Zip housing - housing consultant

Hello cutie pies ! This time I have a bit different blog post for you guys. As you guys know, Sara & I moved to our own place few weeks ago. Neither of us have ever before lived on our own, so getting your first own apartment on the other side of the world is definitely not an easy task! Except that for us it was, thanks to Moon & Roy, our dear friends also known as the staff of Zip housing, a housing consultant for foreigners here in Seoul. They've helped us so, so incredibly much during this month we've been here in Korea, and completely free of charge, so I thought the least I can do is to write a post about them and their great work here on my blog.

We first learned about zip housing several months before arriving to Korea. Sara saw a post on tumblr  recommending their services, and we were, of course, jumping with joy when we heard there's someone willing to help clueless people like us to find an apartment in Seoul. Our original plan for finding an apartment was to walk around Seoul, dragging along few of our friends, and visit various real estate agencies. That could have turned out to be a really long and a difficult way though since we know nothing about the real estate market here in Korea.

We contacted Roy & Moon via kakaotalk and explained our situation. Later, we sent them our application form and they promised to start looking for apartments for us few days before we arrive to Korea. Which they did. Only two days after coming here they had a bunch of apartments to show us and they took us to a guiding tour. I never made it there though because of a sudden jetlag / fever so instead Sara went and took a whole lot of pictures and videos for me. We found our apartment in one day after one guiding session. All we had to do was to send them our application and they went through so much work and trouble to find apartments suitable for our needs. 

We met again after few days to sign the contract, and Roy also helped us with bank accounts and paying the deposit and all the other fees. He always translated everything into English for us and made sure we were on the same page and knew what we were getting ourselves into.  In addition to the whole apartment stuff, we've been bothering them with the most ridiculous little problems we have here, from the awkward language barrier with our landlord all the way to ordering the right wifi router for our home. They've been patient, and always there to help us even when they are really busy with their own lives.

These guys are seriously the best. If you ever need an apartment here in Seoul, don't hesitate to contact them. They're professional yet still fun and comfortable to hang out with. You will get the best service available here in Seoul, no doubt, and also new friends. Friends are important. Friends who have a long temper and are fluent in Korean are important when you are trying to get your life together on the other side of the world, lol. Trust me, I know.

Here's the guiding story of our apartment hunting and here's the review we wrote about the whole process. P.s it includes some pictures of our apartment as well ! 

Go read them, and then go like and support them here.

xx,
Julia 

This and that

Hello !  This time I really don't have a certain theme or thing to write about so I'm just gonna briefly write down some things. 

Our apartment is still not completely ready, so I don't want to take pictures of it yet. We did visit IKEA the other day but due to its huge popularity in Korea right now every other of their items were sold out. So was the table I wanted, and the lamp I wanted, and the clothes rack thing I wanted- I could list these things for the next 15 minutes. We did, however, get meatballs and other useful stuff! In Finland IKEA trips were a mother-daughter thing for me so it felt really nice to finally go there. It was nostalgic. Mom, I miss you ! 

Last Friday we visited our school and registered for the language school. We also walked around the campus a bit and just took it all in. And let me tell you, the campus is huge. We got lost like 3 times before we found the right building, hahah. We also killed some time at this cute CNN cafe. After the school trip we went to Dongdaemun  & then to Hongdae. Sara did some shoe shopping while I was hunting for a new jacket and bag. Which I did find after like 2 hours. Few more weeks of winter vacation left and then on the 10th of March we have a placement test and classes start on the 13th. Then for the next 6 months it will be just studying Korean every day all day. I look forward to that but at the same time I'm kinda terrified, lol.

Otherwise we've been pretty much just hanging out in our apartment, meeting up with friends and going to club cocoon more than too many times (I swear I could go there and dance the whole night every damn day if it was up to me). Life here has started to settle down. Moving into our own apartment changed a lot. We have our own beds to sleep in, own kitchen to cook in and a lot of just...own space in general. It feels good after 3 weeks in a guesthouse sharing everything with everyone. 

Next week is probably going to be pretty busy, but I will try to write something here too when I have time. Otherwise more updates on my insta & twitter. I have a bunch of writing ideas but somehow I just always end up doing something else... Still kinda trying to get used to the fact I'm here. 

Life's good. Also Happy late valentine's day to you all ! 

xx,
Julia

Hongdae nightscape

Hello beautiful people~ We have finally moved into our new, tiny and cute apartment in Idae! We moved in about a week ago, slept 3 nights on the floor surrounded by suitcases and now this week the stuff we've ordered from gmarket has been arriving little by little everyday. We got our mattresses, mirrors, wifi router etc. The only super important things missing right now are our electric fans, so we can turn off the floor heating which costs way too much for our budget. 

I will take a bunch of pictures of our neighborhood and (still kinda empty) place for the next post, but for this post I walked around my favorite place, maybe in the whole world, called Hongdae. During the day it looks like just a normal artsy area with a lot of shops and restaurants and music playing on the streets, but in the evening it becomes just something magical. The music becomes louder, lights brighter and the streets are full of people going clubbing, or shopping for clothes even though it's 12 AM, street bands showing off their skills and the already familiar older women and men selling steaming hot street food from their small booths right next to the station. Unfortunately the pictures cannot capture the atmosphere fully, but maybe I'll do some vlogs from Hongdae later on, especially during Friday or Saturday evenings since I took these photos on a Tuesday evening, hahah~