100 Ways To Spend ₩₩₩ in Korea

Key:
$1 USD = 1,121 Korean won
(It's easier if you just look at the won and take off 3 zeros to convert it to dollars)

Arguably the most alluring reason to come to Korea and teach English is the pay.  Whether you teach in a hagwon (private academy) or for EPIK you will be getting a pretty good deal in the dolla dolla bills department.  With just a four-year college degree you are eligible to apply for a teaching position in Korea.  As a public school teacher one has the potential to earn from about 1.8 million won to 2.7 million won depending on the area of Korea where she is teaching and her credentials.  I personally make 2.1 million won which translates to about $1,800 USD.  Because I took an online teaching course before I came I was bumped up on the pay scale.  Before you say that $1,800 isn't that much money, the benefits of teaching in Korea as opposed to many other countries are quite substantial.  First of all our school pays our rent.  All we have to take care of is the utilities, internet and cell phone bills.  This is quite nice depending on the apartment your school hooked you up with.  My apartment is pretty modest but it's enough for me.  I would guess that it saves me from paying around 400,000 won a month.  The cost of living here is cheaper in many aspects of day to day life than it is back in the States.  Before deciding to come to Korea I had read, and people had told me first-hand that it is easy to save money while living here.  Admittedly, I decided to come to Korea because I figured I would be able to save the most money in order to pay off student loans.

Okay, Mom, stop reading now.

Before I left for Korea I had planned on saving around $12,000 dollars and knocking my student loan debt down to about half of what I started out with a year before.  Sounds too good to be true, right? Right.  Turns out we do make a lot of money as teachers and it would be possible to save this amount if one was very frugal, but it's hard to live like that when you're in another country living a "once in a lifetime" experience.  I want to enjoy my time here as much as possible because it is very likely that once I leave in about 7 months I may never come back to the good ol' ROK.  So what's a girl to do?  If you know me I think you know the answer to that.

As I read and heard from people before me, "It's easy to save money in Korea."  Well, I am going to give you the other end of the spending spectrum and tell you about how "It's easy to spend money in Korea" as the title implies, although I lied about it being 100 ways.  It just sounded catchier than "6".

How to spend money in Korea:

1. Drinking.  I would say that drinking is a favorite past time of both Koreans and foreigners in Korea alike.  On a weekend night in Daegu there isn't much to do besides ditch outta town or go downtown.  If one chooses either of these his night may very well consist of moderate to heavy drinking.  Unless one decides to camp outside of GoGo Vinyl all night, which serves 3,000 won "extra strong alcohol" drinks in a bag that look like adult Capri Suns, drinking can make a significant dent in one's wallet.  I can't say that most people spend more money on alcohol here than they do back home but I can say that I have seen my friends drop some cash.  One can also choose to go the soju and Korean beer route but after a full night of this one may find himself in the gutter-literally.
2. Western food.  Non-Korean food here is priced about the same as it is back home and sometimes can be even more expensive.  If one chooses to eat Western food, which my friends and I do pretty often, she can expect to spend around 10,000 won a dish.  Since I eat Korean food everyday for lunch I usually prefer to eat something else for dinner.  Unless of course it's kimchi pancakes which I could eat for every meal.  Korean food is pretty cheap and you can get a meal for around 4-5,000 won but, although it is delicious, I can only eat so much.  To give you an example, a medium pizza at Papa John's is about 23,000 won.  
3. Travel.  It's only natural while living abroad to want to travel while you have the opportunity.  In Korea the public transportation system can get you anywhere in the country.  This makes traveling to more entertaining cities than the one you already live in very easy, and pretty expensive.  In the last 5 months that I've been here I would guess that I've traveled to Seoul five times.  At 41,000 won each way on the KTX (high-speed train) this gets pricey.  Of course you could take the bus at 26,000 won each way but you will end up spending a few more hours in transit.  When you will only be there for less than 12 hours it's sometimes not worth it to take the bus or slow train!  Also, many people were placed in more rural areas of Korea where there is very little to do.  I have friends that make frequent trips to Daegu and other big cities for the weekend.  Finally, having important people in other cities makes you forget about the money that you spend getting there and back.
4. Shopping.  Daegu has a lot of really good shopping, at least for women.  As it is known as "the fashion capital" to Koreans there is naturally much money to be spent.  The price range varies from really cheap to really expensive depending on where you shop.  You can choose to browse through a local boutique with cheaper Korean-made clothing or head to Busan to visit the largest department store in the world, Shinsegae Centum City which is crammed with floor after floor of brand name and designer stuff.  The first few months of living in Daegu I was overwhelmed with joy at the vast shopping possibilities.  Therefore I went at least a few times a week.  Since then my addiction has subsided a bit but is not back down to where it was in the States.  I'm gonna have to donate a bunch of clothes before I leave Korea because they definitely won't fit in my bags.
5. Music Fests.  Since I have been in Korea I have attended two music festivals at about 88,000 won a pop.  The first, Global Gathering, was an electronic music festival held in Seoul in October.  The second, SEMF, was an awesome concert held at a classy hotel in Seoul over New Years Eve.  Both nights were an outrageously fun but pretty expensive with the tickets and the trains to and from Seoul, although we did save on drinks!  Holler!  Definitely worth it in my book.
6. Reoccurring health issues.  I know some people who have had to go to the "hospital" many times since they've been here.  Although we do have insurance through our schools, it doesn't cover everything.  Koreans tend to go visit the doctor much more frequently than Americans, maybe because it is cheaper, and this means that if you go once, you will probably be back.  When someone goes to the "hospital" the doctor gets a certain amount of money per person that they see.  The cost is subsidized by the government so the patient doesn't have to pay all of it.  Because the doctor is making more money the more patients he sees, sometimes it is in his/her interest for the patient to keep coming back.  This is definitely not the case in most situations but I have spent more money than I wanted at the doctor's since I've been here.  The Korean health care system is explained here for anyone who cares. I find it quite interesting. 

Now I will give you the one-and-only definite way that you WILL save money in Korea.

1. Partying at Club Frog in Daegu on a Wednesday night.  Hold your breath....Club Frog in downtown Daegu is FREE!  No, I'm not just saying there's no cover.  The drinks are free too.  So are the lockers to put your shit in.  If you order a cocktail (they have a list of 10 or so to choose from) you can have free drinks all night.  And this is not even just for ladies; men drink for free too.  Don't ask me why cause I have no idea.  I don't promise that this will be going on for much longer, as I don't see how this is even possible.  Not shittin ya.

Saving money:  Korean beer and drink-in-a-bag

Okay, so I've made it sound like I haven't saved any money in Korea but I totally have.  I've got a few grand in the bank so far but I am going to the Philippines for three weeks comin' up here really soon.  I am doing fine and paying off my student loans as they come.  Don't worry.

I really just think that Korean money is so easy to spend because it looks like Monopoly money.