You just arrived in Korea, you are so stoked to start your adventure. You are all sassy like, “Hey, let’s open Google and see what’s up”! You pop open your handy smart phone and start searching for things you love! You search and search and search… but nothing is coming up. You find almost no info that really helps and a little seed of panic starts to settle in. You wonder if there is actually anything out there to do or eat at all (don’t worry, there is a ton). The walls start to close in.
You leave Google maps in defeat and move on to searching through blogs. There isn’t much out there, but you find a trace of what you are looking for and copy the safe-looking Romanized address they provide into Google. Nothing happens. The address doesn’t work. You feel the rage begin to build. You feel helpless, frustrated, and isolated. For the first time, you have that little thought, “This sucks. Korea sucks”.
Don’t worry, Korea doesn’t suck, but your feelings that it does are a completely normal reaction. Nope, you aren’t even a bad person. What you are is a person who moved to a new part of the world, where your carefully crafted coping skills and favorite apps don’t work like you wished they would and it makes things really hard at first. Suddenly, the way you are used to the world works has been turned on its head and what was standard no longer applies. You have entered… wait for it… CULTURE SHOCK! We have all lived it. The important thing is to not listen too closely to that voice that says, “This sucks and Korea sucks.” Instead, listen to that feeling and say to yourself, “This is new and I have a lot to learn”.In short, it’s not Korea’s fault or your fault you don’t understand each other, you have only just met. Give it time.
In order to overcome this little voice, you are going to need to download some new apps, learn some new systems, acquire a few skills, and go on some adventures. The feeling won’t go away overnight and it won’t always be easy to push past it, however, it will be REALLY worth it to keep going because living in Korea is actually AWESOME!
We are going to help you on the journey by addressing one of the biggest issues you will face… MAPS! Yes, one of the most critical aspects of life in this new place is wrought with challenges. We will be giving you additional information about what hurdles you may face when searching for things in Korea and what maps/navi apps can help you get moving in the right direction. So strap yourself in and get ready for some knowledge bombs.
First Stop: UNDERSTANDING THE HURDLES WITH NAV APPS
ROMANIZATION v. HANGUL
The problem: Using Romanized Korean addresses and business names simply isn’t going to work well with navi apps. Sure, you can get by, but it will never be efficient or consistent. You NEED to use the Hangul address or business name whenever humanly possible. This is going to be one of the most frustrating things you will deal with, especially if you haven’t learned the Korean alphabet or mastered basic reading skills. However, if you put in a little effort it will really pay off quickly. Make this a priority. Hard work in the short term will pay off during your stay.
The reason this happens: The main reason that Romanized addresses and business names don’t work is that there has been at least 4 official ways to Romanize Korean. This results in two things can go wrong: 1) You can’t be sure which is being used to run the algorithm of each map app or nav system; 2) You don’t know if the person who Romanized the address used an official system or just winged it. In short, changing Korean to English is a hot mess. With so many Korean names being one letter different, the only way to be 99% sure you are going to the right place is to use the REAL address. In the South of Seoul app we try to make this as easy as possible, more about that later.
What to do: Learn the alphabet and how to read the basics stat. PIEF offers affordable classes near Osan Air Force Base and Camp Humphreys. However, you can quickly pick up the skill using websites and YouTube videos. We highly recommend Talk to Me In Korean as the place to start. Learn the order to read addresses in so that you can identify the beginning and end of a street address. You can learn more about Korean addresses by clicking here.
How South of Seoul Helps You With This: We provide an easy-to-copy accurate Hangul address in each of our all listings. We gather these addresses from either Kakao or Naver maps. This means it’s the MOST accurate information. This address can be copied from the South of Seoul app and dropped into the navigation app of your choice. We encourage every user to use this system instead of WAZE or Google Maps because we have far more faith in Daum/Kakao and Naver’s ability to get you places. Even if you can’t understand it, dropping the address into Kakao Maps or Naver Maps will get you there.
NEW AREAS, NEW ADDRESS SYSTEM, NEW ROADS
The cities south of Seoul, like Pyeongtaek, have been going through crazy amounts of development and entire areas are being completely remade. In these areas, sometimes none of the map apps work right. Even WAZE sometimes gets blocked and you can’t even drop a pin. It’s frustrating for everyone. Soseobol in Bijeondong has been kicking our asses like this for years. In fact, right now the entire East side of Pyeongtaek is hard to navigate because of this issue.
Please be kind and understanding as everyone does their best in this situation. One day an address in this area will work, and the next it sends you 8 blocks away (sometimes to a completely different area of the city). It sucks and we all do our best. Hold a place in your heart and embrace the adventure. The businesses in these areas also wish things would work correctly. No one is happy about it.
MILITARY BASES
YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW
When you arrive in Korea you might search for gymnastics for your kids or the best place for french toast and come up with nothing. That’s because these things are not really a part of Korean culture. Sometimes you simply don’t have access to what you valued in your old life. HOWEVER, there are many NEW and fun things to try. If you search for nori bangs (singing rooms), archery, Korean BBQ or mandu (Korean dumplings) things will be quite different.
During your short time here you will find life far more rewarding when you participate in Korean culture rather than trying to recreate your own. This is a brief and exciting period in your life when you have the freedom and opportunity to discover exciting things you never even thought could exist. Take advantage of every minute of it. FOMO!
How South of Seoul Helps: This is one of the main reasons our neighborhood directories allow you to scroll through what’s around you instead of relying just on search. We know that you wouldn’t even think to search for the half of what’s around you. We sure didn’t when we arrived. It took us 8 years to compile the amount of information you now have readily available at your fingertips via the South of Seoul app. Actually, even if you speak Korean you can’t easily find many of the places South of Seoul has listed simply because Pyeongtaek is the countryside and most bloggers are in Seoul or Busan.
