Studying Korean in Korea
Don't do it. Study Korean back at whatever home country you're in. Once you get here, I feel like you're slowly drained of motivation to study Korean. The more culture I absorb the more I feel like the pursuit isn't all the meaningful. I personally, see the business benefits but only as an entrepreneur.
Before I really talk more about this just read Jake's article: http://jakeinkorea.wordpress.com/2011/01/11/stop-studying-korean/
What? You're still here to read what I have to say? Fine, even though I don't know why.
Speaking Korean is really awesome for getting along with your co-workers. A lot of them enjoy talking to me and socializing with me. Most of them time, I really like hanging out with them. Unfortunately, only a few of these cats seem to understand how to interact with people. A lot of them don't respect my free time and personal space until after they've abused it. The more you show appreciation of the culture, the worse it gets. If you call them on it, they'll lose face but if you don't they'll just see it as okay. It's a lose-lose.
This is not the time to jump and say, oh you don't like hanging out with Korean people? I do enjoy it. However, I got boundaries and I like to make plans. Beyond that, I really just like to be left alone sometimes.
Forget that, say you want to learn Korean to pick-up girls/guys. Dump that idea right now, I'm sure speaking Korean makes it easier but so does having a lot of money, looking, good and driving a nice car. I can only really speak from my limited perspective but a lot of the girls that are really interested are going to speak enough English for whatever your intentions are. Just sex? Not much English but then you don't need much. Full relationship? Intermediate to advanced English comprehension with moderate speaking -- enough to get through the first 3 months.
One of my crazy ideas was getting a job in Korea. I looked in to working at a Korean company. Apparently, career-wise it's a death sentence but they pay is better and you don't have much to do. I'm already saddled with lots of free time and extra cash. As much as I do want more extra cash. I'd rather just do something productive with the free time and move on to a better profession in the near future.
Simply put because I easily get bored of topics, Korean isn't that valuable. Yeah, it's more valuable than say, Swahili but that's not saying much. It's a shame because Korean is a pretty nice language from what I've learned. I've enjoyed learning it way more than Japanese. It just appears to make more sense. If you really want to learn an East Asian language, stick to Japanese or better yet, Mandarin Chinese. Sorry Hong Kong, but you're false service economy and the mainland's large production economy makes me think learning Mandarin is the way to go.
That said, I did not sign up for level 2 Korean class. I want to but I just want a break. I still plan to learn Korean. I'm here and I like languages. I'm going to do self-study for a few months and then sign up for level 3 class around March or April. I just can't be bothered right now to be trekking in to the city once a week for class that I have no motivation to study for. I need to find my drive for language acquisition before I throw more money at it.