Ask HN: I need to quickly move to South Korea, How?

I lived there almost a decade and know the visa process. Get started on paperwork for an F-6-1 visa. It will allow you to work without restrictions. Your best options for work are Kakao (KakaoTalk) and Naver. They have solid Python development capabilities. Coupang is their best ecommerce company. Go check out the paperwork on visas: https://overseas.mofa.go.kr/gb-en/brd/m_20265/view.do?seq=66...

Thanks so much for the link, I didn't know they had English speaking jobs going in Kakao, Naver and Coupang. I assumed those companies especially would be 100% Korean.

I lived 5 years in Korea, parent's advice is good.

Additionally:

- Sponsoring a work visa (most likely E-7, maybe E-3) is trivial for big companies. Don't get married if you don't need to.

- Big conglomerates hire foreigners all the time. Samsung, LG, ... Give it a try.

- To a lesser extent, big American tech companies too. I have friends who managed to stay in Korea and who are now working at Microsoft (specifically GitHub).

Spent few months there at one of the biggest companies. Left due to personal preference.

Try Samsung/etc (ie the big ones) you won’t even have to worry about visa etc. It was as if the local (in my country) Samsung office issued visas.

(I don’t know how much important it’d be for you - especially given the situation - but you might want to check about work life balance situation in that country esp at big ones.)

Check the tourist visa requirements. China has (or at least had) a 60 day or 90 day multi-entry tourist visa with no maximum number of days. So you just take a trip to Japan ever couple of months and come back. Even if it had a 180 day per year limit (like the US and Europe, I believe), it would be a way to be there, talk to some expats and see what things are like.

Another option is language study through a University, which if you think you will be in Korea for a few years, I would recommend. I tried working FT in China and studying language in my spare time, and in retrospect I would have been better off taking a year (or better, two) to study language, as I never progressed beyond survival+, and that's about the point where the built-in need to learn peters out. This would work well with remote work, especially if you take a light class schedule.

I think that frequently the non-work visas only require that you do not work at a local company paying you in local currency. If you work remotely for a foreign company, being paid in foreign currency to a foreign bank account, I believe that is not a problem. (How would that be functionally different from having your rich parents pay your living expenses? Or living of the dividends of your trust fund?) As far as I can tell when I researched it, even the US is okay with that (and have known several foreign students in the US doing that), but I would advise doing your own research.

Randomly came across this posting...

I'm leading a machine learning data platform team at Naver (which is basically a South Korean version of Google), and we are actively looking for software engineers of all seniority levels. We build services like data catalog, ETL platform, consolidated data exchange terminal, and so on. To put this in a different perspective, our mission is to provide a highly-efficient, self-serviceable data platform for machine learning engineers and researchers.

If you have strong experience in backend engineering (web service, distributed systems, scalability problems, MSA, SRE, etc.), we'd love to reach out to talk to you. Data engineering experience is also welcomed.

Although I need to do some research on my end, but I'm pretty confident that we can work something out for your visa needs. I occasionally come across with some foreign/English-speaking engineers working at Naver.

Here's the job posting (in Korean): https://naver-career.gitbook.io/kr/service/clova/data-platfo...

If this sounds like something you'd be interested in, let's talk. (This is my first time posting on Hacker News, and I'm not sure what's the best way to share my contact. Any advice would be appreciated.)

Thanks so much! Put my details a in pastebin (so I can delete later): https://pastebin.com/J21YfqHz

Best option is to get the merraige visa. You can't work with the student visa. And unless you already have a contact, I think to get a work here (that offers visa) would be difficult. You can play live 3month as tourist hop to Japan and come back move but that would be difficult with the pandemic and it is an uncertianty that would weigh on both of you. I'm a Korean my husband is a Brit programmer. We went through this route before and my advice is to look into marriage visa immediately. Its actually not that difficult and while it's comparatively fast it still takes some time. You can find my contact in the profile if you want.

Sorry to hear that. You may also want to ask r/korea in Reddit, it has some weirdos but many people there would have some experience with Korean visa.

I might be able to hook you up with a part time contract, not the most glorious project (js/ts node, react) but highly flexible.

Let me know how I can reach out.

Sounds interesting! Contact me on Linkedin: https://pastebin.com/J21YfqHz

Korea-based, software engineer, working as a contractor for a company based in the USA, US Citizen married to Korea National.....

I arranged my setup with my company before I moved to Korea, and made an arrangement where we'd overlap during the Pacific Coast Afternoon (lines up with Korean Morning pretty well). For tax purposes, I changed my work status with the company from Full-Time employee to Contractor.

I'd say here are your concerns in no order:

1) Visa. This one is pretty easy if you and your fiancee marry. I am pretty sure you'd be eligible for a F-1 visa quite quickly. 2) Work. This one is trickier but still doable. I think your options are a) working out a more remote/time flexible arrangement with your current job, b) finding a remote-first job at a company that could support your hours and your residency concerns, c) becoming more of a freelancer that takes on work as it comes. If you are making a UK wage, Korea is not an expensive place to live.

Sorry that this comes at such a bad time for you. I hope this helps.

