{"id":97188247,"date":"2017-05-10T09:10:36","date_gmt":"2017-05-10T09:10:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cheapoair.com\/miles-away\/?p=97188247"},"modified":"2017-05-12T18:39:00","modified_gmt":"2017-05-12T18:39:00","slug":"farewell-korea-saying-goodbye-to-a-place-i-called-home-for-2-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cheapoair.com\/miles-away\/farewell-korea-saying-goodbye-to-a-place-i-called-home-for-2-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Farewell Korea: Saying Goodbye to a Place I Called Home for 2 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Born in China and raised in Pennsylvania, Samantha Elisabeth is a wanderer, freelance writer, and ESL teacher. You can read more about her adventures on her blog There She Goes Again<\/a>. Here, she writes about her two-year gig teaching English in a small Korean town, and what she went through when it was finally time to leave.<\/em><\/p>\n

I honestly didn\u2019t think I\u2019d cry leaving Korea. I left Namwon, my home for the last two years, in a bit of a rush for a two-week goodbye tour of the country. I don\u2019t think it really hit me that at the time Korea wasn\u2019t in my foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

But then it happened. I was sitting on my plane headed to Los Angeles, and as it pulled away from its gate I could feel the tears start spilling. It was a quiet cry with only minimal sniffling, but I couldn\u2019t have stopped it if I tried. It continued until we were well in the air, and I, exhausted, fell asleep.<\/p>\n

There really is nothing like those tumultuous first few years after college. You\u2019re an adult but you don\u2019t feel like one, and the real world feels like a constant pop quiz of things you never knew you needed to study.<\/p>\n

I got to spend those unstable years in that little town down in southern Korea.<\/p>\n

When I first arrived, I was burnt out. Towards the end, college had become an incredibly draining experience that left me feeling uncomfortable in my own skin, unsure of my passions, and about fifty thousand dollars in debt. Everything I thought I\u2019d need at seventeen had completely changed at twenty-one, and all I wanted was at least one year to put myself back together again.<\/p>\n

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Nothing beats the feeling of getting to the top of a mountain after hiking. You remember why you started the journey in the first place 📷 by @wandr.fox #sheexplores #ig_korea #imagineyourkorea<\/a><\/p>\n

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