjoy the period where you can sit in coffee shops and restaurants and not have to block out inane chatter. It’s effortless when it’s all gibberish.

Get used to the problems of the country not really being your problems. You don’t have a say in them, so it’s easier if you just accept them as they are — out of your control. Don’t worry, it’s an easy feeling to get used to; it actually becomes comforting.

Use the Internet and watch it become even more amazing than it already is. Used together with a little improvisation, you can get almost anything you would be consuming back home — music, movies, books, food, clothes. Almost everything. Where I live the foreigners talk a lot about missing good avocados. You get over it.

If you have a phone, call your family every week. It helps keep you feeling normal. It also preempts them from sending you emails complaining about your absence.

Take comfort in knowing that once you got beyond your country’s borders you already began winning. If you can stay out for at least a year than there’s a very real chance you’ll be able to stay out in the world indefinitely. I spent my first two decades in America. That’s a quarter of a normal life in the same country. More than enough. Once you get the foreign-life inertia in motion, the longer you stay away the easier it is to keep going.

Know that most places in the world where you would end up living for any real period of time can get you to an airport in a day. From there you should be able get home in one more day. You can live on the other side of the world and if something requires you to get home you can probably get there in no more than two days.

Give up on where you’re from but don’t give up on the people. Your friends back home won’t forget about you. They will move on with their lives without you, and they might resent you, but they will still listen to your stories if your stories are good.

On those days when a really simple thing could be easily handled if you were back home, and you get frustrated, and you start really wishing you could go back home — maybe you should do it. Maybe you should go back home and stay there. Maybe you don’t belong overseas. The frustrations are what teach you the most. But if you’re too strong or proud or stubborn for that, then try and remember that every day you live in a foreign country you get better at it. Every day you live abroad you learn something — about yourself, about the country you live in, and about how there is always more than one way to look at something.

Date someone from the country you’re living in. Or don’t. There is no certain way to go about this. It has caused mixed outcomes in my fellow expats. Almost always the relationship improves their understanding of the country and their facility with the language. It also without fail is the cause of no small frustration and trouble. Go forth at your own risk.

Plan on making friends that will stick. Living together in a strange place together binds you. The only problem with the friends you make is that they, like you, have caught a full dose of the itinerant lifestyle, and it won’t be long before they’re off to somewhere else.

Try to keep your head. Another country might make you forget who you are and where you came from, and maybe that’s what some of you want. That’s a big part of it. But no one ever fully escapes where they came from, or who they are, and once you come to terms with that you’ll be able to really enjoy yourself. It’s a good, interesting life if you can handle it.

Hello from Korea!

First post from the Land of the Morning Calm!

It’s been a week since I arrived in Korea and as far as first impressions can say, all is well in Korea.

1) Weather – It is now the start of spring so the weather ranges from 0 to 8 degrees every day. Pretty warm in Korea's stanard. Sometimes, the wind from the north gets pretty bad so it feels like friggin negative especially when I am out of the apartment at night.

2) Transportation – Anything better than Philippines’ transportation is good enough for me. But seriously Incheon International Airport is one of the world’s best. Bus system / Train / Subway system in the city is also impressive. And most importantly, no traffic.

3) Security – Generally, Korea is a safe country when mugging is the concern. At the airport, people just leave their luggage to go to the restroom, buy food, etc. People don’t normally lock their apartments. My lab mates leave their bag and other personal effects at the lab. No trust issues.

4) People - HUGE language barrier, goddamit. It’s like ME vs KOREA when it comes to communication. There is less barrier at school since most students can communicate in English (though not much), but it’s like a war when I get out. Ahjummas and ahjushis don’t know how to speak English. Honestly, if not for the language barrier, Korea is a good place to live in. My labmates are thoughtful and hospitable enough. Just don't know until when. Hehehe.

5) Support group - is GREAT. There are about more than twenty Filipino scholars around Cheonan area, nine of us are in one school together. All of the graduate students in KNU are from UST, and they are really supportive. They take care of our initial needs, accompanies us to groceries, church, and points us to cheap places for shopping. It's no joke to move in another country with higher cost of living and different language that's why I am so grateful for the support that I got here from my fellow Thomasian / KNU friends.

I know it's too early to say if I made the right decision or not. Along the way, I expect a lot of hard times with my colleagues and professors, loads of struggles when it comes to living away and alone, emotional stress, physical stress especially with the cold weather and what not. But all of these struggles will be charged to experience -- experience that I can never have had I not moved away. So yes, all is well.