Movement By Lydia

So before I came to Korea and met my host family, I had already talked with my host mother via Kakaotalk and email. Most of the other students also contacted their family before meeting them, and I would definitely recommend doing so! It makes it a lot less awkward when you meet and you can get to know them before actually meeting them and living with them! Before meeting my family, I talked a lot with my mother about my interests and their interests [which helped with gifts], and just about how we are both excited for me to arrive in Korea and meet. We arrived in Korea on Saturday at around 2:30am, and after more orientation [click here for that blog post] , we finally met our host families on Sunday afternoon! My host mother came to pick me up alone since my brother and appa were at church, and we got along really well. The car ride from the hostel to my new home actually was not awkward and we talked a lot~ She spoke English pretty well, so if I didn't understand the Korean sh...

Originally we were supposed to arrive on the 27th at around 6pm, but due to a [8ish hour] delay at the Detroit airport, we ended up arriving at Incheon at around 2am. The Detroit airport delay was quite fun, however, since I was able to watch the Korea vs Belgium game [World Cup]. I was pretty disappointed I wasn't going to be able to watch it since I was going to be on the plane during it, but we ended up watching it at the airport with a woman who was streaming it on her laptop! YAY for soccer and bonding with random Korean people over it haha. I am a huge soccer fan so the girl who was streaming it and I bonded very quickly hehe. Unfortunately Korea lost [which was really disappointing because I wanted to watch soccer in the streets while I was in Korea], but it was SO much fun watching the game with people in the airport! Also while in the airport, I got to practice my Korean! I've only self-studied [and when I say self-study I mean pick up from texting and b...

Before heading to Korea [or any country you're going to with NSLI-Y], you have what is called pre-departure orientation for 2 days. For the NSLI-Y Korea group with iEARN, we had our PDO in New York City at Columbia University so if you get accepted to that program, that's where you'll be heading!  I'm pretty sure all programs that iEARN is in charge of go to NYC for their PDO, but not ALL NSLI-Y programs will be in New York. American Councils groups usually are in DC for example.                             We arrived at Columbia at around 10am and didn't have anything program-wise to do until 5pm that night so they let us free- we just had to stay within the boundaries (aka don't go to Harlem) and couldn't take the subway. When we first got there, we checked in, received our stipend, NSLI-Y shirts, room keys, and some other things from iEARN. I headed to my room with my cumbersome lug...

Last week we were told that we would be getting our host family information Monday (June 16th) so I was pretty restless all day. I had a half day of school and came home all ready for my host family info, but when I checked my email there was nothing. Some people had gotten theirs already, and we figured out it was probably going in alphabetical order [meaning I was going to get mine much later haha]. When I finally got my info, I was soooo excited! So I can't reveal too many specifics because of privacy, but I will tell you as much as I feel I should. I will be living in the mid-north part of Seoul near where Korea University and Daeil Foreign Language High School are, both prestigious schools. I'm pretty close to Dongdaemun and Myeongdong which are popular areas so that's exciting~ I have a mother, father, and little brother, and I am SOOO EXCITED about my family. My parents are fairly young and my brother is younger than me. I've always been the younger sib...

So I'm assuming there will be two different groups of people reading this blog (for the most part). There will be.. 1) People who are interested in applying for NSLI-Y [Korea] and want to know more about the whole experience/what it's like 2) Friends and family who are just interested in what I'll be doing this summer in Korea but don't really know much about what I'm doing I'm pretty sure those who fall into the first group know a good amount about NSLI-Y and will understand what I'm talking about in my posts. I'm not sure if my friends and family know much about what exactly I'll be doing so this post is mostly for them. I just want to explain some things I'll probably mention a lot in my posts so you're not confused! •NSLI-Y: This is the scholarship I received, funded by the Department of State, and stands for National Security Language Initiative for Youth. I explained more about what NSLI-Y is on the "About NSLI-Y ...