Korean beauty standards

One thing that I noticed in Korea as soon as I arrived was a total difference in beauty standards from Korea to anywhere else I’ve been in the world. There’s a clear reason why Koreans are renowned for their beauty in the Asian world.

In the west, there isn’t really a set beauty standard, someone either is or isn’t good looking, it depends entirely on the person. You could like red heads, freckles, dimples, body builders, skinny people, or girls who are curvy or you could just like big buts and you cannot lie…(I’m gonna stop there lol)

SNSD's Yoona

So, in Korea, there is the culture to fit in with the crowd and people don’t really have a burning desire to be individual. So everyone wants the perfect face, and yes, there is a set criteria in Korea for the ideal face shape. If you don’t fit into this, then unless you’re some crazy anomaly, then you’re not really going to be considered beautiful.  Everyone wants a V shaped face, slight jaw line, narrow cheek bones, big eyes, double eye lids and a high nose bridge. Korea very much sticks to this idea that you can aspire to. There’s pretty much a list of things that you can either do or look like which make you an attractive person. The list basically consists of the above face shape and: being tall (over 175cm), long legs, pale skin, S-line (hour glass figure), V-line face shape and s small face. Basically looking like a doll is what people aspire to.

In comparison to the west, this level of attention isn’t really something that people think about, at all. Before I came to Korea I never noticed a double eye lid on somebody. But one thing that would horrify most Koreans, if they knew, is the western obsession with tanning, and getting that Mediterranean looking skin. People in the west tan all the time or even use fake tan. In Korea, people freak out about the sun. it’s common to see people walking round with a parasol to stop themselves from tanning. In fact, in Korea they have the opposite of fake tan.
They have skin whitening kits that you can buy in any beauty store. In fact, one thing that is common here, is that if someone naturally has tanned skin, but by no means dark skin by our standards, other people will make fun of them for it. Weather it be in a classroom at school or as an adult. For some reason it doesn’t translate as bullying…yeah Korea is about the most racially insensitive place in the world. Lol. I’ve had to explain to a few of my students what could happen to them if they spoke that way to someone in the west. Haha.

So back to the small face thing. This doesn’t translate at all into western culture, and I didn’t understand it at first. People tell me all the time…actually no, correction, boys and men tell me all the time that I’m handsome because I have “the above list” and I have a small face, and my reaction at first was always like, “what?”. I didn’t know if that was a good or bad thing, and I was pretty certain that my face wasn’t particularly small or big, it was just a face. But when we take photos my students and other people will cover their jaw bone area with the tactful piece symbol to make their face look smaller and V shaped. In fact let me show you some poor quality face pictures...

 Until I saw them I didn’t notice but I actually do have a small face O.o The high and wide cheek bones (that westerner’s usually say “omg his/her cheek bones are beautiful” to) that Asian people have makes their face generally look so much larger when directly compared to my face, but in themselves, they look completely in proportion. In the west there’s nothing wrong with that but in Korea, that’s not good. Tbh, I don’t think that before Korea I ever would have noticed.

Infinite's Myeongsoo

The interesting thing however, is that these rules, apply to both men and women! It’s not like in the west where men have an aesthetic ideal and then women have a different one. The ideal way for a man and woman to be is very similar. I’d say that men in their 30s and over don’t really fall under this kind of social pressure, I think that generation missed it, but men in their 20s and under fall right into it. So that includes, men and boys wearing makeup. It may seem strange to a westerner, in fact,

Before and after make up

in the west that would just be deemed “gay” but here that way of thinking doesn’t signify. But In Korea, aesthetics and impressions are super important. And that includes men. Eg: Korea doesn’t have anti-discrimination laws, or at least none that are enforced. So someone who is more attractive could get a job over someone who is less well groomed, easily. Having that edge in Korea is too important. But note that I’m not talking about “fashion diva” makeup, men who do wear makeup here are really careful about how they use it, because it can‘t be obvious that they‘re using it, that defeats the point of naturally being beautiful.

So it’s actually really common and you’re just as likely to see a bunch of teenage boys fixing each other’s hair as you are to see a bunch of teenage girls. In fact, half of my elementary school boys all comb their hair in class >.>.

One other things worth noting is that height here is really important, as I mentioned earlier. When you buy shoes in korea, they will have an inside heal which you can’t see from the outside, so you actually look taller

than you are. You can even buy thick insouls to make you even taller. It’s also really fashionable to have trousers that are slightly too short to make your legs look longer than they actually are .

