13 March - 27 March 2025
I figured it was about time to write about my trip! I have some core experiences I want to keep as memories. I left my house Thursday morning around 2:30am (bless Valerie's heart for coming to get me) and I arrived at my hotel in Seoul, Korea 25 hours later. My first four days in Korea were on my own before my tour started. During this time, I actually did feel very alone, but not too scared. But ordering food was scary, so I would just buy some things at the convenience store across the street. I definitely feel like I didn't do as much when I was on my own compared to being on the tour group. I was grateful I got to meet up with Sister Lee at the temple and have her show me around afterwards. It was SO nice to have someone to talk to that I was so chatty. I missed hearing people speak English! There were a lot of foreigners around, but when I eavesdropped, they were speaking German or French or other languages. Riding public transportation is super quiet, since people don't really talk, and plus I didn't have anyone to talk to when I was alone. The tour was eight days, from the 18th to the 25th, and the night the tour ended, I took the subway to Incheon and was picked up by Hanna's sister and her husband, taken to my hotel, and then spent half of the next day with them. My very last day, the 28th, I walked around and explored on my own and went shopping, then took a Taxi to the airport. Again, I felt like it was hard to know cool spots to go to or fun things to do when I was alone... plus being alone and not having someone to share the experience with automatically makes going to do some things a bit harder. But it was still fun and an incredible time, even the parts where I was alone, but I just definitely noticed a HUGE difference when I was with other people. Hanna's sister and her husband were so sweet and kind. The language barrier was greater than I thought it would be, so fortunately I was able to use Google translate to help us communicate about the details. I just made sure to smile a lot have have a cheerful countenance and look like I was enjoying everything (because I really was but I just wanted that to translate even without words). I wanted to show my immense gratitude and joy in being able to meet and connect with them. When they heard that I really like Korean BBQ, they changed the place they'd picked out for lunch and took me to a great spot for grilling up steak and it was SO good! I really enjoyed the food and made sure to let them know, and I ate everything they got me! I don't know if they were surprised that I ate everything, but I think they really enjoyed seeing me eat. Then the husband had to leave for a business trip, so me and Hanna's sister went to a cafe and she ordered me this shaved milk/ice dessert with red bean sauce on top. We took a picture of us all eating together, and then Hanna's sister turned it into a cartoon using an app, which was super cute!
When I visited the Seoul Korea Temple, I got there much earlier than my appointment, and I followed the signs to the Family History center. I went inside and there was a senior missionary couple from Utah! This was their second or third senior mission to Korea. It was so nice to be able to connect with them, and they were incredibly friendly. I also got to walk around the temple grounds (I could circle the temple in less than 2 minutes) and I passed by these two ladies with this toddler girl who was adorable, so as I passed, I said "cute" in Korean while pointing to her and they laughed and said thank you (I'm sure my pronunciation was not the best, since that's a hard word for me to say, but I think they appreciated the effort and it made their day). Inside the temple, the changing room was so small. The stalls were short, so my entire head stuck out and I accidentally made eye contact with another lady walking into the dressing room! LOL. As I waited to get my new name, one of the temple worker ladies gestured that I was really tall, so I told her my height in Korean (which took me saying 2-3 times before she understood, but probably because she wasn't expecting me to speak Korean) and she looked so surprised and impressed, her face was like "No way!" During the endowment session, it felt a bit foreign, because it was so much smaller than any temple I'd ever been in, and was in a completely different language, but afterwards as I was standing and pondering in the celestial room, I had this overwhelming sense of rightness and truth pierce me. Even though it felt a bit weird/foreigner, I felt the Spirit telling me it was all true. It made me think about how people hearing the gospel for the first time might think it sounds weird, with angels appearing and gold plates, but how the Spirit will testify that it is true and touch their hearts even if they don't understand everything. I was also strongly overcome with the Spirit as I looked around and saw all the temple workers and thought about these faithful saints from across the country dedicating their time to serve the Lord in His house.
I also went to the English Military Branch, and there were people there from all over. I got to meet some girls who were doing a semester abroad, and we decided to all go together to the Seoul YSA Branch (I was so happy because I'd been planning on going by myself and was so happy to have some company). We traveled almost an hour by subway to get there. We went to Sunday School first, which was on the third or fourth floor, and there were only three or four others besides us. It was so cool to meet people from Switzerland and other parts of the world, and to see us all communicating in English. There were also some native Koreans who spoke English very well, either from serving missions or just studying it in school. There was a girl who had been living in Korea for over five years and her Korean was really good, so during sacrament meeting, she live transcribed into zoom, and fortunately I had my Bluetooth ear buds, so I connected to the zoom call and could listen to the translation... because unfortunately, my Korean was not as good as I'd hoped, and I really understood next to nothing :(. Then they had a Relief Society linger longer after, with hot dogs, and watched a broadcast (but we'd already seen it in the branch before that one) so we dipped out and went down to the YSA gather place room on the first floor (it was so different to have the church buildings look like office buildings on the outside and then to have to take elevators to get to the chapel vs sunday school etc. The gathering place room had a foosball table, tons of games, a kitchenette with snacks, and a stage. I stayed for at least two hours and chatted with other YSAs and played Jenga... I was the youngest one! The others were into their early thirties, even though everyone looked so young.
