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Focus only on your own growth.
GapYear is a time for growth and happiness.
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40th gapperPark Joo-hong
A one-and-a-half-year gap year
Experience during the gap year: Internship at an NGO
My 20-Year-Old Self Wandering in Thick Fog: The Brake I Needed
"The reality of my college life was completely different—not only from others' expectations but even from my own."
At 20, I was just an ordinary girl who had finished the entrance exams and entered university according to my scores.That's what I was. Looking back, I think I suddenly began university life while still immature and not yet aware of the difference between 19 and 20. Maybe that's why my college life didn't reach what I'd call 'average.' It wasn't that I did poorly so much as I was simply below average.
I naturally liked taking the lead and stating my opinions clearly. So I believed I had to work harder than anyone else, and those around me regarded me as a promising student. I liked that label. After all, who doesn't appreciate encouragement and respect from many people?
But the reality of my college life was completely different from not only others' expectations but also my own. I entered a department that seemed fun because my scores fit, even though I didn't have anything I particularly wanted to do, and I think my unhappiness started there. Because the English classes were harder to follow than I expected (the department's courses were conducted in English), I found myself watching the professor in every class and beginning to ask fundamental questions like, 'What do I really want to do with my life? Why did I come to this department?'
This inner wandering shook my life. A country girl's sense of alienation in the city, the juvenile, suffocating classroom, my confidence hitting rock bottom, other people's sincere feelings I didn't want to accept, a life flowing without knowing where it's headed — even if these were worries that come with being young, the weight of them felt heavy.
So I took a leave of absence immediately after finishing my freshman final exams.I didn't want to let my life slip away; I vaguely wanted to find a clue to it. In that thick-fog situation, I thought what I needed was a brake.I had no plans, but I decided I should temporarily forget about a university life that felt like ill-fitting clothes.
# He Who Does Not Work Shall Not Eat: The 'Job' I Started for Financial Independence
"It was an age when I could so easily pour my 'effort' into places that did not promise a future; I was so easily anxious and unable to find my footing."
The first thing I started after taking a leave of absence from school was a part-time job.I thought I couldn't even ask my parents for help while unemployed, so I chastised myself with 'he who does not work shall not eat.'I had already planned since childhood to be financially independent by the time I was twenty, so I don't think I gave working much thought.
The kinds of jobs a woman in her early twenties could easily get were mostly in the service industry. So most of the work I took was at department stores, Japanese restaurants, tutoring, family restaurants, hotels, and academies — I didn't turn anything down. I wasn't in a position to be picky.
Personally, the job I learned the most from among these was the family restaurant. The operations were well systematized, staff training was structured, and I could experience a variety of interpersonal relationships and social life. Crucially, there weren't many places that paid hourly wages more generously than family restaurants did at the time. So it was an extremely stable job that helped me grow, and I remember working there for quite a long time.
It was around the time when the family restaurant's characteristic food smells began to feel familiar and comforting.Once I had achieved the independence I wanted, perhaps the problem was that my goal disappeared, and I slipped into the habit of 'thinking' again. Looking back, I neither played nor relaxed; I was absorbed in work. In that way, my early twenties were an age when I could easily dedicate myself to places that didn't promise a future, when I was so easily anxious and unable to find my bearings.
# Starting Over in an Unfamiliar Place, Philippine NGO
"So this time I decided to waver again."
Then someone I knew suggested that I try working at a Philippine NGO. I accepted easily without much thought. Even simply put, having grown up in a small town and having worked hard to come to Seoul, it was perhaps natural that I was interested in 'big waters' and foreign cultures. And since I wanted, from childhood, to help others and be someone useful to society, an NGO seemed like an excellent and new challenge. So I decided to waver again this time. And so I set off again looking for an escape from the weight of my life.
I justified it to myself, thinking that maybe it would be okay to escape reality just one more time.
I departed for the Philippines, and upon arrival I immediately visited a site in Manila. Perhaps because it was the day after a heavy rain, people were doing laundry and bathing everywhere. The smell of laundry soap was strong. Between the densely packed houses along both sides of the road (they were places made of wood or planks patched together—hardly houses, yet there was no other way to describe them), residents looked at me with curious eyes. I felt a mix of complicated emotions.
The work I did there was mainly field work and office work. The place I was introduced to was a local NGO engaged in international relief activities, and because it had many Korean donors they needed a Korean to manage them, so I was sent. Thus, on weekdays I handled donor management, promotion and marketing, project planning, and project monitoring and management in the office, and on Fridays and Saturdays I visited sites in person to monitor projects, etc.At the time it was a small NGO that had not long been established, so I got to experience everything from miscellaneous tasks to major work like project planning.And there were times I had to go to remote areas of the Philippines or abroad for field research, and because I had to build relationships with locals from diverse backgrounds, I had to quickly get used to the cultures and customs. For someone like me who likes to work hard, each day was extremely fun and exciting.
