It’s a familiar trajectory for anyone who has paid attention to the movements of foreign correspondents for establishment media outlets: a journalist is dispatched to another country to report for some time, and, towards the end of their stint, they write a book. For foreign reporters posted to South Korea, the fascination is often with its closed-off northern neighbour, geopolitical questions and worries about nuclear weapons and state secrets. Those are the subjects that tap into current anxieties and the hot-button issues covered in the 24/7 international news cycle. Those are the topics that are assumed to sell well. But Raphael Rashid isn’t a full-time correspondent for a big-name Western news publication, and wasn’t interested in focusing his first book on such issues.

Rashid, who was born and raised in the United Kingdom, moved to South Korea after completing an undergraduate degree in Japanese and Korean studies in his home country. He attended university in Korea and stayed on after graduation, entering the job market along with his local peers. That was more than a decade ago.

As a long-term immigrant, Rashid often connects English speakers interested in Korea with what’s going on in the country. He spends time and effort translating Korean news articles into English for his social media followers, adding context from the perspective of a foreigner now deeply immersed in the goings-on of Korea. He’s reported extensively on a variety of issues, such as the discrimination against LGBTQ+ people and last year’s tragic Halloween crush in Itaewon, Seoul, which claimed almost 160 lives.

• Tags: Issue 30, Raphael Rashid, Seulki Lee, South Korea