When we first started the tour, as I was meeting up with my tour group, I ran into Pavy. She was the next youngest one on the trip besides me. I was the "maknae" aka youngest in the group. She has over 400k followers on her K-Drama account so she was invited on the tour for free as a way to promote the tours to her followers (I believe she still had to pay for her flight). We sat next to each other on the bus and became good friends, along with the third youngest, Tori. The three of us hit it off well and called ourselves the "Maknae Line" iykyk ;). Anways, so I bumped into her and we hadn't eaten yet. We had an hour until we could check in and then go to orientation, so we went to lunch together. We were supposed to meet up with some of the other ladies in our group, but we could not find them! They sent us the address of where they were meeting, and for the first and only time on my trip, Google maps let me down! It took us to the completely wrong place and we kept getting so turned around. It was quite comical and bonding. We ended up just heading back to the hotel and stopped at a kimbap store on the way for lunch.
On the tour, we attended a Traditional Korean Drum class, and at the end of it, they had some people perform for us. After the performance, we got to take a group photo with them, and one of the drummers was very short compared to me, so when he noticed how tall I was standing next to him and looked amazed/envious, I told him my height in Korean, and he looked surprised and then gestured to his own height and said playfully "No comment" and then then went to the front. It was so funny. Me and my nearby tourmates were laughing so hard.
I cried two times during my trip to South Korea, and both times involved food. The first time was because we were left to find lunch on our own at a market. Sophy, our awesome tour guide, had shown me around to two places I could try to get something gluten-free, and then she left. I went back to the first place she had shown me and ordered, but they said that actually there was gluten because of the soy sauce. So then I felt overwhelmed because that was really the only place I could have eaten at (the other one she showed me was cross-contaminated, not really going to work), so then I felt like there was nothing I could eat, and I couldn't communicate well with any of the people to try and find something on my own, and it was super crowded and noisy, and I was SUPER hungry, so I got overwhelmed and emotional and started crying. I ate a granola bar out of my backpack, which helped tide me a bit, and then I got a cup of fruit to eat. I ran into the male tour guide, and his English was not very good, so we had a bit of a hard time trying to communicate, but he felt bad that I had been crying and wanted to help find me something to eat. He said there was a stall that sold "live beef" that would be gluten free... but when we got there, I realized he meant RAW beef, and the poor lady got her hopes up that we were buying from her but I shook my head "no thanks" and backed away when I realized it was raw meat (which fortunately she thought was amusing) and then I told our tour guide I would be okay and went to search for food on my own. I found some packaged snacks and nuts, reading the ingredients to make sure they were safe, then bought and ate those instead. The second time I cried was on my last day in Korea. I had been touring around all morning on my own, and knew I needed to grab some lunch before heading to the airport, and I didn't want to have to deal with the hassle of finding a place that would be safe for me to eat at, so I decided to go back to the restaurant where Hanna's family had taken me the day before. I was familiar with the menu and how to order on the kiosks on the table. But I didn't realize that to order the Korean BBQ, there was a minimum amount you had to purchase (close to $40-$50 worth), so they wouldn't let me order just one or two. At this point, I'm sitting down at the table, and they've already brought me water and side dishes, so I feel stuck. I can't just get up and leave at this point. And it took a while for them to communicate the minimum requirement because my Korean is very poor and they did not know English very well. So I'm trying to look through the menu to find something else, and I'm not really seeing anything else, and I'm trying to ask if there's wheat/gluten in them, and I have to use Google translator, and I am hungry and overwhelmed, so they leave me alone to keep looking and I start crying. Then one of the waiter guys comes over and types out on his phone into Google translate, "Why are you crying?" and I type out that I was having a hard time finding something that wouldn't make me feel sick because of my food allergy, and he finally understood and sat down and went through the whole menu with me and pointed out things I could eat and said my best bet would be the bibibap (which I grew SO sick of. I can't have the pepper paste that goes with it because they add a bit of wheat to it, so it's very plain and bland), but I was over it at that point, so I just said "okay" and ordered it. Little did I realize.... (karma, yall...) that the beef it came with was RAW. So I had to eat raw beef after all! I didn't want to be offensive and I need my protein, so I just mixed it all up and sucked it up and ate, with only the slightest urges to gag. It tasted fine, and the texture was okay, despite being a bit slimy/chewy, but just knowing it was raw made me want to gag. But I didn't get sick from it or feel bad after I ate it. Also, the waiter was very attentive and brought me more side dishes and another sauce to flavor it with since I couldn't have the red pepper sauce. He was more communicative and attentive, and I was really grateful for his help because I'd felt so overwhelmed and lonely. When I left, I made sure to bow and say thank you to him.
