It's all about the Won

I went to the bank yesterday to exchange some money. I foolishly assumed that they would provide me with any relevant information pertaining to the currency exchange process, and also that their bank policies would be in keeping with basic mathematical principles, like multiplication. Wrong on both counts.

The exchange rate is roughly .001, which means that one US Dollar equals approximately one thousand Korean Won. I was a bit surprised to see the exchange rate on my receipt, exactly .001. This isn't impossible, of course, but rather unlikely. Especially when the 2 Million Korean Won I asked for was costing me $2,195.14. Turns out their "policy" is to only write the first four digits of the exchange rate on currency exchange slips. This is my favorite kind of corporate policy, the kind that saves about 1 second of work, and guarantees customer confusion. As I'm on the phone later that day, I decide to look up the actual exchange rate, .000987167, which means I should be paying $1974.33.

Several phone calls later, I find out that the official exchange rates posted everywhere only apply to very large transfers, and that the bank pretty much makes up their own rate for small exchanges. I also find out that using my credit card overseas will only result in a 3% charge on top of the transfer, using the official exchange rate. The bank exchange was costing me about 10%.

I canceled the order, after several minutes spent explaining to the bank that simply exchanging back after the fact was not going to make me happy, as that would screw me out of twice as much money.

Moral of the story: Don't exchange currency unless it's absolutely necessary. I was planning to buy some fancy electronic toys when I got there (I don't get paid until after a month of work) but now I'm just going to bring enough money to eat and get around for a month. Also, upon further research, it turns out the exchanging money in banks in foreign countries generally gets you better rates anyway.

Because

Assuming everything goes according to plan, I should be in South Korea in less then a month. I'll be there for a year, teaching English to elementary school students, and living in Yongin, a satellite city near Seoul. The main question people have is "Why?" and the truth is I don't have a particularly good reason. It's a lot of little reasons, which in my mind sum up to the simple answer, "Because."

I decided I wanted to go somewhere else. Not just as a vacation, to take pictures of all the famous buildings and then leave, but to actually live there. I want to be alone in a foreign country, forced to learn a new language and make new friends, to live there, work there, and play there. That sounds interesting and fun to me.

People often seem to intimate that I'll be "missing out" on everything I'm leaving behind. I can't argue with that, but it does seem rather narrow minded. Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, you are missing out on everything else. It's up to you to decide what you're going to miss, and whatever you do with your life, you'll end up missing a whole lot.

The purpose of this blog will be to give as honest an account as possible of my experience in Korea. I'll gloat about the good things, whine about the bad things, and take pictures of the funny things.