You know the feeling of being a student again and it’s terrifying??? Traumatic school flashbacks haha.

Since I’m married to a Korean man I’m allowed a free Korean tutor through government services. Unfortunately we had to wait a year or so before one was available for me. Being in the countryside it’s a tutor that comes to people’s houses, which is good for me because I don’t have time to travel to a class twice a week.

Yesterday was the first evaluation to see where my Korean level is. My Korean is very basic and although I can follow some conversations, my speaking level is very low. People mistakenly think that by simply being in Korea that it should be very easy to learn Korean, but it’s not at all. Everyone has different skills and experiences. For example, someone who has already learned another language will likely learn faster, whereas I have never learned another language before. Also whether your relationship developed in English or Korean or a bit of both will affect it. When I first met Hugh, I couldn’t even read Korean.

Another aspect is what language who have to work in, and of course our work is mostly in English. Teachers, full-time bloggers and others working in English environments in Korea have this problem, and it’s a very different experience to someone who is learning Korean in a Korean university for example. What type of work or study you are doing in Korea will really influence the opportunities you have for learning Korean. (Not to mention extra things like dialect!)

Due to time limitations and knowing that I’d be getting a tutor later anyway, my Korean study stalled a lot. But now I’ll be learning Korean in Korean, which the tutor said is the hardest but fastest way. It’s kinda terrifying but I’m really glad as well.