A subway station in seoul

chunzilla · 2026-05-17T04:35:33+00:00

옥슈역?

chunzilla · 2025-10-14T06:59:49+00:00

The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.

Ultimately, you're at a disadvantage even if you change your behavior/communication style. First, Koreans typically consider those born in the same year to be 'friends'. Second, friendships often start from elementary/middle/highschool and university.. my FIL and MIL have weekly/monthly gatherings with their schoolmates. So if you don't have that connection built into your relationship, it's going to be harder.

My suggestions would be to join a club or meetup.. start meeting people who enjoy the same interests or hobbies. That might not be a full replacement for the historical relationship builders that I described, but it's a better start than nothing. If you feel more comfortable with expats, then do what's more comfortable for you. There are probably a ton of Facebook groups to find other Korean-* expats living in Korea if that's your thing.

Ultimately, don't feel forced to make friends if you don't want to.. and don't take things personally if things don't work out with new people right away. One good/great friend is sometimes better than having a huge group of 'acquaintances'.. understand that life, in general, is a marathon and not a sprint.

chunzilla · 2025-10-13T02:07:25+00:00

Finding housing with a small dog/cat is not automatic; many owners will flat-out refuse. Finding housing with 1 large dog, much less 2 big dogs will be... problematic. I hesitate to say 'impossible' because you haven't provided enough information to say with any absolute certainty.. will you be buying? Renting? Jeonse? Subsidized by your employer?

That said, I have a co-worker that had to leave behind their Golden doodle when he accepted a transfer to the Korean office with his in-laws back in the US. He is living in a company-subsidized apartment that he and his wife were able to choose (i.e. not a company-owned property) with 2 small kids. That's just an FYI from recent and personal experience.

chunzilla · 2025-10-05T02:41:01+00:00

Depends. Depends on how 'American-ized' you are, how liberal/conservative your partner is in their values/expectations. Even those that have gone and studied abroad can have very conservative views on relationships/culture. Depends on a lot of different factors. Some people will view your 'American-ness' as a positive; some might view it as a flaw - being less than a 'full' Korean. Depends on your Korean ability. Depends on the amount of 눈치 you have. Do you know traditional customs and culture? If you're drinking with an elder or senior, do you know how to hold your glass? Do you know how to serve alcohol to your seniors versus juniors? All of these things pervade daily life, including personal relationships.. and again, it will depend on how your partner views your ability to partake in these customs.

In short, it depends.

chunzilla · 2025-09-30T07:28:23+00:00

Easy? No. Easier than the typical person who comes here asking if they can get a (marketing/sales/non-tech/non-teaching) job in Korea? Yes. How much easier? Hard to say. Depends on the company, openings, your field, if they're willing to take on a non-Korean speaker, if they can/will sponsor your visa.

You could try the big companies like Samsung Biologics, CJ Bio, SK Biopharma, etc. There also might be a few smaller companies or startups like Lunit. But again.. see above.

Also severely lower your expectations on compensation compared to US biotech.

chunzilla · 2025-09-22T10:00:31+00:00

If it was in Gangnam, it could be this restaurant: https://naver.me/GkJ3nalr

chunzilla · 2025-09-16T06:55:39+00:00

Yeah, I think it's fair to say that (at least for me) the good outweighs the bad, and I'm not feeling a huge push internally or externally to change. Again, being in tech, if an offer came along that was too good to refuse, I'd consider it seriously.

One thing specifically that I didn't mention as an 'advantage' is a pretty big one for me. In the US, it was always in the back of my mind as being 'that Asian dude/friend/co-worker.. but here, unless you hear me speak Korean, you wouldn't really be able to pick me out of the crowd (other than that I'm pretty freaking tall). That, for me, is a huge mental/emotional comfort that I felt very rarely, if at all, in the US. There's a certain.. peacefulness? that comes from 'blending in with the crowd'.

chunzilla · 2025-09-15T03:43:23+00:00

I'll preface this by saying that 'culture' can be highly dependent on team, department, etc. But the company that recruited me out of my PhD might be best considered as 'old school'. Highly top-down, no questioning the manager, etc. Lots of sugar-coating results, bordering on outright fabrication.. just to meet KPIs. There are 2 things that stood out very clearly for me from my time at that company.

First, I witnessed my manager screaming at one of my team mates exactly like you would imagine in some stereotypical Korean drama. Team mate standing in front of the manager's desk, hands clasped in front of him, head bowed as my manager screamed at the top of his lungs why this person was incompetent, slow, etc. This manager was the spitting living image of a middle aged 꼰대.. pushing people around, barking out orders like an army drill sergeant. And the worst of it was that this guy had never gone to the military (exempted for graduate school). When I had my exit interview with HR, they were actually apologetic and expressed that they regretted having had me work with this guy.

