How I ended up in The Asian Country of South Korea.

How I ended up in The Asian Country of South Korea.

As mentioned briefly in the previous post of my self-introduction, I just graduated from Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea. 

I originally come from Tunisia, born and raised there for more than 20 years, yet at some point in my life in 2010, I decided to jump out of the secure "easy" life I had always lived in Ariana, Tunisia and to move all the way to Asia and exactly to Seoul, capital of South Korea. 

At the time I was in my second year of university, majoring in Industrial Engineering at the National School of Engineers of Tunis (Ecole National des Ingénieurs de Tunis, french name of it) but I decided to transfer to Seoul National University and change major to... Nuclear Engineering. Yup, I was always interested in nuclear scale "things" and I thought that if I had to go all the way to Seoul, might as well just major in something totally new and non-existent in my country.

Now the reason why I chose Korea wasn't totally my choice. In fact, one of my best friends is half-Chinese and left for Shanghai in 2009 to attend university there. For several reasons, right after I graduated from high school, I wanted to leave Tunisia and go abroad somewhere and this friend of mine suggested that I'd join her in China. 

That sounded like an amazing plan for me, to go all the way to China and share this experience with one of my best friends, but the price was too high. I'm not talking here about real money, but moving to China meant learning Chinese and starting all over again as a freshman (the universities I wanted to attend didn't offer a transferring program); this meant wasting a year or two in the language plus having the 2 years I already studied in my Tunisian University go to waste... and honestly I wasn't ready to spend 2+2+4 years just for a bachelor degree.

So my friend suggested either Japan or Korea, that way we could still be closer to each other and visit each other more often. I personally wanted to end up in Japan, but as my parents were paying, I couldn't allow myself to have them pay for everything (tuition+living expenses+traveling expenses), and Japan isn't the cheapest country out there.

So I decided on Korea, I searched for the list of universities in Seoul and decided that Seoul National University sounded cool, so I went for it.

I had all kind of reactions from people around me; some were surprised and didn't understand why I was leaving now half-way through my education, others laughed at me for choosing Korea as a destination (most people go to Europe, Canada or the USA)... but the most important people around me were my parents, and as they were supportive and encouraging, I just decided to ignore comments and reactions around me and focus on my application, and it went as follow: 

July-August 2010: application procedure

November 2010: reply (positive for me)

February 2011: moving to Korea and starting school on May 2nd, 2011.

As a transfer student, I was supposed to study just 2 years and graduate, but as I had to change major, there were a lot of 2nd year mandatory courses I didn't take in Tunisia and so I stayed in Korea for 3 years instead of only 2. 

During those 3 years I experienced amazing moments as well as horrible ones, but if I had to do it all over again, I'd probably do the same thing (maybe choose a different university instead but yeah :p ).

Now this long story isn't just to tell why and how I ended up in Korea but it's also to encourage people everywhere to move, don't wait for opportunities to come to you, create them and seize them. Be ready to deal with refusals, accept them and just keep on trying until you make it happen. I personally have applied for the UK, Switzerland and France since 2008 and each time I couldn't make it (whether because I wasn't accepted or because I missed the scholarship application deadline etcetc), but I still tried and I ended up in Korea and I don't regret it at all.

As a student, you can go on exchange programs, look for internships abroad, go backpacking wherever you want to. Of course be careful and most importantly ready to accept and respect the differences you will find in other countries and by the time you are back home, you will have carried with you the best memories of your life.

The world is an amazing place full of awesome people and breathtaking places, but most people are too scared to leave what they have even for a short period of time and go somewhere new. Open up your eyes and travel the world while you are young and can do it. Once you settle down, get a serious job or start a family, it becomes harder to stop and start all over again.

JinJu, South Korea.