Where My Study Abroad Friends Stayed, Part 1 (Goshiwon)

This series is

a continuation of the series on where to stay in Seoul during language study abroad.

My study abroad friends stayed in various places, including goshiwons, one-room apartments, dormitories, and some even lived in share houses, rented rooms with multiple people, or lived with Korean acquaintances.

Writing about everything would make this quite long, so this time, I will write about the goshiwons where my friends lived. Since goshiwons can be contracted for short periods, people like me who were studying abroad for three to six months used them.

One-room apartments generally require a contract of one year or more. However, some classmates signed contracts even for a six-month study abroad period, but the condition was that they had to find someone to live there after the six months were up.

I have summarized what my study abroad friends told me about the goshiwons they lived in.
Both goshiwons had showers and toilets inside their own rooms.

★ Person A (Japanese woman)
・Stayed for six months.
・Located in the Ewha Womans University area, women-only, near the station, and the building was relatively new.
・Found it using a housing search app (for Japanese people).
・The real estate agency managing it was on the floor below (I also wanted a women-only goshiwon, but my study abroad agent turned me down, saying that women-only ones are decreasing due to management difficulties. However, the app my friend used had several women-only ones listed).
・The washing machine (microwave and refrigerator were in the room) and kitchen were shared on one floor (four rooms per floor. Sometimes laundry was left out, and she had trouble being unable to use it).
・Rice was stocked, and each person could cook it themselves
(In the goshiwon I was in, there was a system where the manager always had cooked rice available).
・It was okay to flush toilet paper.
・She wore shoes up to her room door and kept them inside (In the goshiwon I was in, there was a shoe cabinet for each room in the common entrance, and up to two pairs were allowed).

This goshiwon looked like a normal apartment building from the outside and near the elevator, and it was clean.
Looking at photos of the room itself, the size was not much different from the room I was in, but the window was large and had a great view!

★Person B (Japanese woman)
・Stayed for three months.
・Located in a residential area and quiet.
・The manager lived in the same building (You might think that sounds reassuring, but the manager would sometimes talk for a long time in the common area with a long-term resident—a Korean person who didn't seem to be a student—which sometimes made it difficult to use).
・The kitchen was shared, and there was a microwave in the room.
・It was okay to flush toilet paper.
・There were no tenants in the building.

Although this goshiwon was more than a 30-minute walk from the Yonsei University Language Institute (bus available), she decided on it because her own older sister had lived in this goshiwon when she was studying abroad.

The manager would introduce new people to others, so she was able to get to know the residents. The goshiwon I was in had quite a large number of people, and there was absolutely no atmosphere of introducing people.
Moreover, most people didn't even greet each other when passing by, which was a bit surprising...
Maybe that's just how things are these days (No, is that really true...?).

However, I actively greeted the people who used the same auto-lock door (there were 8 rooms).
There was one man who ignored me (he also had bad manners, like leaving his shoes in the common entrance...), but the others replied with a smile.

Person B's goshiwon was scheduled to be demolished due to aging, and since she was going to continue living in Seoul, she said she used the housing search app again for her next home.

By the way, I don't think the goshiwon I was in was only for students. There were people who I thought might be older than me.
That said, I'm sure people were wondering about me, thinking, "You're not a student, are you...?"

That concludes the summary of the goshiwons my friends stayed in.
I think the system, fees, and atmosphere vary considerably depending on the location, the age of the building, the presence of tenants, the personality of the manager, the number of rooms, and the facilities in the common areas and private rooms.