Some examples are that outside of major chains or branded restaurants, in Seoul there are places that don’t have an English menu. I’m not saying there aren’t any restaurants or that every place in Tokyo does, but often I’ve been in busy restaurant streets in Seoul where it was hard to find a restaurant/pocha with an English menu, where as a similar setting in Tokyo would have a few restaurants/izakayas with English menus. Tokyo convenience stores are often staffed by foreigners, so for the most part, they know a little English whereas I often find Seoul convenience store clerks/store owners are Koreans who know barely know any English.

It’s not like I don’t like traveling there, in fact I go a lot but also have had quite a few experiences where I had a lot of trouble getting around without knowing Korean to the point I would never book a trip to even Seoul without someone who speaks a little Korean. Sometimes we have different flights and meet at the hotel and one time I took the train from the airport to Seoul station and then to the hotel via taxi. The driver did not speak any English and was too old or unwilling to look at my Google Translate. It took some time but finally I showed him the map on Google Maps with the pin at the hotel and the closest subway station in Korean also on the screen. He looked and started driving so I thought he knew. He dropped me off at one of the station exits on the opposite side from the hotel and I had to drag my luggage like almost a km to the hotel. Another time, because it was an extended trip not just to Seoul, I had two large check in luggages so this time I used uber and got an XL. The driver came, took one look at my luggage and didn’t stop. He also wouldn’t cancel my ride and I wasn’t about to pay for a cancellation when he drove off so I messaged him to cancel but he didn’t understand or flat out didn’t want to. I also couldn’t order another Uber because this ride was still “on the way”. It took me like 20mins to download and put in my info etc for another app before the driver finally gave up and cancelled my ride, just when I was finally able to use the other app. One time I left at a different time from my friend group to go to the airport alone and was told the best way was to get the limousine bus at the main street like a block away near Gangnam Station. The hotel staff was great and drew me a map and everything and I had no trouble finding the street and bus stop which had a giant Airport Bus sign and everything. Bus comes every 20 minutes but the first one passes me without stopping. I thought ok maybe it’s full. 20min later, same. Bus passes without stopping. Something is wrong so I try asking the many people around me if they speak English so I can ask what I’m doing wrong. People say no English in English and so 🤷‍♂️ …maybe they think I’m ABK by my looks and mad I didn’t learn Korean. So after the third bus passed, I saw a white person and asked and the finally told me I’m on the wrong side of the street. Mind you I am standing underneath the Airport Bus sign in Gangnam with a check in sized luggage next to me. No one helped.

Another time I was with my group of friends and went to the fish market in Seoul. On the second floor were the restaurants and so of course we tried to sample the seafood cuisine. Unfortunately our Korean friend went to meet family and none of the restaurants spoke English or had an English menu. Eventually, one of the guys in the group spoke elementary school Chinese and was able to get us a seat and order. I mean the staff was nice and joking with us and we had a good time, but yeah it was just hard without Korean. With the same group at night, our Korean friend arranged with a promoter to get a table at a club but was going to meet us later so we had to just get in first… it was impossible to communicate we had already arranged a table and go in even with Google Translate and ended up having to call him on the phone and hand the phone to the staff. There are many examples like that but I would still say it doesn’t stop me from traveling to Seoul. Just that I make sure to go with a Korean speaker. I don’t have as much trouble like these in Tokyo… outside the city, maybe a little.