Recent Blog Posts
Breaking the Eye-Level Habit: A Beginner’s Field Guide to Street and Travel Photography in South Korea
South Korea is a playground for photographers. Within a single afternoon, you can pivot from framing jagged coastal fishing boats to capturing the geometric layers of a mountain temple, ending the night under the neon-drenched pulse of urban apartment towers.
Yet, after shooting here for a few years, a creative rut often creeps in: Stand there. Camera up. Eye level. Click.
How Buddhism Became a Lifestyle Trend with Young Koreans
Buddhist-themed pop-up stores, meditation classes, and merchandise have become a regular draw at Korean shopping malls in 2026, aimed mainly at shoppers in their twenties and thirties. The trend, known as hip Buddhism (힙불교), is growing at the same time as the number of Koreans who identify as Buddhist continues to fall.
Why Electric Cars Are Winning Over Koreans in Their 20s
Koreans in their twenties registered 11,844 new electric cars from January through August 2026, a 130 percent increase from the same period last year. The figures come from market tracker CarIsYou and were reported by Korea JoongAng Daily on September 26. Across all age groups, EV purchases rose 84.2 percent over the same period, so the youngest adult buyers are moving to electric at roughly twice the market pace.
Location:How Chuseok Family Gatherings Are Changing in Korea
Chuseok remains one of Korea's most important family holidays, but the meaning of gathering is changing. Surveys released around the 2026 holiday show that many people still value family contact while questioning intrusive conversations, demanding rituals, and the assumption that everyone must celebrate in the same way.
- Read more about How Chuseok Family Gatherings Are Changing in Korea
- Log in or register to post comments
Too Nervous to Speak Korean? Try These. | Into Korean
People have told me they’re too nervous to speak Korean, and wonder what they should do. Well I used to have this same problem when I was a beginner, and even later on after I started improving. In this new episode of my podcast “Into Korean” I share my own experiences with feeling anxious to speak Korean, as well as chat with a guest (Sami from Australia) who shares her experiences with language anxiety.
- Read more about Too Nervous to Speak Korean? Try These. | Into Korean
- Log in or register to post comments
Why People Don't Drink Korea's Safe Tap Water
Most people in South Korea do not drink tap water (수돗물, sudonmul) directly, even though official testing rates it as safe. A 2024 government survey, reported by the Korea Herald, found that 4.4 percent of respondents drank tap water straight from the tap or after refrigerating it, while 33.5 percent boiled it. In Busan the question has a local edge: on August 18, the mayor met the national water commission and civic groups to discuss where the city should draw its drinking water.
- Read more about Why People Don't Drink Korea's Safe Tap Water
- Log in or register to post comments
Ramyeon Evolves Into a Full Home Meal
Korean instant ramyeon is becoming a more deliberate home meal as shoppers face higher prices and share simple ways to change a familiar packet. The additions are often ordinary ingredients such as soybean sprouts, egg, tofu, cabbage, scallions, or leftover rice, but the point is larger than a single recipe.
Instant noodles remain fast, inexpensive, and deeply familiar, especially when a full meal feels impractical. What has changed is the attention paid to turning them into something more filling, more personal, or less repetitive without spending restaurant money.
- Read more about Ramyeon Evolves Into a Full Home Meal
- Log in or register to post comments
Korea’s 2027 Abortion-Pill Access Plan Explained
South Korea has announced a plan to introduce a medication-abortion option for pregnancies of up to nine weeks, with a target of the first quarter of 2027. The announcement is important, but it does not mean that the medication is currently available through Korean clinics or pharmacies.
- Read more about Korea’s 2027 Abortion-Pill Access Plan Explained
- Log in or register to post comments
When Books Become Collectibles: Korea’s ‘Text Hip’ Trend Reaches Convenience Stores
In South Korea, books are increasingly being treated as more than things to read. Book covers, quotations, publishers, bookmarks and other literary objects have become part of a lifestyle trend known as “text hip,” and one of its most unexpected expressions recently appeared in convenience stores: bread.
He stopped studying Korean for 3 YEARS, and still became fluent
What actually happens when you take a long break from studying Korean? I met Ashemon -who once took a 3 year break and then came back to become fluent in Korean – why he stopped, what he did to get going again, and what advice he has for other people who’ve done the same.