When I was traveling from Seoul to Incheon to meet up with Hanna's family, I looked a little bit lost as I was looking at maps and trying to figure out which train to take. I had taken it quite a few times before, so I did know what I was doing, but I was still slow and just triple checking everything, and probably tired too, so just being super cautious. But an older Korean man noticed and came up to me and asked where I was headed and was able to help me. This reminds me of a previous experience I had of when I was first using the system and a Korean gentleman noticed I looked lost and directed me to the right way to go. But this time around, this other man said he was heading in the same direction and said to follow him, so I rode the train with him to the next stop and when we got off, we were going separate ways, so he gestured for the way for me to go and then before we parted, he asked if we could take a picture together (he was actually really tall, but I had maybe 4 inches on him, and he wanted me to stand up very straight, not bend forward). He said he was Christian and asked to pray with me before we parted. He said a prayer in English and had me repeat after him. I also left him with one of my WWJD bracelets. This was such a cool experience, because literally the day before, I had been praying for a missionary opportunity. The Lord is SO good and truly does hear and answer prayers. When it is on our mind and we seek it, He helps line things up for us. I felt so happy and grateful. Well, lo and behold, I got on a train that ended right before the stop I needed, so then I had to transfer to another track, and as I was standing in front of some seats waiting with my luggage, more and more people came and stood around me. Two young Korean girls approached and I heard them speak in Korean, and I thought I heard the word for "sit" and I immediately thought that they were saying they wish they could sit down and I realized I was standing in front of the only seats left, so maybe they were complaining about me blocking the way, idk, but I immediately moved to the side and gestured for them to sit, and they looked suprised/taken aback, and one of the girls gave me the deepest bow I saw while there and said thank you. It made me feel good that I was able to understand and help them out.
I didn't really talk about my tour experience, but that is because I took SO many pictures of everything (and even created a picture/video slideshow of my experience on YouTube). The itinerary was so well planned out and I feel like every meaningful moment is pretty much accounted for! Overall, I had the most fabulous experience. Even when I came down sick and lost a lot of my youthful, giddy energy, I was still able to relax and enjoy and go-with-the-flow. The days passed by so quickly, and on my last day, I remember just wanting to touch everything I passed by to help it stay more concrete in my memories. For me to leave a trace of myself being there (like my fingerprints on the sides of buildings) and to remember the texture of how things felt so that when I went home and watched K-Dramas, I'd be able to more fully be submerged because I'd be able to say, "I've touched those types of signs or plants or stone before!" I know that sounds a bit silly. But I was just so incredibly present and mindful during the experience. I didn't have to worry about any of the logistics and was just able to sit back and enjoy. I didn't even know how much of a break I needed until afterwards. It helped put things into perspective, and when I went back to work afterwards, I just felt more grounded and confident and relaxed. Work wasn't as stressful or big of a deal. I'd traveled across the country by myself! I got to see all these new things and it put into perspective how small my worries were that I wasn't a good therapist, etc. I also loved that I could just be myself on the tour. I didn't have to pretend to be a professional (how I felt the first year or two of practicing therapy, like I had to pretend I was a real, legit professional even though I was a real one. Imposter syndrome for the win). And the people I was with were truly incredible. They were kind, uplifting, encouraging, fun, funny, and supportive. We bonded over K-Dramas and never ran out of conversations. I didn't have to be on guard or worry about people saying hurtful things or me not being enough. I felt accepted just as I was and was so uplifted by all the kindness around me, including the natives serving us meals and the people we ran into as we traveled around. Like when we wore Hanbok at the temple/shrine, an older man spoke with me and was impressed with my Korean and I was impressed with his English, so we shared a bit about how we learned each other's language. I felt very emotionally safe among my tour group and didn't even realize how relaxed I could become/how stressed and tense I was before this trip. It was an expensive trip, but truly healing and so good for my mental and emotional health, and the memories and connections are lasting months after the trip.
I also love how the connection has continued since I've been home. Not only is our tour group chat still active and we update and talk to each other from time to time, but also I invited over friends and family to come watch a slide show of my trip (link included below) and have been able to share it with lots of people and basically get to relive my trip!! It's awesome :)
YouTube Video Link: https://youtu.be/8iJympbK_hA
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