A Tour of our Korean Officetel

Filed as: Us and Bucheon // Responses: 130

So we’ve got around a month and a half left in our apartment now. But it’s not really an apartment. In Korea, we live in what – to us, and to everyone who’s asked for a tour – seems like an apartment, but it’s called an officetel. The difference is slight. Supposedly, and officetel is a smaller sized apartment, used often for businesses, but can be lived in as well if you’re broke. To us, though, it seems like a pretty freaking sweet place.

If you’re asking why we have only a month and a half left here, that’s because that’s when Martina’s contract with her school is finally going to be up, and she’s not re-signing with them. She’s going to stop working as a teacher, and start working on the site full-time. Hooray! Both of us working on the site full-time now! BAM! But, that means that we’ll have to relinquish our place and find one on our own. We’ve been living in this officetel since we first came to Bucheon back in 2008. Our schools picked them out for us before we got here, and when we arrived it was all clean and fully furnished. And…in what feels like just a few more days, we’re going to be moving out. Oh! So many memories! So many videos!

We’ve started looking into finding a new place to live in now. We’re torn between living in Bucheon and Seoul. Living in Seoul would be great because of the location, but we’re worried about the size of the place we’ll be living in. Since most of our videos take place in our apartment, if we get stuck in a shoebox in Hongdae, then doing Music Mondays while standing on top of our toaster might suck. But it’s Seoul! Wouldn’t it be cool to live in the city? Wouldn’t it be easier for us to do cool videos in the city? Bucheon’s still really close to Seoul though: we live a two minute walk away from the intracity bus stop, so we can easily catch a bus to Gangnam, Hongdae, Seoul Station, Jongo, and other places we frequent. So…ah! Decisions, decisions.

Anyhow, if you’ve got any suggestions or input, or know a guy who knows a guy who won’t try to con us the way other real estate agents have so far, let us know! When we find a place we’ll probably do a video about the whole process of finding an apartment in Korea, which we can’t fully comment on now, because we’re still learning the ropes without getting fleeced by realtors.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1670100069 Katherine L D Kirk

    Hey, you don’t need to worry about zombies. Your officetel is full of plants. You’ll be fine!

    http://www.popcap.com/games/free/pvz

  • http://twitter.com/clazziq K.

    Polish??? „Nogi”??? :D
    OK, I might be slow, but I’m Polish, I’m watching your stuff for some time and here comes Polish accent! WOW!!!
    *off to the rest of the vid*

    I really really like seeing various flats/houses/apartments, so I find this vid just awesome :) I’ve always been pretty interested in your nice little place… but shh ;)

  • http://twitter.com/clazziq K.

    …and finally I saw what’s upstairs! :D

    <3 your place. Good luck with moving!

  • Amelie

    Hi guys! This video as awesome and very informative!
    I had a question though, could you tell me how much it is to rent an officelet?
    When I return to Korea I would like to rent one.

    • http://www.eatyourkimchi.com Simon and Martina

      Our officetel costs 10,000,000 won as a deposit, and 600,000 won a month for rent.

      • http://twitter.com/Trizzty Louise

        Uhm, I’ve heard that korean money is more expensive than dollars?
        ehm, let me explain…I’m from sweden. so my question is how much is 10.000.000 wom in dollar?and how much can you get from 1 dollar?
        thx!

        • Ramham424

          1000won=1 dollar
          10,000,000won=10,000 dollars

      • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=24610483 Jeet Singh Dhindsa

        What subway station was your officetel near?

        • http://www.eatyourkimchi.com Simon and Martina

          Songnae in Bucheon

  • pinupgirl158

    Hi we sort of have the same amount of hard drive and I don’t have a dock…I have to place it in cases and remove it and all the hassle in the world…

    What brand of HD dock to you guys use? Or do you recommend any? Thank You!

    By The Way…I really like Martina’s headband collection :)

    • http://www.eatyourkimchi.com Simon and Martina

      Hard drive brands don’t really matter to us, because we’re not using them heavily. They’re more just dumping grounds of all our original footage and files for each video, just in case we ever need to go back and pull some stuff from them. I’m pretty sure we just get the cheapest Samsung drives we can find. Yeah!

  • Hodtotu

    Polish nogi.
    I was wandering before due to Simon´s surname if he is a polish or has a polish ancestors and it looks like it is so :)
    In my language we have very similar word for feet.
    Best wishes from Slovakia

  • Maron5

    hahahah kogi and pogi
    so cuuute!!!!! omg i love the accent!
    i like the way you say about Korea stuffs

  • Stevia

    Hey awesome officetel!!

  • Braveseoul

    How did you guys get about in the TESL program? I’m very interested in doing the same I think i’ve finally found my passion of teaching English

  • Victoria

    Is that a GD&TOP wallpaper I see on the laptop? :P

  • Lovekaramito

    what you guys place look like now

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001052786758 Sunghye Ji

    Every time i watch ur vids.. i miss korea more and more… :/

  • Jax

    good luck! i hope you find an awesome apartment!

  • Jax

    good luck! i hope you find an awesome apartment!

  • Keresa Howard

    How did are allowed to stay there visa wise if you no longer have a contract for teaching? Also, why does every korean real estate site i visit have such expensive rent? Under rent it usually says 4,000,000 won to 11,000,000? Who can afford to pay $11,000 per month for rent? Am I missing something?

  • elisa

    Can you give advice as to where to look for housing… I’m trying to find something like this. Something with a loft, but it seems hopeless. 

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