(G)I-DLE’s Yuqi Recalls The “Biggest Culture Shock” She Experienced After Moving To Korea
(G)I-DLE‘s Yuqi and Minnie were the most recent guests on Eric Nam‘s Daebak Show, during which they discussed the release of the group’s first English single, how they adjusted to life in Korea, and more.
(G)I-DLE’s Yuqi was born and raised in Beijing, China, while Minnie was born and raised in Bangkok, Thailand.
As the two talented idols discussed how they became K-Pop idols, Yuqi opened up about what she considered to be a difficult adjustment to life in Korea.
For Yuqi, she initially struggled with Hanja, which is a traditional Korean writing system that incorporates the use of Chinese characters.
While, at times, the Chinese characters can have a similar meaning in Korean, that’s not always the case and caused confusion for Yuqi when she first came to Korea.
You know, Korean, it has a lot of Hanja, which came from Chinese, so I just mixed them up a lot during my first time in Korea.
— (G)I-DLE’s Yuqi
It was also difficult for Yuqi to adjust to the Korean hierarchy system, which dictates how one would treat someone based on their age, status, social setting, and more.
Yuqi shared that it doesn’t exist in the same way in China, and because she’s naturally sociable and outgoing, it took her some time to get used to.
It’s super different between China and Korea because, you know, in our country, “unnie” and “dongsaeng,” we don’t have those things… I’m really outgoing and I just treat everybody as my friend.
— (G)I-DLE’s Yuqi
Yuqi joked that now she had to listen to her older members as the second youngest member of the group and questioned why she had to listen to them when she has her own personality.
She explained it was hard to adjust to it, and she resisted the change at first but is now getting used to it. Although she has adjusted, she shared she continues to treat her dongsaengs as her friends.
Yuqi recently earned attention after proving her easygoing and friendly personality while interacting with a fan. Learn more about that in the article below!
