The unexpected side of university exchange
Long before I even entered university, the idea of going on an exchange seemed like the dream experience. The magnum opus of university life.
My Instagram feed was full of people posting about their exchange experiences. Travelling around with their friends, visiting a new city or country every weekend, and still finding time to have study sessions at aesthetic cafes.
And yes, I know Instagram is filtered to oblivion with all the good things, but after seeing all that, I couldn’t help but romanticise the whole university exchange experience. But of course, it doesn’t always look like that perfectly curated feed, and mine definitely didn’t.
Going to Korea for my university exchange
The subway to Seoul has a pretty sick view.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
I did my semester-long exchange in the latter half of 2025 in South Korea – the home of all things Hallyu.
For someone who’d grown up on Korean content since kindergarten, but somehow had never stepped foot into the country, this felt like a dream come true when exchange applications rolled in. Add on the fact that I’d more or less built my entire university life around Korean culture and media – including a planned final-year project that needed Korean connections to really pull off – this dream started feeling like something I had to do.
Applying for a spot, even though the competition was tough
But before I could lead my dream life, or so I thought, I had to go through the application phase first. I was desperate to secure a spot at a Korean university – slots were limited with a maximum of 2 students per school – on top of Korea being a popular exchange destination. And to make things worse, my GPA was slowly slipping with each passing semester. So I applied a semester earlier than planned, going all in and filling out my entire application with Korean schools.
My exchange university – who knew it would look this pretty?
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Thankfully, I was posted to my 5th choice – not my 1st option, but beggars can’t be choosers, and I figured I could make it work.
I was posted to a university in Incheon. Sure, it wasn’t Seoul, but on the bright side, I could get a unique experience that’s different from the city life I’m used to. And if I really wanted to, I could just hop on the subway to Seoul.
Plus, I wouldn’t be doing this alone, because there were 2 of us posted to the same university, which meant I’d at least have someone to crash out together with.
Preparing all the paperwork
And these were just the visa requirements – don’t get me started on the school application.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
We’ve all seen those IG stories of people posting their airport fits and boarding passes like it’s the start of their main character era. But what no one really talks about is the sheer amount of paperwork you have to get through before you even make it onto that plane.
Applying through your home university was only the start. After that comes a whole new wave of admin – from host university applications to visa paperwork – and honestly, I can’t even remember how many documents I’ve had to get in order.
It didn’t help that I chose to stay off-campus and find my own accommodation, because I preferred not to stay in my university’s dorms. Trust me, the dorms didn’t seem ideal – I was much more willing to take on the extra paperwork.
So Airbnb it was, with this one guy who had listings for about 100 units around the campus and could do longer-term leasing contracts.
Pro tip: Korea can be quite strict with its regulations for Airbnb stays, so don’t blindly follow this route. The only reason I went ahead was that it was clear there would be a contract for longer stays.
Planning for course registration to maximise weekend travels – this ended up being my actual class schedule.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
And while this doesn’t exactly count as paperwork, it’s similar and stressful enough to count. I’m talking about course registration.
Trying to curate the perfect mix of classes with a good schedule and interesting content was tiring, and so was familiarising myself with a course registration system that was a whole different ball game from what I was used to.
Thankfully, everything worked out in the end, and all my paperwork was in order. If you’re currently dealing with paperwork of your own, make sure to read the requirements multiple times to confirm what you need and list everything down in a spreadsheet to avoid making extra trips.
Packing for one of the most important milestones in my life
Beyond the paperwork, deciding what to pack for 4 months of my overseas life was also a hell of a beast. I was due to hop on a Korean Air flight there, and I had to work within a 23kg limit.
How many clothes to bring, and how to balance between summer and winter fits? What essentials can I buy there? Do I have space for Singaporean food in case of homesickness?
4 months’ worth of my life, painstakingly packed into Korean Air’s baggage requirements.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
After multiple rounds of Tetris-like manoeuvring, I somehow managed to close up my luggage at 23.5kg. A little over the 23kg limit, but luckily I didn’t get flagged for it. Try not to risk it like me, though.