This brings to mind a plague of romance scams. I have a close relative who was duped by a woman who wanted to move in with him but needed him to cash some checks for her first. I'm guessing you're smarter than that and your fiance is someone you've actually met IRL and have a physical relationship with. So condolences on her prognosis, a scam would actually be easier to recover from.

ahaha thanks for your concern, but we've been dating for 3 years, met her the old fashion way at university. :)

Sadly I know someone who also optimized for being cautious of a romance scam and their penpal verifiable died from a preventable ailment. If only she sent that $100 dollars they explained they needed.

She had initially met this person on vacation and stayed in touch and they eventually asked for money. Guess its impossible to tell the difference!

what sort of 100 bucks prevents a death?

Color me skeptical, but antibiotics could fit the bill.

Yeah like Africa? Where else would 100$ buy anything

If you are under 31 you can apply for a working holiday visa which grants you an availability to stay there under relatively lax circumstances but limits work to around 28 hours per week I think.

https://whic.mofa.go.kr/eng/

1. Enroll in Korean language school. 2. Pay admissions, get expiated visa. 3. Do 14 day quarantine.

AFAIK, UK may not be restricted, USA still is not restricted just mandatory 14 day quarantine with only 30 day visa waiver being issued.

I’d check out some UK/US based remote first companies as they would be less of a culture shock. A lot of companies have a dev presence in SEA and India and would love to have more on call coverage for those regions

Under 30? get a working holiday visa and take it from there. You can only apply from your home country, so if you are in a real hurry, maybe consider just going there as a tourist and figure it out. It does give you 90 days, and being British, you can probably get a job teaching English (without VISA or maybe even a sponsor), and then figure out if that helps you in any way VISA wise.

I've lived in Korea off-and-on over the past decade or so. Just go in visa-exempt and leave every 90 days to Japan or wherever for a weekend. I've never had any problems.

You're not going to be able to find a software job in Korea easily, and if you did, you probably wouldn't like the work culture. Just work remote or teach English if you need cash. If you want more info, just add me on Kakaotalk.

Hey just added my kakao id to this pastebin: https://pastebin.com/J21YfqHz Is you kakao ID just your hn username?

I'm sorry to hear that. I don't know if you'd have the possibility to work as a freelancer and work remotely from South Korea for international clients. In case this is an option for you, I can recommend freelancermap.com in order to look for IT projects. Wish you all the best!

assuming you have at least a small amount of money saved, say $7k-$10k. Fly in on tourist visa. That gives you 90 days, and it seems you can just leave the country and come back for 2 years every 90 days (though this will be annoying). https://www.onlinevisa.com/visa-south-korea/british/

When you get there assess the situation, and can go talk to companies that you apply to. Then if you get a job, can leave to get the new visa and come back.

Of course these was easier pre-covid as can take cheap flight to Japan or other country after 90 days, but probably still doable.

DM me - I'm an American non-technical startup guy who went over there in 2018 and met most of the VCs and interesting startups. I joined a great one and launched the US business for them. Happy to make introductions.

Hi that sounds amazing, contact me on Linkedin if you have it. I put the contact details in a pastebin so I can delete them later: https://pastebin.com/J21YfqHz

I've lived in Korea off and on in the past and am living here now. I don't know regarding F-visa types, but I think you'd be able to get a job without too much hassle, maybe just some extra-work to seek out companies willing to communicate in English. There's definitely a pool of companies / startups interested in foreigners / their skillset though of course they would appreciate it if you could communicate a bit in Korean.

I believe you can also get a remote job from a company outside of Korea as others have mentioned the currency and work is not involved with Korea so it should be okay.

Jumping in and out with tourist visa is a bit more difficult now with most countries on lockdown. I also think Korea has a mandatory 10-day Quarantine at home or government facility for anyone entering the country, regardless of their vaccine / visa status.

For the last point, if you enter on a tourist visa (B-1,B-2) if it's applicable to you, that visa can be changed within Korea. But if it's the other type tourist visa (C-1,C-2) you can't change the visa within Korea. This is a rule I recall vaguely, so don't quote me exactly.

Is there any chance that you can keep your current job and work remotely?

If he could, I'd be doubtful South Korea would want him. Looking at some work visa requirements [1] they'd need a sponsoring company in South Korea. If they're working remotely for an English company it sounds like SK would say "Cool, keep working over there then".

If OP wants to live in SK with his fiance and work remotely for somewhere else, they'd probably be better off being a "tourist" and getting married and getting a SK visa that way. Yes, they're engaged because they didn't want to rush into that, but lots of people from different countries end up getting married in a hurry for this reason.

https://www.justlanded.com/english/South-Korea/South-Korea-G...

I hadn't given visa requirements much consideration, so good shout! Thanks.

I'm going to talk to my boss tomorrow but I think its unlikely, Korea is GMT+9. I'd have to work outside of normal GMT+0 hours. My boss is great, but something like this will require higher clearance, which I doubt I'll get.

If you work in times relative to Korea’s solar day, yes. You could conceivably work from 9-5 in GMT still (from 6PM-2AM local time).

I’m not saying it’s ideal, but you’re trying to pick the least bad of some dreadful options (for which I’m sorry and wish your fiancée [and you] well as you navigate this). Keeping your current job, working it as a “second shift” job from Korea might give you stability that’s valuable here.