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| People wearing face masks to protect against the coronavirus walk through the Wangfujing shopping district in Beijing, Dec. 12. AP-Yonhap |
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Under this plan, Park would have been able to earn her degree without ever having to return to China, where she had only spent a single semester physically at school. In December 2019, she returned home to South Korea from Hangzhou for her first winter break, but the rapid emergence of the coronavirus made remote online classes her only option.
When she finally returned to Hangzhou last month, it had been almost two years since she left China. And she is already a junior.
"In the end, I decided to go back to school because one day I suddenly felt like I was missing out on the quintessential college experience," Park reasoned.
"When I talked to friends who were already in Hangzhou, they told me that their lives had normalized, in terms of living with Covid-19. That's when I decided that I wanted to go back."
Park is one of the few international students who have been allowed to return to China during the pandemic.
China stopped issuing student visas to international students in March 2020, as part of its restrictive zero-coronavirus policy that left many international students stranded abroad.
But in July 2020, South Korean students were granted an exemption as the Chinese and Korean governments made a special arrangement to reinstate the issuance of visas. Since then, South Korean students have returned to their schools in China, but it is unclear exactly how many.
And some say they have faced new challenges as Chinese universities remain extra cautious.
Park Seon-yeong, 20, another South Korean student at Zhejiang University, had initially planned to return to Hangzhou in August, just in time for the new semester. She had spent three semesters taking classes online from South Korea.
Although Park Seon-yeong's visa was approved, she said the school repeatedly told her that it was not the best time to come back, and her return to campus was delayed until last month.
"They told us that, since a lot of domestic students were returning to campus in August from different cities across China, it would be better if we international students could return later - after the school could make sure that everything was sorted out and settled," she said.
Park Kyung-su also said she received the same messages from the school when she was preparing her return around the same time.
Zhejiang University's hesitancy in welcoming back international students this fall came as neighbouring Jiangsu province had been hit hard by the coronavirus Delta variant.
Another South Korean student at Zhejiang University, Kim Eo-jin, 20, who returned to China much earlier than the two Parks, in November 2020, said he understood why the school was wary of the South Korean students returning.
"I think it's absolutely reasonable that the school asked us not to come back. Of course the school would be cautious about it," Kim said, adding that the school had communicated similarly with him when he notified administrators that he wished to return during the 2020 fall semester.
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| Women wearing face masks to protect against COVID-19 look at a display board as they stand in a plaza at a shopping and office complex in Beijing,Dec. 10. AP-Yonhap |
The school's urging of South Korean students to postpone their returns highlights how cautious Chinese universities are in welcoming the first batch of international students back to campus since the beginning of the pandemic.
Kim, for one, said he feels safe in China thanks to its zero-tolerance policy toward Covid-19.
"I personally think China's zero-COVID policy is really good, and I actually believe it is much safer than the 'live with corona' policy implemented elsewhere in the world, including in South Korea," Kim said.
"When I came back to China in November 2020, I was sure that it was really safe to be in Hangzhou in terms of COVID."
Cho In-jung, 29, who is pursuing a doctoral degree in business administration at Tsinghua University, echoed that sentiment, saying that although the zero-tolerance policy measures could be inconvenient at times, the public health benefits were apparent.
"The Chinese government's determination to contain the virus is extremely strong. Yes, sometimes you do lose some freedom as a consequence of the strict policies, but it's nothing unbearable," Cho said.
The two Parks at Zhejiang University agreed, even as they were on their fifth day of the university's Covid-19 lockdown at the time of their interviews, after an asymptomatic case of Covid-19 was discovered on campus.
"I actually really appreciate the Chinese government's swift and thorough measures like this, because they ensure everyone's safety. Although, of course, it's a shame that a lot of school activities had to be cancelled during the lockdown," Park Kyung-su said.
However, while these returned students and others have embraced China's strict coronavirus control measures, many others from South Korea remain extremely apprehensive about setting foot back on campuses.
In fact, the students who were interviewed said that a large number of their Korean schoolmates have chosen to remain in South Korea. According to Park Kyung-su, most of the South Korean freshmen who started school in September at Zhejiang University chose to stay in their home country and take online classes.
The students said the reasons their friends decided to remain in Korea included factors such as an unwillingness to endure lengthy quarantines upon returning, wanting to take the opportunity to attend school online while doing other things in Korea, and various uncertainties about the pandemic.
Meanwhile, foreign business groups have warned that Beijing's strict border controls could drive away foreign talent, which would weaken China's soft power and ultimately hurt the country's talent pool and innovation capacity.
Many foreign students have been appealing to the Chinese government in the past year to be allowed back in. China's foreign ministry said in September that it was aware of the international students' predicaments, but there had not been any change to the visa policy.
While the South Korean students who have returned to China did so for various reasons, all of them said they were psychologically prepared for the possibility of not returning to South Korea any time soon ― at least not until quarantine measures are relaxed.
"When I decided to come back to school, I made peace with the fact that maybe I won't be able to return home until I graduate from university," said Park Kyung-su, who is on track to graduate in May 2023.
But while being away from friends and family back home can be difficult, those South Korean students who have returned to China also acknowledged that they are in a privileged position, as many of their peers from other countries were not allowed to return.
"I have a friend from Myanmar who is in the same doctoral program as me," Cho said. "I heard that she was unable to get her student visa, and she ended up deciding to take some time off."