Exploring the South of Seoul listings and reading the blog will help you get an idea of what new and fun things are waiting to be experienced. With that said, it’s time to look at what options you have for navigating Korea.
Second Stop: FOREIGN MAPS/NAV APPS
Google Maps
Although we’ve already mentioned that Google is a hot mess, we should still cover it so you know what’s up. It’s notoriously unreliable in South Korea because Google doesn’t have access to current information in Korea and is banned from offering driving directions (although they do offer public transit info).
We can’t ignore Google Maps because it’s embedded into many foreigner-developed apps, since (until recently) Daum/Kakao and Naver didn’t have an English language option. It’s not COMPLETELY useless. Just mostly. Over the years many Korean businesses have realized that foreigners are slow to adapt to local apps and have started adding their businesses to Google. These days Google does appear to have quite a bit of information but it is only a fraction of what is available on Naver and Daum.
We have found Google Maps useful for public transit info in Busan and Seoul and locations are becoming increasingly accurate. Their relationship with WAZE is certainly starting to pay off. If they were allowed to offer driving navigation it could almost be useful.
WAZE App
In 2013 Google beat out many other companies to buy WAZE. Yes, that’s right, WAZE is basically Google, but not. It’s a clever little tool Google has leveraged to gather information in Korea even though it’s not really welcome here. Due to the fact that WAZE aggregates information directly from users and isn’t restricted by the Korean government, it has far more accurate information than its parent company. Still, it will fail you miserably on long trips, searching for new things, and sometimes it simply doesn’t take you where it’s supposed to when you put in an address.
The good parts of WAZE:
- 1) Waze can be easy for new arrivals to adapt to. You can just put in an English language pin that a past person has entered and it gets you there more often than not. It’s a great tool to find what other kind foreigners have taken the time to mark for you.
- 2) There is a photo of the building. If you don’t read Korean it can be hard to know when you have arrived. Having an image of what the location looks like can give you confidence that you found the right place.
- 3) You can mark places with no address. This is possibly the most useful part of WAZE and the one thing we use it for. You can drop a pin anywhere. That means you can mark hiking trailheads you spot in the middle of a field, etc. It’s great for when you need to meet up somewhere really random.
The bad parts WAZE:
- 1) Limited Information. You are relying on what foreigners have entered for you, which means most of the country’s information isn’t there. If a kind English-speaking foreigner who loves WAZE didn’t drop a pin and make notes, you aren’t going to find things very often. That means it’s mostly useful in certain areas of Seoul, Pyeongtaek, Cheonan, and Asan, or near US military bases, since ex-pats don’t really use it.
- 2) It’s unreliable. Even the WAZE Pins/Ids will sometimes just not take you where they used to. Maybe the week after they will.
- 3) It doesn’t work well with accurate Korean addresses. In fact, we just refuse to use it unless there has been an actual pin dropped for the location we are going. We have added perfect Korean addresses and had it send us to a place 30 minutes away from where we should be.
- 4) It’s hard to read. Honestly, we hate using it just because it’s #weirdAF to follow. We don’t actually like the experience of using it and avoid it whenever possible.
- 5) It doesn’t always give accurate results. Depending on things one can’t control, even if you have an EXACT WAZE pin name, it doesn’t always give you the information you ask for. Maybe it thinks you are too far away or it’s not of interest to you because of your favorites. For whatever reason, it will simply not show you things that you know for a fact exist.
- 6) WAZE Pins are fickle. Sometimes a location will vanish, take weeks to go live, or just not show for certain people for reasons listed in issue 5.
In short, it’s remarkably unreliable and non-US Military ex-pats simply don’t use it because it’s terrible and drives us slowly insane.
7) WAZE is only for car drivers. It’s pretty much useless for people walking, needing a bus, or taking a taxi. That means when you share a WAZE pin instead of a Naver or Kakao Pin you are only helping people who drive cars. This is the primary reason that South of Seoul does not share information via WAZE pins. We want everyone to have access, not just those that have the privilege of driving.
Third Stop: KOREAN MAPS/NAV APPS IN ENGLISH
Kakao Map and KakaoNavi are – hands down – our preferred apps. They are owned by Daum who bought out Kakao many years ago. They sync easily with KakaoTalk which means it’s easy to share addresses and navigation links with friends. They also sync with Kakao Taxi which means you always have access to emergency transportation.
THE GOOD PARTS OF Korean Nav Apps
1. For Everyone: There is route information for buses, cars, subways, walking, and bikes. This fact alone makes Google Maps and WAZE obsolete. Unlike WAZE you don’t need a car for it to be super useful. This makes buses, subways, and taxis simple.
THE BAD PARTS OF Korean Nav Apps
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| Paste Address into Nav App and off you go. |
Naver Maps works in a very similar way to Kakao Maps. We also use this one a lot. We don’t feel like you can really go wrong with either. We aren’t going to repeat the points above, just give you some screenshots to see how the two compare. We will get more into the details of both of these apps in future posts.
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| Sample route |
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| Sample Bus Route Info |
Kakao Maps and Naver Maps are true sources of freedom in Korea.
They connect you to the community and the life here in ways that Google and WAZE simply can’t. We know it feels good and comfortable to use WAZE and Google at the beginning, but you will find making the effort to transition to Kakao or Naver will make your life so much better. Just jump in, start clicking around, and find your way to freedom!