# Gap Year in the Philippines, and My Solidified Dream
"The wandering and urgent longing about life at that time transformed into a 'restoration of myself' through this time of prayer, reached after various experiences."
If someone asks when I enjoyed the Philippines the most, countless images unfold in my mind.
The taste of the coconut I ate after experiencing the mountain village children's two-hour walk home,
A remote village we reached after taking a boat, a bus, and even a motorcycle through winding paths,
A party where local friends and I played with cheap fireworks, but instead of sparks there was only thick smoke and we giggled together,
The memory of seeing a pile of pig eyes at the local market for the first time and being unable to eat pork for a while,
The smell of water everywhere as we thoroughly cleaned the office-cum-lodging that had been flooded,
That quiet night when I studied Korean diligently to teach the locals,
An impromptu excursion we took with the local staff, leaving work behind...
It was so eventful that I couldn't pour it all out at once, and each moment contained its own joys and sorrows. However, at the end of those memories, the sight of the sky I watched from my room's balcony every morning and evening remains faintly in my heart. I prayed to God every morning and evening. I used the word 'deity' for a more romantic expression, but I am a Christian. So it would be more accurate to say I prayed to God. I'd like to describe it as a conversation with the universe to find the secret of my life (laughs), but it wasn't that grand. Morning and evening, watching the lives of Filipinos, I would murmur my thoughts on small but varied life topics.The wandering and desperate feelings about life at that time, through this time of prayer reached after various experiences,seemed to transform into 'a restoration of myself.'
In fact, during my time in the Philippines I really worked hard. I worked from morning until night without any shortcuts. The work was enjoyable and meaningful in itself, so I had no complaints. I gained such diverse experience within the organization that there was hardly any task I hadn't done, and because I worked diligently I was able to build lasting trust with many people. Through thesecountless experiences and moments of self-reflection, I came to understand the real 'me,' and naturally standards for my life emerged. Because of that, I gainedwhat seemed like the space to look back on myself once more (positively or growth-oriented).
These standards did not clearly and specifically present an answer as to 'what I should become.' But more importantly, they allowed me to decide for myself what I should live for. Once the direction of my life became certain and I accepted myself, the winds that had been raging in my heart quieted down.
# After the gap year, reality remained unchanged, but 'I' changed
"As the semester went on, I had become a decent college student in a different sense."
I decided to return to school and wrapped up my NGO activities. Nothing was clear and I still felt like I was in a fog. But if anything had changed, it was that I had gained confidence. Once I 'decided' what to head toward, those difficult classes and the changed environment no longer worried me at all. I actually began to look forward to what would come next.
Of course, the path that opened up after my gap year wasn't all romantic. Life is always like that—reality can be a mess (laughs). Like other students returning after a leave, campus life after three years was really unfamiliar to me. During my absence the department building had even moved to a completely different location, so I couldn't find my classrooms properly, and with no classmates my own age, I was saddled with roles just for being an upper-year student; still, difficult classes weighed on me.Although I had a mountain of daily tasks, I became a more passionate student on my own. I had reasons to work hard, and all of it was enjoyable.As the semester passed, I became a decent college student in a different sense.
# Starting a business to make my dream a reality
"The pause of my gap year actually gave me more opportunities."
I am currently running a startup in the social economy sector. That's because I was very interested in social innovation. I wasn't interested in the social economy from the start. However, thanks to my experience working at an overseas NGO, I could participate in various domestic and international volunteer activities both on and off campus while attending school, and because of the experience I gained, I was able to get a job in international development cooperation without any notable certifications. While working like that...I learned about the concept of the social economy and, wanting to directly experience the social change I desired, started a businessI ended up doing so.
Life is unpredictable, but I dare to say that my gap year experience led me here. That's because I've been trying, even up to now, to make concrete the picture of the life I drew during the gap year.
A gap year might have been an escape for me. But the pause of the gap year actually gave me more opportunities. My early-twenties experiences shaped the social environment of my mid-twenties and influenced the start of my thirties. So even if we can't know the future, isn't it okay to conclude that the experiences and feelings I had during my gap year determined my life up to now?So I think confidently stepping away from reality to find 'yourself' is a worthwhile investment. It may not be everyone's answer to life like it was for me, but I want to vouch that boldly taking a pause in life at least once is a reasonable approach.
We always welcome recommendations and submissions for the 100 Gap Year participants. Marketing manager Haein Cho (dorothy224@koreagapyear.com)Please send an email to her. |