Nerdy Korean Glasses

South Koreans have some of the sweetest and nerdiest eyewear around. It was something that we noticed on our students, coworkers and everyone on the street since we first arrived. In the elementary schools, a lot were bright colors or strangely patterned so they fell into the 'so bad they're cute' category. When we made the move to high schools, we were surrounded by more 'stylish' versions of Korean glasses that moved up into the category of 'so bad they're awesome.' Seeing our students' glasses daily, we started to get a little jealous. Judy even made a girl hand her glasses over so that she could try them on.


We knew that non-designer glasses were super cheap here, but we just never managed to go in, choose a frame and get the eye test. In Ulsan, things like that seemed too daunting without a co-teacher, and buying a pair of stupid glasses seemed too trivial to bother our co-teachers with. In Seoul, on the other hand, we've had zero troubles doing things on our own, which has been a great change.


So, without fear one day, Andrew headed into Tomato Optical in the bottom of the apartment building next to ours (He was looking for glasses and he loves tomatoes, so it was meant to be). In under 10 minutes, he had chosen his glasses, gotten an eye test and was told to come back to pick them up in 30 minutes. The frames cost a whopping 10,000 KRW and he chose the most expensive lens option for a grand total of 40,000 KRW ($35.00). You definitely get what you pay for with glasses. They work alright during the day, but vision gets a little hairy after dark.


After Andrew got his, Judy got jealous, of course. A few days later, while we were out walking she found her pair of nerdy Korean glasses. Hers ended up costing less than Andrew's and were made in much less time. Needless to say, she is still trying to get used to them. So far, she's worn them for one full day and they gave her a headache. The following pictures are only of Andrew's new glasses. As soon as Judy acclimates to hers and is able to wear them, we'll post more pictures...

Close-up


Self-timer shots before hitting the town one night