Ep.7 Where the Journey Ends - Pen Illustrator Lee Ha-jung Series

The wheels of the airplane touch down on the runway. Along with them, the romantic illusion of my self-study abroad also lands.

Almost immediately after dropping my backpack, I was forced to face the harsh wall of immediate survival. The title "World-Traveling Illustrator" was merely a modifier that worked while I was traveling. Back in the heart of Seoul, I had to prove my worth with a sharp, viable business.

I struggled simply to survive. Desperate to get my name out there, I churned out content for social media every single day. Because I was obsessing over superficial branding without a solid product or business model of my own, I had unknowingly turned into a lifeless content factory. And then? The brakes were slammed hard.

Barely a month after returning home, I hit a brutal wall of burnout.

It was late one night, and I felt like I was running in place. Exhausted, I slumped over my desk, my eyes drifting to a stack of drawing notebooks from Europe piled up in the corner. Absentmindedly, I flipped one open. Amidst the awkward, densely packed pen strokes, unfamiliar yet familiar sentences suddenly caught my eye and struck a chord in my mind.

Knocking blindly on the door of an Amsterdam agency.

The memories came rushing back vividly. Right. When I was staying in Amsterdam, my heart raced simply knowing that a world-class design agency was located near my accommodation. It was an unfamiliar city where I didn't speak the language, but I didn't hesitate. After lingering outside their building for a bit, I took a deep breath, confidently opened the door, and walked right in.

"I'm a traveler, but is there any chance I could get a tour of this place?"

Although I couldn't actually go inside because the manager was on vacation... Back then, I was recklessly brave and highly proactive.

My hand, gently tracing the notebook, paused. Where had that bold person who confidently opened an unfamiliar door in Amsterdam gone? Seeing myself now, wearing down while obsessing over aimless social media content, felt incredibly pathetic.

I turned the page a little further. This time, it was a note scribbled down in front of the National Gallery in London, UK.

What if I powerfully redesigned Korea's ancient palaces, food culture, countless historical contexts, and dynamic modern culture, much like the narratives of these masterpieces?

The countless masterpieces by the greats hanging in the gallery. Standing breathless before them that day, I promised myself I would abandon my impatience and my excuses about lacking skill, and instead commit to powerful design. It was a vision to interpret Korea's unique history and culture through my own lens and craft a compelling narrative.

I stared blankly at that sentence. I had returned home with such a heart-pounding vision... yet here in Korea, I was brutally confronted with the fact that I had completely forgotten that crucial direction while chasing immediate reactions right in front of me.

Suddenly, I realized it. My study abroad didn't end the moment I stepped off the plane. The countless questions I faced on the road, the proactiveness I proved in Amsterdam, and the grand vision I embraced in London. Only when I planted all those fragments of thought into my life would my study abroad truly be complete.

I quietly closed the social media window that had been meaninglessly floating on my monitor.

I could no longer remain a content factory just for show. Just as I built my own world with a single pen in the alleys of Europe, now I needed to proactively cast my narrative and Korean culture into a real business within the reality of Seoul.

I decided to stop churning out performative content under the guise of branding.

To protect the "me" I found on my travels. To build a brand that could fully embody my vision.

(End of series.)