"safer here than anywhere else"

It's a bit of a joke among long-term Korean ex-pats that the writing abilities of many of us are, ahem, limited, when it comes to commenting on Korea and (ugh) Korean culture.  So here's your unicorn -- a very thoughtful piece on living through the corona pandemic as an English teacher in Seoul:

"Even with the amount of cases in Korea ballooning at the time, I felt I would be safer here than anywhere else. The reality is that my job provides me with housing and national health care. If I were to return to America, I’d be unemployed and uninsured. How would I get by if I actually did contract the virus? I also didn’t want to risk bringing the virus back with me, especially since my mom is older and has health conditions that compromise her immune system. The choice seemed clear.

Some of my fellow teachers pulled what we call 'midnight-runs' (leaving Korea unannounced) and fleeing to their home countries, out of fear of the virus compounded in part with the financial stress of possibly losing their jobs if schools remained closed. At first, I wondered if I should have done the same. But my faith in the South Korean government's ability to handle this pandemic has proven to hold true, because it feels like the situation is improving here with each passing day. The amount of new infections has significantly decreased, from thousands each week to fewer than a hundred per day."

Short of a family member having an emergency there's no way in hell I'd consider leaving Korea right now or for the foreseeable future.