My luggage was so full that I could barely bring any emotional support items, other than the tiny plushies that were already displayed on my bags. I didn’t even have space to squeeze in my Hangyodon plush that I’d gotten just to bring to Korea. Spoiler alert: I at least made up for it by buying way too many K-pop and anime merch there.
Other pre-travel preparations, like honing my language skills
By “other preparations”, a whole lot of it meant finding more reasons to be excited about my time in Korea.
TOPIK Level 2 might not mean much, but at least I knew some Korean before I got there.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Survival in Korea meant I had to at least know some of the language. With whatever Korean I had picked up since I was a wee child, I was somewhat confident in my basic Korean skills. Getting to actually apply what I know in my everyday life felt scary but also exciting.
Of course, learning another language can’t be that easy.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Practice makes perfect, so naturally I hit the books to boost my confidence in the language. Since I couldn’t really practice speaking while I was still in Singapore, this would be my next best bet.
I also signed up for a buddy programme that my host university was organising, and made contact with my assigned buddy, a local student who was studying there. Though getting my KakaoTalk, the main messaging app used in Korea, to work took ages – apparently, KakaoTalk hates foreigners.
The most stressful ticketing experience of my life; I was way too desperate for this one.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
And what’s an exchange in Korea without watching a concert or two? Sure, I missed out on tickets to SEVENTEEN’s concert, but I managed to cop tickets for PLAVE and natori before I even flew to Korea.
Needless to say, my spirits were high.
Finally making the move for my university exchange
Starting uni exchange off strong with a concert.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
I flew into Incheon half a month before the semester started – I needed the buffer time to settle into the country, and it just so happened that PLAVE had their concert then too.
These 2 weeks were spent cleaning up my new room, countless trips to Daiso to stock up on essentials, finding the best eats in the neighbourhood, and the occasional trip to Seoul to check out the anime exhibitions there. All in all, a good start to my new life here. Maybe I was still in my little honeymoon phase bubble, but I remember thinking, “Korea would be great!”
But things didn’t go as planned
My graveyard of batteries, all casualties of my faulty door lock.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Perhaps I should have realised that the 1st day of the semester would be foreshadowing the next 4 months.
Waking up at 6.30am to find a centipede with way too many legs that were way too long was definitely not a good sign, nor was the fact that my door lock stopped working and I had to leave for class with my apartment unlocked. I also learnt in my very 1st class there that my professor’s favourite quote is “life is unfair”. Yikes.
I didn’t realise it at the time, but this would be the start of my brush with Murphy’s Law.
Learning that I had to improvise, adapt & overcome
When everything that can go wrong does go wrong, all you can do is go with the punches and engineer a way to get around it.
When I fixed my apartment’s toilet flush with a string
Unfortunately, superglue didn’t work to fix this. I also got ID’d at Daiso for getting superglue, and I’m still trying not to think about that embarrassment.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
The toilet flush at home stops working right before a long string of public holidays, and your landlord won’t reply? You may want to try sticking your hand into the freezing water tank to replace the old, broken ball chain with raffia string from Daiso, as I did.
When my buddy went MIA & I was forced to make new friends
Dear confessor, you’re so right, I was almost that friendless bum.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Local student buddy goes MIA after suddenly taking a leave of absence? That was my cue to go back to square one and make new friends.
Somehow, I ended up meeting one of my closest friends by striking up a conversation with another exchange student in between classes. And honestly, sometimes friendships form in the most unexpected ways, like bonding with your group project mate over how terrible your groupmates are. Complaining together really is its own genre of friendship.
Pro tip: Join a club or attend more events organised by the university for international and exchange students to make new friends, and be proactive about it. I skipped out on all these because I wanted more time to explore and chill on the weekends, but in hindsight, I would have liked having more friends around.
Struggling to communicate with other international students
I made sure to brush up on my Korean before flying there, but literally nothing could have prepared me for the amount of Uzbek I would be hearing.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri.
I even had to face groupmates speaking in a whole different language during group discussions because everyone else was from the same country. All I could do was pull up Google Translate and hope the translations made sense. Spoiler alert: they didn’t most of the time, but at least I tried.
