Table of Contents
Pre-Flight Preparations
My Luggage
As accordance to the advice given in the guide I decided to keep my luggage to a minimum. I plan on doing laundry about once a week so I have enough cloths to last that long. I also brought the minimum amount of stationary necessary to start studying over there.
Finance
I called my bank (bank of america)let them them know that I will be traveling to Korea for the summer. This is to stop them from freezing my card when they see transactions in Korea. I also called to see if they have any partner banks in Korea that I can withdraw from. Although they don't have any in Korea I found out that ATM's with a Global ATM sticker (Usually found within bank lobbies) are able to withdraw from foreign accounts. I will probably take out a lump sum at the start of the month and use it little by little. I will only bring $200 to the airport then convert it into won once in Korea. I also made sure to bring a sizable wallet since I find it convenient to have a certain amount of money on me while abroad.
Telephone
I plan on taking an unlocked phone and buying a pre-paid sim card to buy mostly data. As texting and calling can be done through the popular kakao talk app in korea, actual texting and calling is rarely used, or so I read on a random blog so we will find out how true this is.
TSA-Pre
I got tsa-pre thinking this might make my journy through security a little easier but I found out after I got it that most of the international airlines don't accept tsa-pre. So for traveling abroad tsa-pre is a waist of time.
Transportation
I thought of bringing a skateboard with me but decided against it because it was something that would only make traveling harder, and I would hate to lose it. I might buy a bike while in Daejeon. If I do I will make sure to document my experience with it.
KAIST Emails
I am sure that everyone who goes with this program will receive at least two emails from KAIST. One is about the internship registration form, while the other is about your unique id. Follow through with both emails and go through the registration proces asap, find out what you need and who to get it from. Register your unique id because this will allow you to get KAIST campus wifi.