Intend of applying FIT
If I had to describe Dongdaemoon market to someone who had never been to Seoul, I would tell them to picture a small circle very near the center of a much larger circle. The smaller circle is the market area, and the larger is Seoul. Within the smaller circle you find several buildings, each reaching between eight to twelve floors (several floors below ground, the rest above), all with wide stances and situated within shouting distance from each other. Each of these floors in each of these buildings are teeming with clothes and accessories, the aisles crammed with shoppers on any given day and the booths overstocked with colorful merchandise, and housing ï in its couple square feet of open space ï one or two salespeople beckoning the customers like multilingual Sirens (voicing sales pitches in Korean, Japanese or English, depending on the passing shopper's ethnic appearance). The streets surrounding these buildings are also packed with small shops and streams of tents providing shoppers with a different category of wares with every few steps.
The larger circle is inhabited by over ten million people, a considerable percentage of them devoted to fashion, desperately seeking to attain and portray status and sex appeal as though they were the two main forms of sustenance in such a bustling metropolis. All these fashion-hungry people ï multiplied by tourists from all over Asia and lands still farther ï converge at the smaller circle each night and obliterate any sort of order that exists before the doors open in the evening.
At seventeen, this is where I had my first job. This is where I had my first experience in sales and merchandising. This is where I discovered the direction I wanted to take with my professional life.
Seventeen is considerably younger than the average age of the salespeople in Dongdaemoon market. And the person who hired me was noticeably reluctant to offer me this opportunity. On what I considered an unspoken trial basis, I knew my only way of keeping this position was to do what I could. Namely, as an inexperienced teenager on her first job, be effectively enthusiastic, get to work on time and forget the term "sick-days." And somehow ï perhaps due to my considerable youth ï I was able to maintain this diligence for three years, never missing a single day of work.
My duties included researching fashion magazines (both domestic and international) each month immediately upon publication, recognizing and predicting fashion trends, organizing the displays, and selecting new purchases. As I became more ensconced in my work-life, I drifted from my academic responsibilities. I left high school near the end of that first year working at the market and focused my energy on my job. In my final year at Dongdaemoon market I was given full control of the shop, overseeing others in the tasks I had carried out the two previous years. And although this is not a huge success story, it was what led me to believe I had found what I wanted to do, and what eventually led me to decide to return to my studies and earn a GED so that I could pursue my professional dreams within the realm of academia.
After earning my GED, I continued my efforts toward my professional goal by getting a job at a Louis Vuitton retail shop in Korea's Avenuel Department Store. During this time I came to understand the necessity for further technical knowledge and a fluency in English to pursue my desire in working for an international company, and ultimately, to use this knowledge toward founding an institute in Korea designed to educate students in fashion marketing.
I know because I am from a culture that is very different from the US, a large part of my knowledge gained through experience will have to be relearned once I am at FIT. But I mention this not as a disadvantage, but as a significant advantage. Learning by recognizing the differences seems to me the best way to make clear observations. I will be able to see American and international marketing techniques through the eyes of someone who has had hands-on experience in the Asian market. I will be keener at noticing subtle details, that to many others might be considered a given; mundane and invisible. As an outsider in a foreign environment, I will be hypersensitive to all that is new, all that is different from what I am and where I come from. And I can hardly wait.
If I had to describe Dongdaemoon market to someone who had never been to Seoul, I would tell them to picture a small circle very near the center of a much larger circle. The smaller circle is the market area, and the larger is Seoul. Within the smaller circle you find several buildings, each reaching between eight to twelve floors (several floors below ground, the rest above), all with wide stances and situated within shouting distance from each other. Each of these floors in each of these buildings are teeming with clothes and accessories, the aisles crammed with shoppers on any given day and the booths overstocked with colorful merchandise, and housing ï in its couple square feet of open space ï one or two salespeople beckoning the customers like multilingual Sirens (voicing sales pitches in Korean, Japanese or English, depending on the passing shopper's ethnic appearance). The streets surrounding these buildings are also packed with small shops and streams of tents providing shoppers with a different category of wares with every few steps.
The larger circle is inhabited by over ten million people, a considerable percentage of them devoted to fashion, desperately seeking to attain and portray status and sex appeal as though they were the two main forms of sustenance in such a bustling metropolis. All these fashion-hungry people ï multiplied by tourists from all over Asia and lands still farther ï converge at the smaller circle each night and obliterate any sort of order that exists before the doors open in the evening.
At seventeen, this is where I had my first job. This is where I had my first experience in sales and merchandising. This is where I discovered the direction I wanted to take with my professional life.
Seventeen is considerably younger than the average age of the salespeople in Dongdaemoon market. And the person who hired me was noticeably reluctant to offer me this opportunity. On what I considered an unspoken trial basis, I knew my only way of keeping this position was to do what I could. Namely, as an inexperienced teenager on her first job, be effectively enthusiastic, get to work on time and forget the term "sick-days." And somehow ï perhaps due to my considerable youth ï I was able to maintain this diligence for three years, never missing a single day of work.
My duties included researching fashion magazines (both domestic and international) each month immediately upon publication, recognizing and predicting fashion trends, organizing the displays, and selecting new purchases. As I became more ensconced in my work-life, I drifted from my academic responsibilities. I left high school near the end of that first year working at the market and focused my energy on my job. In my final year at Dongdaemoon market I was given full control of the shop, overseeing others in the tasks I had carried out the two previous years. And although this is not a huge success story, it was what led me to believe I had found what I wanted to do, and what eventually led me to decide to return to my studies and earn a GED so that I could pursue my professional dreams within the realm of academia.
After earning my GED, I continued my efforts toward my professional goal by getting a job at a Louis Vuitton retail shop in Korea's Avenuel Department Store. During this time I came to understand the necessity for further technical knowledge and a fluency in English to pursue my desire in working for an international company, and ultimately, to use this knowledge toward founding an institute in Korea designed to educate students in fashion marketing.
I know because I am from a culture that is very different from the US, a large part of my knowledge gained through experience will have to be relearned once I am at FIT. But I mention this not as a disadvantage, but as a significant advantage. Learning by recognizing the differences seems to me the best way to make clear observations. I will be able to see American and international marketing techniques through the eyes of someone who has had hands-on experience in the Asian market. I will be keener at noticing subtle details, that to many others might be considered a given; mundane and invisible. As an outsider in a foreign environment, I will be hypersensitive to all that is new, all that is different from what I am and where I come from. And I can hardly wait.