점점 더 멀어져 간다
머물러 있는 청춘인 줄 알았는데
또 하루 멀어져 간다
매일 이별하며 살고 있구나

(Getting farther and farther away,
I thought youth would stay,
But another day drifts away,
Living each day saying goodbye.
– Around Thirty by Kim Kwang Seok)

🎧김광석 – 서른 즈음에 (1994)

Starting next year, South Korea will adopt the international age system. When the new year arrives, I will be thirty by the traditional Korean counting, but twenty-eight by international age. This year, I had felt a twinge of sadness thinking, “So this is how I’m spending the last of my twenties—” when, in early December, I learned that “from 2023, we will use international age.” What joyful news to receive around the time I turn thirty.

My twenties. They were years of dreaming boldly and challenging myself with confidence. I hardly remember my teenage years, but every year of my twenties is vivid in my mind.

2013
The day I received my Yonsei university acceptance letter 💐

2014
Starting university life in my home country (a completely new culture to me since I have lived outside South Korea up to this point) and having a great time with many new friends, especially with my two besties who have remained in my life until now 🎂

2015
Showing up at the university library completely on a whim to ask for a part-time job even after the recruitment had expired and getting hired on the spot📚

2016
Serving as vice president of HARIE, one of the biggest clubs at Yonsei, meeting a bunch of people and getting dragged into far too many dramas, I never stepped foot into such massive communities again after that experience 😭

2017
An internship at World Vision and a seasonal program at the University of Geneva and a three-week trip across Europe (Rome, Firenze, Anzio, Geneva, Hermance, Montreux, Vevey, Interlaken, Prague, Wien) 🗺️

2018
Internships at the UN Refugee Agency and the North Korea Human Rights Information Center 🌐

2019
A whirlwind year of internships at the Refugee Center and participating in Korea University’s OGA program—so hectic I didn’t even take a proper graduation snapshot 🎓

2020~
Joining UNESCO APCEIU as a world citizenship education manager and preparing for law school ⚖️

I was at times strong like a tree that withstands the fiercest storms, yet fragile like a blade of grass stifled by the slightest pinch. Every moment of struggle and joy is etched clearly in my memory, yet all of it passed by in the blink of an eye. What remains approaching thirty is a sense of longing. There are many regrets, but the greatest is that I didn’t truly love myself. Had I known how to love myself, I would have spent my twenties far more happily on my own terms—and I feel a bitter pang whenever I look back into my twenties.

My twenties were dazzling on the outside, yet anxious within. Amid radiant freedom and infinite choices, I was actually fearful. It was a time when anything was possible and I could achieve whatever I wanted—but within that infinite possibility, I didn’t know what to choose or what path to take. I wish someone had told me, “If you do this, you will succeed. This is the path for you!”—that guidance would have eased my heart.

Looking back, the weight of having to carve out my own life in my twenties was overwhelming—yet I never admitted it, nor could I even allow myself to imagine it that way, because it was so important for me to feel smart and capable. In the end, I I leaned on society’s standards, chasing career success, recognition and prestige. If I could return to the beginning, I would do things differently—I would measure myself not against society, but against my own values. Yet at that time, I was too young, too inexperienced, too clumsy to fully seize the golden decade of my twenties.

Around thirty, I realize that while I carry regrets and a sense of loss for my twenties, perhaps this is how life and love are meant to be learned. As I enter the latter half of my twenties, I want to love myself without reservation. Not to climb, not to succeed, not to be recognized, but for my own happiness and the kind of person I want to be—I will do what I truly want, not what I think I should.