Communication was one of the biggest barriers in my university exchange experience
“I can’t lah and lor in these conditions.”
These Speak Good English posters made the rounds on X in some discourse about Singlish.
Image credit: @uncle_deluge via X
Being born and raised in Singapore has made me accustomed to speaking Singlish daily – it’s simply easier and more efficient for me. Unfortunately, Singlish, or even regular English spoken with a Singlish accent, is apparently incomprehensible to your average non-Singaporean, and I was surrounded by them.
Out of necessity, I had to code-switch to “Speak Good English”, the same English you’d hear from our local newscasters and radio DJs. I may be used to switching to this accent for the occasional group presentation, but using it for every single conversation was a whole different story.
Of course, this wouldn’t be an issue if you simply stopped caring so much. The further into the semester I went, the less I worried about maintaining the “proper” English accent. Partially, I was too tired from trying to survive to think about it – it’s hard to keep it up when you’re close to crashing out every single day. Part of me also considered it as me getting closer to my friends, because that accent felt too much like a filter anyway.
Perhaps, to me, it just boiled down to “keep up the proper accent but drop it when you need to crash out.” Oh, and also, talk slower. Singaporeans talk notoriously quickly; you’re probably not any different, even if you don’t realise it.
“Fine.”
An average conversation where I overthink what I said, even though I know she doesn’t mean “Fine” in an annoyed way like I’m used to.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
When you’re interacting with people who don’t speak English as their 1st language, you’ll realise that a lot of nuance that’s natural to you is lost to them, which does mess with your brain a little.
Eventually, I learned to adjust to this language barrier, since my friends have been dealing with this from the start too. And that has led to some interesting cultural exchanges.
“I’m going to bed less dumb today!”
The cultural exchange with my friend went both ways, though it didn’t always turn out well.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
That’s something the French say when they learn something new, according to a friend I made.
Coming to Korea, I expected to learn a lot more about Korean culture. But somehow, I ended up learning more about French culture and language from that friend, all without ever setting foot in the country. For example, I learnt that the French use the AZERTY keyboard instead of the QWERTY keyboard we’re used to, which gave me considerable confusion while I was adding my contact to her phone.
I still talk to her on Instagram, and reels about the ridiculousness of the French language often appear in our chat. I will never get over the mental mathematics that goes into talking about numbers – why say 80 when you can just call it “four-twenties” in French?
Feeling homesick & not being able to come home
Between the loneliness and homesickness, being a 6-hour flight away from all your friends and family would definitely do a number on your mental and emotional state, especially if you feel literally trapped in the country.
Nothing I could do about it, but imagine my crashout when I saw this in my inbox.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
For context, my exchange student visa was single-entry, so I genuinely couldn’t leave Korea until I got my Alien Registration Card. After a whole bunch of circumstances, including a national agency literally catching fire, I only got my card 2 weeks before I was due to return to Singapore for good.
As expressed by another fellow exchange student in our official group chat. I felt that so badly.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
But in any case, it’s obvious when you’re going through it – my friend straight up told me I was “the saddest Singaporean” he’s ever met, and this was coming from someone who’s been in group projects with Singaporean exchange students 3 semesters in a row. And when you’re going through it, you’ve got to do something about it.
Things I did to cope that honestly didn’t help
Turning to alcohol
I decided the vibes on my solo Busan trip were perfect for a drink by the sea, but obviously, I don’t recommend turning to alcohol to deal with your problems.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Drinking your problems away won’t work, if it wasn’t obvious enough.
On one of my really bad days, I was joking with my friends that I should test my alcohol tolerance, so I got a whole bottle of unflavoured soju on my supermarket run and tried to chug it deep into the night. Horrible idea – I was aching all over by the end of it, and would never recommend this to anyone.
I feel like I should add that I didn’t really drink back in Singapore either. I just thought it would be worth a try and just be numb to everything. While it worked physically, my brain still felt pretty sober with all the racing thoughts. Plus, knowing I was going to feel horrible the next day definitely made it worse.