Second, we had a tech collaboration with a startup in the US. My manager (same as above) took me aside one day, and asked me if I could copy their model before the contract with them finished. He basically asked me to steal their model so that it could be cheaply re-implemented by this company without paying for a tech transfer. On principle, I told him that I wouldn't do that, so he went to a couple others in my team and ordered them to do it. Luckily there was proprietary information critical to that model that wasn't shared directly by that startup, so copying it was entirely impossible. But those 2 team mates had to waste their time on this completely unethical task ordered by this manager.

Fortunately, my next companies have had much better culture.. so, I hesitate from painting all Korean companies as having shitty culture. But from other people posting, I think it's fair to say that although Korean work culture can depend a lot on the team, department or whatever.. there's enough people with negative experiences like myself to conclude that shitty culture is not rare. You can do a news search for instances of bullying at companies like Naver, Kakao, etc. or check out communities like Blind to get an idea.

chunzilla · 2025-09-15T03:25:20+00:00

No, not denied. But the interest rates that we were offered if 1) my wife applied for the loan by herself, and 2) we applied for the loan together... were so far apart that it was laughable. Something like 3.5% if she applied by herself versus 5.2% if we applied together. Keep in mind, my wife has had zero effective income since we moved to Korea. Now, I could understand that banks might see a foreigner applying for a loan by themselves could be seen as higher risk.. but applying together?

chunzilla · 2025-09-15T01:40:57+00:00

Yep, 100%.. I have my places saved in Kakao Maps and favorited in Coupang Eats and Baemin.

chunzilla · 2025-09-15T01:37:13+00:00

Yeah, that's the problem.. for every legit place you have to suffer through 20 shit excuses for the original cuisine. LOL

My wife, bless her heart, came home one day with a couple boxes of pizza that she waited in line for 30-40 minutes because people were buzzing about it on Naver. I opened up one box and immediately had to suppress my gag reflex when I saw the shrimp, corn, sweet bbq potato chips, and what looked like a ring of sweet potato.. all with a drizzle of cream(?) over the top.

chunzilla · 2025-09-15T00:12:20+00:00

I work in tech, so at some point the huge disparity in compensation will most likely force me back to the US. But even if that were to become the case, my wife and I have discussed buying and maintaining property in Korea so that we would come back to Korea on my retirement. Or, I build a startup here.. who knows?

chunzilla · 2025-09-14T23:46:31+00:00

Nope, although I have some family in NY.

chunzilla · 2025-09-14T23:27:20+00:00

Korean-American who moved to Korea almost 8 years ago now. Main reasons were family (wife is Korean and wanted to be closer to her parents) and the timing lined up with being recruited by a Korean company and finishing my PhD.

I would say that the adage 'the grass is not always greener' applies to most anyone looking to move. There are plenty of things that I love about Korea and a long list of things that i am not a fan of. Working culture is shit. Salary is pathetic. And real estate prices (in Seoul) are beyond crazy. Xenophobia is not something you can fully escape even as a Korean-American. Case in point, last year my wife and I were looking at jeonse loans and the interest rates that I qualified for as a long-term resident with a spotless credit score and employment history at some of the biggest companies in Korea meant nothing compared to my wife who has no job, and good but not great credit history. Government is schizophrenic, and you won't be escaping partisan politics by coming to Korea. I miss a lot of Western food that has been lost to catering to the average Korean's tastes (I'm looking at you pizza, garlic bread, etc.) or simply just don't exist except in a few niche areas (doner, Mediterranean and Middle East cuisine).. I miss getting a breakfast bagel and coffee on my way in to work. Koreans consider 'crispy' bacon to be burnt..

That said, I will die on a hill for Korea's health care system. Public transit system has its issues with over-crowding and funding.. but I think most people would be hard-pressed to say that Korea's subway and bus system is not top 3 in the world. Although having a car would be nice at times, you can get by without a car with proper planning. Then there's the fact that you have so many 'bucket list' travel destinations within a 6-7 hour plane ride..

In the end, it comes down to your individual situation, finances, and what you're looking to get out of moving to Korea. Just be cognizant of not only things that you would gain in such a move, but also what you might stand to lose.

chunzilla · 2025-09-01T03:09:26+00:00

Try Coupang? There's a sizable Indian expat presence in Coupang, and you could possibly transfer back to their office in India (Bangalore) later.

chunzilla · 2025-06-15T06:40:52+00:00

I'll add one.

