As read in this post, there are plenty of things I love about South Korea, but my time there wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Even though South Korea is one of my favourite countries, there are naturally quite a few things that I really dislike about it. Here are 10 of them.
Table of Contents
1. The Air Pollution
Before I moved to South Korea, I had heard about how certain countries in Asia had air pollution problems but I never imagined it to be that bad.
During my time as a South Korean resident, there were times when the polluted air gave me a sore throat or a small cough, which isn’t bad considering that I have allergic rhinitis and a family history of asthma, but it still shocked me. Unfortunately, other people had it worse than me as they got chest infections and even pneumonia.
The worst part of the pollution for me was how it made everything quite foggy. I normally don’t mind the fog, but I seriously worried about my health whenever I walked outside, which wasn’t often on bad air days. It was also impossible for me to find a mask that fit properly, so the bad air was a point of constant concern for me when I lived in Korea.
2. The Spitting
I always grimaced when I saw people spitting on the streets in the UK, and often complained to my family if I ever heard and saw someone spitting outside. However, this still didn’t prepare me for the amount of public spitting I witnessed in South Korea. A lot of people spit, even young men and women, and it’s not something I could ever get used to. The spitting isn’t just shallow either. It feels like it comes from deep within the person’s soul judging by the sound you hear.
3. The lack of public bins
When I go for a short stroll in my hometown, I often walk past a dozen or so public bins. I even see a good amount of bins when I travel to countries like Spain, Malaysia, Singapore and others. But in Korea, one thing I noticed straight away was the lack of public bins. There are admittedly a growing number of them in areas such as Hongdae and Myeongdong, but there still aren’t enough bins for my liking. I often saw empty coffee cups left on sidewalks because people simply couldn’t find a bin and didn’t want to walk with an empty cup in their hands.
The most inconvenient thing about this setup was that my pockets and bags became surrogate bins, which I didn’t like.
4. The pressure to look good
Society in general places a lot of importance on our physical appearance, but I think the pressure to look good is felt quite acutely in South Korea, and it got on my nerves.
It’s pretty well-known that a lot of South Koreans get plastic surgery compared to other countries, but this didn’t really bug me.
What annoyed me during my time in the country was that there are mirrors everywhere from subway stations to supermarkets. So, you’re always confronted by your appearance and you have ample opportunities to reinforce a negative self-image.
The photo-editing in the country peeved me off even more as it presented a drastically different image of you compared to reality. For example, it’s quite normal to get your CV or passport photo heavily edited, even without your permission.
There are also photo-editing apps that Koreans love like Snow. I tried it once because my students recommended it to me and I thought some of the filters looked cute, but I looked unrecognisable in the pictures I took of myself. I’ve also walked past Koreans using the Snow App who looked very different in their photos from what I saw in real life.
As a consequence of the importance of how people look in South Korea, I started to worry about appearance more than I ever did in the UK or in Spain for the matter.
5. The smell
Before moving to South Korea, another thing I had learnt about it is that it smelt bad in some cities because of questionable sewage systems. This was more specifically about the bigger cities in the country such as Seoul and Busan. I kind of forgot about this until I visited Seoul because I lived in a small city far away from the capital, and never smelt anything bad there. Now, the whole of Seoul doesn’t smell bad but some areas do, like certain parts of Insadong and Myeongdong do, and it’s not pleasant.
6. The insects
I’m quite scared of spiders and other bugs. That’s why I had many mini heart attacks when I lived in South Korea. The worst bugs are the cockroaches. I had the misfortune of seeing five of them, which is about five too many.
Cicadas are also quite something. I find the sound they make fascinating but they’re huge so I was a bit scared to walk outside when I first saw them. They also die at the end of summer and their carcasses drop on the floor, which is quite unpleasant.
I have to mention the mosquitos in the country as well. I, unfortunately, have tasty type O blood, so I was often a target of mosquito attacks. One of my mosquito bites even got as big as a 10 pence piece because it was so itchy.
One positive thing about my experience with so many bugs was that I became less scared of spiders when I returned to the UK.
7. The sound pollution
In my post about the reasons why I love South Korea, I mentioned how I enjoyed how music was played through speakers outside of shops. And, yeah, I do love that, but not at 9 am on a Saturday near my flat.
I like things in moderation and sometimes there tends to be a bit of sound pollution in South Korea and it often got on my nerves. It wasn’t only the blaring music but also the sounds of car horns beeping as driving in Korea is quite hectic.
8. The harshness of summer and winter
My family is from the Caribbean where the weather is quite hot and humid. However, I was born in the UK, so I’m used to mild weather. That’s why living in Korea was quite uncomfortable during the summer and winter. The weather is so hot and sticky in the summer that it’s impossible to do anything. I took photos of when I visited Suwon and Seongnam during the summer and you can see the sweat on my face. With the hot weather also come tropical storms, which are shocking. I once got caught in a storm and it wasn’t pretty. I’ve never seen heavier rain than what I experienced on that day.
On the flip side, the winters are cruelly cold, especially in Seoul. I visited the capital for the first time in January but the cold made me so miserable even though I enjoyed the things I did and saw. That’s why you’ll see many Koreans wearing thick long coats during winter.
9. Youtube
Youtube in Korea is quite similar to how it is in the UK. However, there’s one main difference: the age restriction verification. A lot of videos are unnecessarily censored and you’re required to enter your phone number, your date of birth, and your full name to prove you’re over 19.
I remember being unable to watch Beyoncé’s “Blow” music video because it was age-restricted and I had trouble figuring out what format I had to input my full name. I did finally end up verifying my age, but it took quite a while.
10. Online Banking
Internet banking in Korea can give you quite a headache, not just because things are in Korean, but because you need to download a lot of programs to even bank on the internet. The process for paying for something with a Korean debit card can also be quite arduous in some cases. That’s why I’d often pay for concert tickets with my UK debit card as it was simpler and quicker that way.
