Daily Life
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What’s happening with COVID-19 in South Korea? The December Edition.
Around the world, an estimated 71,536,243 people now have been diagnosed with COVID-19. More than 1,603,500 have died. These are the reported numbers and are believed to be an underestimate. Sadly, the United States continues to have a very high proportion of the world’s cases. We last posted about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on South Korea at the end of August. At that time, we reported that when we arrived in South Korea (ROK) on July 31, the count of new COVID cases for the day was 36. On August 14, our first day out of quarantine, that number was 103. On August 27, it was 441, the…
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U.S. Election Week: A Brief Update from the South Korean Front
“So… Donald Trump is winning the election, right?” Thus began several conversations with our acquaintances here circa Wednesday (EST). As I write this post, ballots are still being counted in a number of key states, and the results of the U.S. Presidential election are unknown. Despite living 14 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time, we were disappointed to discover that we are not privy to learning election results any earlier than the rest of the world. We have been following the news closely this week and feel justified in all our efforts to ensure that our ballots would reach Pennsylvania in time to be counted. In other words, I didn’t…
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Top 10 Most Surprising Things About South Korea
Just as with any major life event, we approached our Seoul adventure with a certain set of expectations. Because we are planners, we did a lot of research about what to expect and how to acclimate to life here. We are also seasoned travelers and were prepared to experience those things you can’t plan for. We learned when we lived in Canada that even moving to a neighboring country comes with its share of complications. Indeed, every time we have traveled overseas something unexpected has happened. Plan as much as you like, but there will always be surprises! Here are some of the things – both pleasant and unpleasant –…
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“Are You Bored?” Inquiring Minds Want to Know
Since the chemist began working at the lab every day during the first week of September, many of you have asked what on earth the counselor is doing? Here is a ramble through my rambling days, complete with my “real-world” photos. (In other words, I promise to get you back to the chemist’s much prettier photos in the next post!) The truth is, my days look pretty different from my usual life, which is not the easiest transition but is part of the point of this year. What’s the good of living in another country if you try to make your life look exactly the same as it always did?…
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“Have you guys voted yet?” It’s more important than ever.
If you’ve been following along with us since August, you know our voting process has taken some research and some effort. We did request absentee ballots, but with the USPS having difficulties over the past weeks, we became concerned about whether our mailed ballots would ever make it to Pennsylvania. For that matter, we were unsure when we would actually receive our requested absentee ballots. Rather than waiting for them to arrive, we opted to complete and send the Federal Write-In Absentee Ballot, which overseas voters can use if they don’t get absentee ballots in time to vote. In another bid to ensure our votes arrive in the U.S. and…
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A Series of Unfortunate Events: Korea Edition
I am so sorry to tell you that, as is so often true, nice travel photos don’t capture the complicated reality of traveling to and living in a new country. So here is your (Lemony Snicket-inspired) warning about this post: these stories are all about the inability to be truly understood, the endless waiting around for the slow-grinding wheels of bureaucracy, and the frequent annoyances caused by sheer bad luck. You will most probably slip into an unbreakable spiral of depression and anxiety while reading this post, so just go ahead and skip to another post that I have kindly decorated with pictures of brightly colored temples and delicious food…
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Amazing! Two Phones in One!
It’s a T-Mobile phone with a U.S. phone number! It’s a KT phone with a Korean phone number! Stop! You’re both right! It’s two, two, two phones in one! We knew that when we landed in Seoul we needed cell phones with a data plan that worked in Korea, so we could install the required COVID monitoring app at the airport. Luckily we already had T-Mobile (Magenta plan), which by default includes unlimited data (2G) and texting in most international countries including South Korea. Calls are $0.25/min, but there are easy ways for us to avoid this charge (see below). It was quite nice to turn the phone on once…
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Food Delivery in Quarantine: The Devil is in the Details
Being confined to our small apartment in Seoul has presented a number of challenges. Not surprisingly, our primary concern before arriving was making sure we would have enough food to eat. Thus, before we arrived, we had done some online research and had a plan in place. Our Airbnb host Han kindly offered to stock our kitchen with some essentials to get us through the first couple of days. We also planned to use the Shuttle app (similar to GrubHub) for delivery from area restaurants and Gmarket.com for groceries. Upon our arrival at the apartment we found that Han indeed left us the staples that we requested as well as…