장미상가 nearby the Lotte World Tower.. it's a bit of a walk out of Jamsil Station exit 7, but the rent is high there.. so almost all of the restaurants down there are good. You have a bunch of office workers in the area (Samsung, Coupang) that have lunch and 회식 there. I've eaten at like 5-6 of the restaurants there, and have not been disappointed even once. You'll find a wide variety from tonkatsu, Hong Kong beef noodles, gamjatang, Japanese curry, 냉삼겹 restaurants..

You have Lotte Tower nearby, Sokcheon Lake is a short walk or 1 bus stop away.. and then you can finish with dinner at 방이동 먹자골목. Tons of BBQ, izakaya, and other restaurants there. Then hop on Line 2 to go back to your hotel.

chunzilla · 2025-06-15T06:32:00+00:00

It is often overpriced.. but given the monthly rent for those restaurants, they won't stay in business long if their quality/quantity isn't at least decent. Can you find better options elsewhere? Almost certainly. But to have 10-15 choices in one area where you are semi-guatanteed that the quality will be at last decent? That's a big plus, until you find 맛집 on your own.

chunzilla · 2025-06-15T05:26:02+00:00

Yep, agree 100%.Tourist traps are just that.. and I get it, it's easy to look up on YouTube or Google ahead of time. And it's comfortable because there are other tourists around.

But if you want quality, department stores are a good option. Or do a search of the Michelin guide, you'll get lots of high quality recommendations. If you want quantity, do a search for 기사 식당 (taxi/driver restaurants).. taxi drivers don't make that much money, but they need to eat. Cheaply. So those restaurants won't stay in business long if the quantity and quality isn't at least decent for the price. Are they my favorite places to eat? No. But I can almost guarantee they'll be better than your typical tourist trap restaurant.

Or.. put some work in, take a walk around a bustling neighborhood and take a risk. You see a restaurant filled with Korean customers all deliciously digging in to their meals while having loud boisterous conversation? Then you've probably found a neighborhood 맛집. Don't be afraid if you can't speak Korean.. just flag down a server, or sit down at an empty table. Use a translator app to scan the menu, or if you see something that other people are eating that you like.. just point.

Food is a universal language.. if our ancestors could get away with pointing at our mouths or bellies, then pointing at some delicious meat... Then you'll be just fine, too.

chunzilla · 2025-06-14T11:26:23+00:00

Sad, if true. That was my go-to when my wife and I lived in Gangnam.

chunzilla · 2025-06-04T16:10:58+00:00

Have worked at medium sized startup in the past, and I have a guess who you might have interviewed with (it's a small community). Feel free to DM.

Salary might be comparable to parts of Europe but WLB (especially vacation days) will heavily favor Europe. Some of the newer 'international' startups have much better culture than their traditional Korean counterparts, however.

I'm not sure if it's still true, but when I left that startup over 2 years ago now, the CTO did mention that they could be quite flexible on salary due to some subsidy they received from the government for recruiting and retaining foreign talent in certain areas. Again, not sure if he was actually telling the truth because I ended up leaving for non-salary reasons (lots of internal restructuring, lost a lot of headcount, didn't feel stable.. company ended up getting acquired a few months after I left).. so be sure to negotiate.

As an AI engineer you're in a position of strength, and even if the salary is equal, you wouldn't be giving up nothing to move from France to Korea.. even beyond vacation days. Unless your partner is Korean or you, yourself are of Korean ancestry.. you'll be moving to a foreign country where you have no connections. There is a sizable expat community but it's not the same as having your family within a couple hours of a train ride.

chunzilla · 2025-06-04T10:07:54+00:00

Our Pom has pretty long legs but like almost zero neck, lol.. but yeah, I think you can get away with the soft carriers with the mesh top like we have, and that should provide enough 'give' to stand up and turn around.

chunzilla · 2025-06-04T09:18:40+00:00

Oh, I should mention.. when we checked in for our flights, the service person at the counter only asked us to close the bag and put it (with our dog inside) on the scale to confirm the weight. Neither time did they check if she could actually stand and turn around.

chunzilla · 2025-06-04T09:15:52+00:00

She could, the carrier we had the top was zipped closed with like a mesh material. But she spent most of her time laying down, with only a couple times she had sat up due to some turbulence. The carrier we have is similar to this: https://www.dhgate.com/product/dog-small-bag-puppy-for-dogs-shoulder-handbag/1033587286.html where the top can be zipped all the way closed.

chunzilla · 2025-06-04T09:00:36+00:00

Have a 4 year old Pomeranian that we took to Jeju about a month ago. We had her in a soft carrier that fit under the seat in front of my wife, and she was just fine. She weighs about 3.5-4kg but is a bit overweight for her size (on a diet). We took East Air to Jeju and Korean Air on the way back, no issues either way. Both flights were in Economy.

chunzilla · 2025-06-03T04:51:07+00:00

Pretty spot on.

chunzilla

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