By Olga Pynenkova

Junior Editor, GSIS Newsletter

Moving to another country—whether for family, work, or study—is always accompanied by a certain degree of stress. Adjusting to a new environment and leaving behind familiar routines, social norms, and close relationships can be challenging, regardless of one’s background, culture, or experiences. Both introverts and extroverts may face unique hurdles during this transition. This fall, Yonsei University’s Graduate School of International Studies welcomed over 150 new students from 30 countries, each bringing their own approach to adapting to life in South Korea. In this edition, we spoke with two GSIS students from different cultural backgrounds to learn what helps them feel more at home. Their insights not only offer practical advice but also encourage reflection on maintaining one’s identity while navigating a multicultural experience.

Yifei Xiong, China

Although it is often said that young people are highly adaptable to new environments, I believe that they are actually quite afraid of making mistakes in unfamiliar settings because it can be very embarrassing. When I first arrived in Korea, I did not dare go out alone. Whether it was going to school or shopping, I always asked a friend to accompany me.

One evening, my friend could not go out with me, so I had to do it alone to buy some vegetables. Previously, when I was on a bus, I either asked my friend to press the stop button or waited for others to do so, because I was always worried about pressing it too early or too late and looking strange. That day, the bus driver noticed me frequently glancing at the stop button. Smiling, he asked, “Getting off at the next stop? If so, just press the button.” I nervously replied, “Okay,” and pressed it in a fluster. After pressing it, I kept worrying about whether my actions seemed odd and whether people might think something like: “This foreigner is so silly.” But when I looked around, I realized thet everyone was either focused on their phones or resting with their eyes closed. No one paid any attention to what I had done.

Thankfully, people generally do not care about things unrelated to themselves. I have come to enjoy this atmosphere where everyone focuses on their own matters without bothering with strangers. 

In fact, I feel more mentally free and relaxed living in Korea than I did in my hometown because I actively live with a “tourist” mindset. In my hometown, I belonged to the cultural environment there, so I was more cautious and cared more about how others viewed me. I think rather than forcing myself to adapt to an environment, it is better to accept being an outsider in it. Adapting takes time, and I have decided to be patient and kind to myself—it suits me more. Seeing myself as a “tourist” makes everything around me feel fresh and interesting. Korea’s offline economy is very vibrant, and I enjoy discovering new interesting places on NAVER Map and visiting them when I have free time.

This mindset has encouraged me to go out more frequently and find things in life that are truly useful to me, such as rewards points and coupons, which really helps me to save a lot of money. 

To some extent, I have adapted to life in Korea. Although as a “tourist,” my awareness might always be somewhat detached from the group, which could result in a lack of belonging, I have realized that a sense of belonging does not necessarily have to come from a group or a person—it can also come from within myself. Here, it may be harder to find a sense of belonging, but that is also part of Korea's charm: a multicultural fusion where no one cares about your background, and you don’t have to constantly force yourself to conform to your cultural identity. 

Valeria Zakharova, Russia

The first thing you should do when you first come to study is to force yourself to go to university events, go to MT, etc. I don’t really like that, it’s quite stressful for me, but I forced myself to go to all those events, and it really helped me a lot. Because otherwise I wouldn’t have met the people I met, I wouldn’t have started communicating with my friends. And it seems that the adaptation process would have been 500 times harder for me if I hadn’t forced myself to go to such events all the time.

The second thing is that it’s important not to sit at home. Of course, staying at home is very comfortable, I really like to do it myself, but I advise going to some public places even for study. A library, a coffee shop, a park when the weather is warm, anything to get out of the house. Because if you constantly stay in your apartment or even a dorm room, you can very quickly feel very isolated and lonely.

If you, like many Yonsei students, live in the Sinchon area, try to at least periodically leave it for other areas or even the countryside, explore new, beautiful places. This also involves leaving your comfort zone, but it is very important. On the one hand, it gives you the opportunity to get to know the city you live in, the country you live in, and on the other hand, it really helps clear your head of unnecessary thoughts, much better than just staying at home.

Another point, in fact, quite basic–find a community that shares your interests, or some extracurricular activity. If you want to play volleyball– even GSIS has a volleyball club, if you like dancing - start taking dance lessons. For this and for a more comfortable life in Seoul in general, it would be good to have at least a basic level of Korean. For some reason, when I was going to come to Korea, many people assured me that everyone would speak English to me, since I was a foreigner. But no, everyone speaks Korean, so it is important to know the language at least a little. One little practical tip - if you do not know a word in Korean, pronounce an English word with a Korean accent - there is an 80 percent chance that such a word exists in Korean, and you will somehow be understood.

For me personally, during the adaptation process, it was important not only to get to know the new environment as actively as possible, but also to maintain a connection with my native culture. It calms me down when I have some things from my country in my apartment here, when I communicate with my parents and friends who remained in Moscow. I even started listening to Russian music more often when I moved to Korea. In addition, for me personally, it is very important to be able to cook food here that I am used to eating in my home country - this also relieves stress and allows you to create a sense of comfort for yourself, even when you are in another country.