Expanding Community Classes to Seoul in 2024 - Elim Community

Growing in Size and Spirit

In November, two staff members, Jacob and Dan, went to visit our operations in South Korea. They participated in an English class at Elim Community. It was different from the class that Dan or Jacob taught earlier in the year. The atmosphere was lighter. People were having a great time and laughing with each other. When the instructor asked the group questions, they responded enthusiastically. They were having fun.

At dinner after the class, one of the refugees told us that, for refugees who work full time, leaving the stress of work and coming to the Elim Community class to share that time together and laugh was a great stress reliever. Furthermore, for those at home all day, not having anyone to talk to, coming to class to dialogue together, laugh together and then eat together is also a great way to be in a community that understands this great need.

Life for anyone living in South Korea can be lonely. It is common for an office worker to be at work 60 to 80 hours per week. Apartments are usually small, designed for sleeping and eating and not much else. North Koreans also feel a sense of disconnectedness in their new country. Though they have earned a hard-fought freedom, refugees say that there is little sense of community. One refugee who attends our English class said to us that strangers talk to each other in North Korea. He recalled frequently riding an overnight train and meeting people who eventually became lifelong friends. This simply doesn’t happen that often in the South.

North Koreans need a space where they can gather without judgment. Elim Community English classes have been designed to teach practical English skills in this safe community environment.

Later, in December, as the semester ended, we wanted to celebrate with an end-of-year party where we recognized our students for good attendance and scholarship. The attendees got dressed up, ate good food and played games. Most importantly, they became an even tighter-knit community. While dressing up and attending a Christmast party may not be uncommon to most folks, this event was a gift to most of the refugees. Our English teacher said the one thing she would change for next year’s party is to bring a megaphone. People were laughing so hard that it was hard to get their attention.

SEOUL

With the strength of this community built around Elim Community classes in Incheon, we felt confident in expanding our community classes for North Korean refugees into Seoul, South Korea’s capital and largest city, where most North Koreans in South Korea live. We are partnering with another regional Hana Center in Seoul, the South Korean government’s resettlement agency dedicated to helping North Koreans. Classes in Seoul launched this January and we look forward to sharing more with you in the coming months.

“She smiled and said how great it was to be able to eat together with people like this that evening.”

At dinner with students after an English class in Seoul, one of the North Korean women shared that she had defected from North Korea alone, tried to get married and make friends in South Korea, but ultimately failed and ended up living alone. She smiled and said how great it was to be able to eat together with people like this that evening. One of our newer staff members expressed how she felt more deeply with each passing class how much joy this small event brings to the North Koreans in attendance.

Our prayer is that our Incheon and Seoul classes reach those who need community and the hope of Jesus the most!

Elim Community: January Update

January is off to a great start at Elim Community! Community classes offered in January include weekly fitness/strength training, art and conversational English classes. We’ve had participants join us from both Elim House, the Incheon Hana Center and also those who heard by word of mouth. 

Most classes have been taught by our Crossing Borders and Elim House staff and we’ve also had outside instructors brought in for specialized classes, such as art.

We’ve heard from our instructor and the Elim House team that the women work extremely hard during their fitness classes to the point where some aren’t able to make it to the next class due to being overly sore!

Recently, we also had an opportunity to visit a North Korean senior center. With outdoor activities limited due to winter weather, our missionaries blessed the center with a ping-pong table. As a result, our team was challenged to a friendly ping-pong tournament! Team Elim was not victorious but a great time was had by all!

Elim Community classes are held at a coworking space in Incheon, which is easily accessible by public transportation.

We are also looking for partnerships with local Korean and English ministry churches in the Incheon area! Our first need is for instructors. If the talented folks at your church have a heart to serve by teaching classes, please contact us at hello@crossingbordersnk.org. Secondly, if your church has space for us to use to teach classes during the week, we would love to learn more!

Thank you for your support of our work! Happy Lunar New Year!

The Women of Elim Community

North Korean refugee women at a retreat.

We heard many stories from North Korean refugees that joined our events over the past six months. The common thread in most of the stories is that life in South Korea is difficult and many live in isolation or without any sort of a community.

That’s what led us to focus on Elim Community this Giving Tuesday. The aim of our classes and retreats is to foster a safe and loving community for North Korean refugees who often have little support.

