Korean Expat Community for National Disasters

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South Korea is undeniably a global fashion hub. Trendy outfits change with every season, and with the rise of ultra-fast fashion apps, a new style is just a cheap, one-day delivery away. For a long time, I loved this convenience. But recently, a simple walk through my neighborhood made me look at my wardrobe differently.

I passed by one of the green clothing donation bins—heon-ot-soo-geoham—that sit on almost every street corner in Korea. It was literally overflowing, with cheap, discarded coats and shirts spilling onto the pavement. It made me realize a harsh truth: our love for fast-paced trends is creating a mountain of waste. In fact, South Korea is one of the world's largest exporters of secondhand clothes, meaning much of our unwanted fashion ends up dumping environmental burdens onto developing nations.

Every cheap t-shirt we buy has a massive carbon footprint, from the thousands of liters of water used to make it, to the synthetic microplastics that never decompose. Now, instead of mindlessly scrolling through shopping apps when a new season hits, I am practicing a new mitigation habit: "wear what I have." Resisting the urge to buy cheap, disposable clothes is becoming my personal way of slowing down the crisis, one outfit at a time.