Wen and I offered to take the two KAIST exchange students out to dinner today because they missed having good Korean food (and it didn’t hurt that we love Korean food too). Unfortunately, only Albert made it because Jin was down sick.
We brought Albert to a Korean restaurant near campus and made him do the ordering - rice cake with vegetables, spicy pork with vegetables and kim chee chi gae. The kim chee chi gae turned out only ok (especially compared to the one we had here last week) but the rice cake and pork were very delicious and even gained Albert’s stamp of approval.
As we talked over dinner, I was shocked to learn that both the exchange students did not receive any help from USF administration on finding an apartment. In fact, neither knew about Orientation which could have helped them to meet new friends and get advice on what classes to sign up for. On the contrary, exchange students from the U.S. who attend KAIST are often assigned a local student mentor besides having guaranteed dormitory housing.
So what happened?
After spending a week searching for an apartment, Albert finally found a place that catered to students who came to the U.S. to learn English. The place, near Japantown, provides weekly and monthly leases with breakfast and dinner provided. Jin ended up staying at the same place after Albert told him about it.
Albert hastened to add that in spite of the initial bad experience, he’s been having a great time making new friends at USF. He also offered to take us around during those few days that we would be in Seoul for the study tour. For those of you who are interested in ever visiting Korea (with or without the study tour), Albert and Jin are only going to be here for this Fall semester before returning to KAIST to continue their program. Make sure you try to get to know them and help make their experience here a great one!
You can contact Albert at leehome1|at|gmail|dot|com.