A New Visitor

A volunteer from the US taught workout classes to refugee women during her time in Korea this past summer. Since she’s returned home, many women have longingly asked when classes would resume as they truly enjoyed both working out and socializing together. After much searching, we were able to find a local yoga/pilate instructor to teach classes in November and December. A refugee woman brought a friend. This is the feedback we received from the friend:

“Hello. Since God, in his grace, brought me to South Korea, this is the first yoga/fitness class I’ve ever participated in. I want to thank the Elim House team for considering and loving refugees in this way and look forward to more classes like this. Have a wonderful night.”

Jenna’s Summer Retreat

Rail bikes are four-wheeled pedal bikes that are built on railroad tracks. We had an opportunity to enjoy this activity before arriving at our retreat site this past summer. The wheels sound like actual trains slowly passing over tracks. As two North Korean refugee women rode with a couple of our team members, one woman who we call Jenna let out a sigh and reminisced about how that sound reminded her of home. As she soaked in the ocean air, Jenna quietly murmured “Thank you, God” and smiled.

Jenna was one of the four women that joined our first overnight retreat. The retreat was designed as a getaway and a chance for these women to find rest and healing. The refugee women spent the weekend confiding in one another, laughing and crying together. Jenna shared with us about living in the tension between the guilt of family members still left behind in North Korea while trying to thrive in South Korea. The burden she felt for her family back north was palpable. Acknowledging the challenges they all shared of living in this constant tension, Jenna  encouraged the other women that they should all help each other and be there for one another.

Meeting Ellie for the first time.

Ellie’s Time at Elim House

This fall we welcomed another refugee into Elim House. We call her “Ellie.” Ellie moved to South Korea in 2005 and scratched out a living as a restaurant worker. Her husband recently became abusive as a result of a mental illness, according to Ellie. She was so miserable that she attempted suicide. Finally, she asked around if there was any other place for her to live.

“I don’t want to divorce him. I just need a break,” she told our staff when she entered Elim House for the first time. Elim House was the resting place she needed.

Ellie has also been enjoying the conversational English classes that were offered by our team. She remembers when she first moved to South Korea and how it took about four to five years for her to fully understand the language.

She has been doing Bible studies with our social workers. Ellie’s curiosity about Christianity has grown and she’s even wondered why she didn’t consider the Bible more seriously in the past.

Looking ahead at 2023

Elim House continues to be a place of physical, emotional and spiritual respite for our refugees. We hope that Elim Community will extend this respite to many others.

The new year is just around the corner and we are so excited to see how God will use our teams and gifts to build Elim Community. Having broader reach enables us to serve more people, including through Elim House and local churches.  Thank you for being a part of our journey.

Why Elim Community is Needed for Refugees

North Korean refugee women painting verses from Psalm 23 during our 2022 Fall Retreat

For the better part of 2022, Elim House housed one resident. It wasn’t from a lack of marketing our safehouse to our network in South Korea. In speaking with other organizations and government workers involved in helping North Korean refugees, it was the broader trend this year.

As the entire world recovered from the pandemic, South Korea took several steps to relax their stringent travel restrictions. This enabled our US team to make four separate trips throughout the year. Our missionaries are on the ground at the time of this writing. Having such a low number of residents gave us new opportunities as teams started to arrive in South Korea. With added manpower, we were able to test new ideas to bring refugees together, both past residents and those who were new to our network.

classes and retreats

Refugees joined us for free exercise classes, conversational English classes and overnight retreats. It started out as a means of providing access to classes and getaways that North Korean refugees typically wouldn’t go to on their own. We were overwhelmed by how grateful participants were, not only in being able to attend, but in just being able to spend quality time with other refugees. People shared about their lives to one another and we witnessed the depth of pain and lingering trauma in them. Many of the refugees stepped up to encourage and build one another up. But it didn’t end there. Retreats gave all of us more time together, and there, we all shared, listened, cried and prayed together. We saw community start to form and healing start to happen.

A woman we call Mary attended one of our classes this fall. During a meal after class, Mary opened up about how she suffers from long term effects of trauma. Any loud noise or the sound of sirens triggers panic attacks and her condition is so severe that she can no longer take care of her child. We were touched by her vulnerability with this group but even more amazed when another refugee consoled her and shared about how counseling had helped her deal with her own trauma.

