The Where’s Anne website began in 2013 as a question—and an inside joke—during my study-abroad experience in Ireland. Where’s Anne was a school project for a Multimedia Storytelling university course, where I posted my travel photos and videography, and it has evolved into travel guides for explorers on how to teach and travel Korea. If I figured it out, you can, too!

My journey to become an English teacher is possibly different than others’ experiences. After receiving my Bachelor’s degree, I took an 120-hour TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certificate at Manhattan College, and then was tweaking my experience on my resume to align with skills that the schools look for.

While working in a corporate office job as a video/audio technician (at “my dream job”) in NYC, I was applying for hagwon 학원 jobs—originally in Spain, and then learned more about the pros of working and living in South Korea. My motivation was that I wanted to travel now while I’m young #YOLO. I watched YouTube videos, read blog and Reddit posts, and asked people online about their experiences. Then I learned about the EPIK Program with the Korean Ministry of Education, prepared all my documents, and applied!

My language-learning experience is that pronunciation is… not good. When I was an English teacher, I would tell my students that talking in English is really the best way to learn the language—then I realized that’s what I need to do for Korean!

First when I got to Korea, I could only remember to say 요기 (yo-gi) (which means “here”) which I later learned should’ve been 요기요 when respectfully talking to taxi drivers. (TY Yogi Bear.) And then I finally memorized how to say 갑사합니다 (gam-sa-hab-ni-da) (which means “Thank you” in a formal sense).

Then by the end of the summer, I learned how to read 한글 Hangul, the Korean language. Once you know how to read, you can pronounce since it’s a phonetic language.

I strongly recommend using Memrise website/app and Talk to Me in Korean.com to learn grammar, vocab words, and phrases. I love Memrise since it has various lessons that incorporate everything: reading, listening, and keyboard typing for legit real-world phrases and words. I listen and repeat as I read and type it. 한국어 공부 할게여요!~

And learning Korean helped me understand why my Korean students were totally mispronouncing the letters B/P and R/L, and why some were saying “Englishy” instead of the “sh” sound. Plus it is fun to be able to read and understand!