Impressions

The turbulence of the plane startled me awake. I squinted my eyes and furrowed my brows, immediately cranky from being awoken. At least on this flight, I had managed to get a wink of sleep. I'd been half conscious and half asleep for the entire day, falling in and out of my light slumbers throughout my trip. The small amount of space that economy tickets provided was something I should have prepared for. I had brought my blanket to use on the plane, which I ended up regretting because it was just one more thing to carry through airports.

My final flight landed at 8:45 PM, Korea Standard Time. I had taken three flights in the past twenty-five hours—Fort Myers to Houston, Houston to Tokyo, and Tokyo to Seoul. My tired legs carried me through Incheon International Airport as I read the signs above me and the directions to my host school on my phone at the same time. My eyes drooped with fatigue, and my arms felt like limp noodles. I had no idea how to get to the subway that would take me to Sinchon Station—I had never even taken public transportation in the United States, so this experience was very intimidating. I started looking around for people that appeared helpful to give me additional directions and guidance. I had seen two American girls at Narita Airport in Tokyo, and they were once again in front of me. I subtly followed them, steadily feeling creepier by the second, until they stopped at a line of vending machines, where others were also lined up. The girls looked my age, so maybe they were also students going to Yonsei University, my home for the next six weeks. Overcoming my fear of initiating conversation with strangers, I pulled my suitcases up to the machines near them.

"Excuse me...Do you guys happen to be going to Yonsei? I keep seeing you around," I interrupted them.

They stopped talking to each other and looked at me curiously. Their clothes and style made it look like they were already very familiar with Korea. Even though they were most likely coming from America, they had been dressed in fashionable, colorful outfits while flying across the Pacific Ocean—which is a long and dreadful trip, mind you. One of the girls had black and blonde hair, one color for each side of her long, ruffled bob. The other girl had short, curly blonde hair. They both had the same bright, blue eyes. The second girl surprisingly answered, "No, but we're actually getting off the subway at that station. Do you need help getting there?" Honestly, what were the chances that these strangers I asked for help would be going to the same stop that I was?

After buying our transportation cards, we made our way to the subway. We entered the train, and upon seeing all the seats taken, stood in the corner of the car. Everybody stared at their phones in moderate silence out of consideration for each other. People whispered to each other so as not to disturb the strangers around them. Hannah, Bekah, and I were probably the loudest group in the car, and once we were aware of that, we kept our voices down. We exchanged Kakao IDs—apparently, nobody in Korea uses the regular old text messaging system that phones provide, and they instead use an app called Kakao Talk...and it's probably because of the cute aesthetic compared to the dull appearance of the built-in messaging apps.

Once we were situated and comfortable as we could be in our little corner, we began getting to know each other. I told them that I went to the University of South Florida in Tampa, Florida, and was here to study...but mostly to immerse myself in the Korean culture and explore the country. It turned out that I had also sat in front of them on the last plane and they only realized when we were on the subway. Hannah and Bekah were sisters from a small town in Wisconsin. Hannah had already been in Korea before, returning frequently for a total of nine months of her life in Korea. She was twenty, almost a year older than I was. Bekah was eighteen and this was her first trip to Korea. She worked at a K-pop store back home. "I'm so excited to buy some CDs and posters! They're going to be way cheaper here than at my store." My whole time in Korea, and I had only bought one CD. I'm going to have to go back to Korea for more.

When we finished lugging our bags up the stairs and out of the subway station about an hour later, Seoul was already alive with its night life. The signs on stores glowed brightly onto our faces while street performers sang or played the sax, guitar, or drum set. The first building I saw out of the station and to the right was McDonald's, and its delivery mopeds were parked outside. We passed more stores and restaurants that were both domestic and international. The amount of makeup stores and coffee shops enraptured me. At any part of the street, there would be a coffee shop within one hundred feet.

All the buildings towered over us. In Sinchon (and a lot of the rest of Seoul, at least), stores are stacked on top of each other in one large building, rather than one-story establishments like we have in the United States. One Starbucks I saw, for example, was five stories high. There were all sorts of stores, ranging from convenience stores, arcades, restaurants, cat cafes, and clothing stores, just to name a few. I'd only seen one small garage that carried cars up for you, so most of the area is journeyed on foot. This much was obvious because the streets were bustling with people going in and out of stores. Still, there were many delivery mopeds zooming past, not obeying the same laws that cars were supposed to. They would go through red lights, use sidewalks and crosswalks, and drive up the lines in between cars. It seemed like a free-for-all with these bikes and motorcycles.

I read the names of stores, which were in a variety of languages. Places like Mom's Kitchen and Yellow Spoon stood out to me, the first which sold a wide variety of chicken and the second which was a Japanese restaurant that I would end up visiting twice because of its delicious egg-covered hamburger steaks. I was excited to shop at Korea's abundance of cosmetics stores, and the Nature Republic employees would eventually get tired of seeing me in their establishment. Many clothing stores sold inexpensive shirts with bad English on them, which I loved.

Upon seeing all these new sights on my way from the station to Yonsei, a realization came to me. My application, recommendation letter, tuition, everything was taken care of. I finally made it. This had been my dream for two years and I was finally here. The planes didn't crash, I didn't lose my luggage (but my body wash did spill in one of the bags), and I was actually walking through the busy streets of Sinchon. People I didn't recognize walked past me, making it even more surreal. Nobody knew me here. Half of my work was already done, and now all I had to do was achieve high grades in my two classes, Beginning Korean Language and Asian American Literature, while enjoying everything that is Seoul.

I focused again on my physical surroundings. I couldn't tell if it was hunger or exhaustion taking over me...probably both. The bags that were being dragged behind me weighed me down, and my palms sweated against the handles. The rough brick road always shifted my bags so I lost my grip often. I was constantly stopping to readjust the carry-on that sat on top of the smaller suitcase. Hannah and Bekah kept on trucking while I stopped, making me worry that they would leave me behind, even though they were the ones taking me to Yonsei. I felt bad for slowing them down because they also had to backtrack and find their own place. Hannah had a friend who went to this university, so she was familiar with the back route to the dorms. Once we started climbing the hill to my dorm, however, I was ready to give up. "It's not too far from here, just around the corner!" Hannah encouraged me. Bekah looked back at me with a silly grin plastered on her face. There's no way I can keep going uphill with these bags, I thought. Just then, we saw some people walking ahead of us. They were walking slowly and heard us behind them, and a girl with huge, curly, purple hair asked, "Are you looking for the dorms?" I felt another short boost of energy and separated from Hannah and Bekah, telling them we'd meet up soon. I was tired from the long journey and ready to call it a night after arriving at my room and taking a shower to erase some of the evidence of fatigue.

When I managed to find the lobby after listening to the purple-haired girl's directions outside one of the dorms, I tried to talk to the security guard who was working at the front desk. My Korean was almost nonexistent for situations like these, and his English wasn't much better. After what seemed like hours, I got a bed set, minus the pillow because they didn't have enough. I met my roommate, Lexus, briefly, took a shower, and passed out. I would go back a few days later and receive a pillow filled with macaroni shells, which crackled every time I turned my head. I was counting down the days until I got to sleep on my memory-foam pillow in the States.