The more events we put on, the more our eyes were opened to the reality that North Korean refugees in South Korea lack community. They are a people who feel like they don’t belong and therefore, stay out of situations that might draw attention to themselves. This includes not going to a local fitness studio or a Subway sandwich shop because they don’t know the right questions to ask. A refugee woman shared after a retreat that she had wanted to try a cafe latte for a long time but never knew how to properly order one and so she just went without. Many have also been burned by religious groups including cults and simply avoid organized religion altogether. 

elim community

We are excited at this unique and wonderful opportunity that God has given us. Elim House will continue to house women in need of shelter and protection. We are thankful for two new  residents this fall and many other inquiries. ELIM COMMUNITY, which is what we’re calling our community events, will invite North Korean refugees into community by way of classes, workshops and retreats. As we reach more refugees through Elim Community, we hope to create the time and space that encourages friendships to be kindled and a loving and supportive community to be built.

Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. - Galatians 6:2

Would you prayerfully consider helping us build this community where North Korean refugees can heal from their trauma and Christ’s love is shared?

Konglish - Elim Community Classes

What is Konglish

The two Koreas took divergent paths when they were split in 1945. The South has been open to the outside world, its products and influences, while the North has been hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world. This is all too apparent in how language has evolved in the two countries. Though the North and South shared the same language (Hangul), the South Korean strand of Hangul has taken many words, phrases and ideas from the West since the split.

When North Korean refugees land in South Korea they find themselves in a dizzying array of new. They must find their way in what seems to many like taking a time machine into the future. One thing that makes this transition even more jarring is language. Though the majority of the words, grammar and syntax are still shared between the two countries, South Korea has adopted many English words through the influx of American culture. This hybrid language is what has been dubbed “Konglish.” Not entirely Korean nor English, this hybrid language is more cultural than academic and therefore, there isn’t an easy way to learn it. Crossing Borders started Konglish classes to help North Koreans learn this confusing new language. These classes have already proven to be more than just an education but a starting point for this nascent community.

There are hundreds if not thousands of Konglish words sprinkled in everyday Korean dialogue. For example, the word “rinse” is 린스, which is pronounced “rin-sue” in South Korea and the word for “apartment” is 아파트 and is pronounced “ah-pah-teu.” Though there are Korean words for rinse and bus, South Koreans prefer to use the English word.
Even more confusing are some Konglish words that are derivations of English words or phrases. Take for example the word “오바이트,” pronounced “oh-ba-ee-tue.” This word means to vomit and is a derivative of the English word “overeat”. Also, the word “핫도그” pronounced “hot-doe-geu,” which doesn’t mean “hotdog” but rather corn dog. This list goes on and on.

Konglish Classes

While there are language programs that help young, ambitious North Koreans learn English in order to further their future prospects, there are very few that help North Koreans assimilate culturally, and in this case, with Konglish. Many of the refugees that Crossing Borders has helped through Elim House and in China are not young. The majority are mothers in their 40s and 50s who are trying to scratch out a living and raise their children. This is an underserved population in South Korea and many feel too busy to enjoy any kind of community. According to South Korea’s Ministry of Reunification Survey of North Korean refugees in 2019, 75 percent of North Korean refugees said they do not participate in “any community activities.”

In the three pilot classes that we hosted this fall, we taught 12 refugees and gave them vital language skills that will hopefully serve them well in acclimating in South Korea. But what is more, this has given Crossing Borders the opportunity to help foster a community among the refugees who have participated in our classes. 

Community Among Classmates

At dinner after one of our classes this fall, a North Korean refugee told our executive director Dan Chung and others at their table that she was having trouble sleeping since she came to South Korea in 2019. When asked for more details, she opened up about the times she had to hide from the police in China. She described one incident in which the police came into her apartment but she escaped through a window in the back. She said that whenever she heard sirens or even a loud car at night, her heart rate spiked and a grave panic overtook her. She said she often woke up screaming and she had to send one of her children away to a boarding school because her nightly outbursts were so disruptive.

Another refugee at their table was deeply empathetic and encouraged this refugee to get mental health help. We explained to her the effects of trauma and how it’s important to seek help.

In Crossing Borders’ value statement we clearly lay out our goals. It states “Crossing Borders offers North Korean refugees and their children opportunities to thrive by providing physical care, emotional healing and spiritual guidance in a safe community.” Through just a few classes, this “safe community” is already forming and we couldn’t be more excited.

What started out as a fun idea to help meet the needs of refugees trying to assimilate, we feel like God has shown us a great opportunity to foster community. Please pray for us as we explore more classes tailored to North Korean refugees in need.