Lingo in Transit

We are out of the peak humidity right now in South Korea and whilst I’ve gotten use to being outside and being covered in my own stickiness, I am more cautious about the humidity within my apartment. With humidity, comes mould and is something that is not too foreign to me. Whilst living in Sydney near the beaches, it was common to talk to colleagues who lived nearby about the wardrobe mould they kept finding. This year particularly, Sydney has had a lot of rain and I would imagine, many household have had their fair share of adventures with mould.

But in Korea, the humidity is expected in the summer. While dehumidifiers do exist, for those of us working away from home- this is not that practical as I would imagine you’d be emptying out the water often.

With this in mind, I had 2 problem areas. My suitcases still house my winter items and my apartment does get pretty toasty during the day. The second area was the pantry cupboard. So off I went to Daiso, the Japanese store that sells everything for cheap, to see what I could find.

First, I bought these wardrobe packs to place in my suitcase. They originally had beads inside but as you can see here, after about 3 weeks, the beads had dissolved and were now filled with water! I decided that I needed something better so bought something different the 2nd round (will explain below).

For my pantry, I bought this charcoal container which has beads at the top and can collect water underneath. I’ve since emptied it twice already in the past month.

For my wardrobe, I decided to try this gel pack which has what feels like jelly inside. One side is green tea scented and the other side is charcoal.

After I saw how much water was being collected/absorbed, I went back to Daiso to find an alternative for my suitcase. I decided to buy the gel ones for my suitcase so that there are no water collection and risk of spilling. These gel ones also seem to last abit longer than those wardrobe packs I initially bought.

I also bought some more of the water collection ones to place in my pantry and inside the storage area of my wardrobe. At 2,000 won ($2 aud) each, they are a great money saving solution to the Korean humidity in summer. As these containers are plastic, they can be recycled here!

How do you combat humidity?