Watching depressing shows
For a while, I was reliving the old days of illegal streaming, with YouTube reuploads of shows cropped and surrounded by the most random clips.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Also, don’t make yourself feel worse by watching depressing shows. I watched Uramichi Onii-san at one point, and to the uninitiated, this was basically the embodiment of working adults’ intrusive thoughts told through the cast of essentially Japanese Hi-5.
On one hand, it felt weirdly validating, like it wasn’t just me who was tired of everything. But on the other hand, the show gave me way too many existential crises for my mental health to take. Take it from someone who’s been through it: maybe leave these shows for when you’re in a better mental state.
Finally overcoming the struggles
Journaling was an outlet for my emotions
A snippet of my exchange logs, where I was actively counting down the days until my return to sunny Singapore.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
You know how self-care guides always have “journaling” somewhere in them? I was shocked to find out that they weren’t kidding, as much as I hate to admit it. A one-time exchange log where I spent 3 hours in the night ranting in a 5,000-word stream of consciousness led me to write a daily log to just vent about anything and everything.
Being OK with spending time alone
Sometimes, you just have to sit back, relax, and enjoy the show, even if you’re all alone.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
It helps when you find something you enjoy in your off-time too. Personally, I fell in love with going to the movies.
Solo movie dates became a regular occurrence, especially at the cinema near my apartment – a full-recliner cinema with the same ticket price of KRW15,000 (~S$12.91) as a regular cinema. A recliner seat for about S$15 is pretty much a steal to me, and there were barely any people there, so I could watch my movies in peace.
Dealing with unsolicited comments about my university exchange experience
“How come you don’t have any pictures of yourself?”
Life is really the best when you can just enjoy life like this little guy I found.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
In case you haven’t actually noticed, there aren’t any pictures of me in this article. Because I barely took any in the first place. In fact, my relatives have actually asked my parents why I didn’t have any pictures of myself from the exchange.
And to that I say, “Why should I have them?”
I mean, obviously, I was alone a lot of the time, and being an introvert, I would never bother a stranger to help me take a picture. I’m not even photogenic anyway.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
But also, I simply learnt that there’s a beauty in just living in the moment. You don’t have to worry about how you look or how to pose if you’re not constantly worrying about your next Instagram post. After all, you don’t owe it to anyone to prove that you did something. Just immerse yourself in the experience and focus on being fully present.
“I have never seen anyone happier to come back from an exchange.”
I was looking back at all my crashouts after I came back at the end of last year and realised I’ve been wanting to be back in Singapore only after 2 months in Korea.
Image credit: Andrea Chandra Putri
Exchange is definitely a good experience, but that doesn’t automatically mean it’s a happy one. If anything, it made me appreciate Singapore a lot more – I was even praising the weather (though I have unfortunately taken back these words recently).
Do I regret going on an exchange at all? Well, like Frank Sinatra said, “Regrets, I’ve had a few.” I definitely could have made some better choices here and there, but that doesn’t mean I would have stopped myself from going at all if I could turn back time.
That being said, here’s what I would tell someone before their journey on exchange:
- Try to stay positive: I sure couldn’t, but try your best to find the bright side somewhere.
- Expect the unexpected: It might sound obvious, but it doesn’t hurt to be prepared to stay flexible.
- Keep a good support system: It can get lonely on exchange sometimes – make some friends if you can, but also keep in touch with your family and friends back home.
- Enjoy the ride: You’ll likely never have a second exchange.
- Keep your expectations low: The less you expect, the less you’ll be disappointed and the more you’ll have pleasant surprises.
It’s not picture perfect, but going on a university exchange is still special
As much as I’ve complained about my exchange experience to my close circle, I would still encourage people to go on an exchange if the opportunity pops up. Sure, it might not be the picture-perfect experience you’d expect to see on Instagram, but it’s definitely an invaluable experience.
Read our other perspectives:
- First dating app experience
- Working as a Reintegration Officer
- Life of an international figure skater in Singapore
Cover image adapted from: Andrea Chandra Putri, @uncle_deluge via X