But overall, Korean’s dress very well, and very sharp, especially in comparison to the west. One of the reasons I’ve been on such a mission to buy new clothes while in Korea is because I’ve felt embarrassed to wear my English clothes. Foreigners aren’t held up to the same beauty standards as native Koreans but still, I like to look good. And looking good in Korea means something totally different to looking good in England.

If I was go into detail about how the fashion here is different and there are different idea's of what parts of the body are and aren't acceptable to show, this blog would take you a year to read so i'll leave it at that. ^^  

Making Friends in Korea

So, friends in Korea. This is quite a loaded topic because it’s among the top reasons why a foreigner who is working in Korea might leave home. It’s also something that more recently I’ve had to combat myself. 

If you’re a student and come to Korea to study, or as a teacher like me, chances are that you’re part of a package and there’s plenty of people to choose from who are very much like, “yeah go Korea” and keen to make new friends.  Not to mention that once arrive at your school or university, you’ll also have either you’re Korean colleagues or class mates to make friends with. If you work as a Hagwon (after school school/academy) , they’re also a good chance that there will be other foreigners there who can show you the ropes. 

Since I’m a public school teacher, I’m the only foreigner at my school, in fact I’m certain I’m the only foreigner for a fare few miles, but that’s ok. I get along well with all my colleagues, and even though I’m able to talk to them, they all have families to take care of, and are older than me. As I talked about in my last blog, it’s very difficult to maintain friendships with older people with the Korean social hierarchy system, unless you’re lucky enough to be talking to someone who is quite western in their thinking. 

When it comes to actually making friends in Korea, I’ve actually been very lucky that most Koreans are so friendly. The majority of my Korean friends have been made during my travels while either in a night club or at a bar or some kind of event, and they’ve just approached me, and struck up a conversation. Being exotic and all, people are generally interested in me. Unfortunately, that means that my friend base is…everywhere but where I live. 

Since where I live is the middle of nowhere, and most people here speak as much English as I speak Korean, It’s a different ball game trying to make friends here. I’ve had to actively hunt for friends…like a nursery child. “Will you be my friend?” yeah, that’s pretty much it. And as you know, unless they’re the same age (and a boy, Ill come back to this later…) the answer is going to be no.  Unfortunately, I haven’t been successful in making friends yet where I live. I’ve met a few people who were interested in a language exchange, but none of them have worked out. For now my only alternative for friends is the foreigners in town…I’m not that desperate…

Anyway, lets talk a bit about the Korean friends I do have. Oh how Korean friendship is different from western friendships. 

There’s a thing here called skin-ship, which kind of caught me off guard at first, but I’m used to it now. It’s roots go way back into Korean Confucian history, but put simply, same gender friendship is a lot more intense than western friendship. Skin-ship refers to people being touchy feely people are with each other, and there’s a lot of that in same gender friendships. With people of all ages, literally, weather they be two old men struggling with canes two elementary school kids or people my age, there is a lot of physical intimacy. It’s common to see two boy/men holding hands, sitting in each others laps, giving each other back massages or even feeding each other. Actually, even when they’re not all that close, it’s common. In my school, if another male teacher has to talk to me about something, he’ll hold my hand while we’re talking. It doesn’t have the same relationship connotations that it has in the west. 

Now let me elaborate, I must make a point that all my friend in Korea are boys. Why? This is because of what happened when a boy and girl get into a relationship. Once a guy starts dating a girl, he is expected to relieve himself of all involvement with any of his female friends. As is the girl expected to remove herself form all her male friends, if she has any. Once they get into a relationship, the amount of time the spend with their friends is massively reduced, and they almost live together from the get go. This means that whenever a guy or girl does have time to see their friends, the time the have together is like gold dust. It also means that a guy can’t ever really have a strong friendship with a girl, because the moment he gets a girl friend, they’re friendship is gone. Which is why no one here can understand why my best friend is a girl and how she has a boyfriend that isn’t me. 

Outside of a relationship, opposite genders mix plenty, especially at university, but this doesn’t mean that guys and girls are completely segregated for the rest of their life once they‘re in a relationship. In the in a work place or school, an opposite gender professional friendship is completely acceptable. Though it would be very inappropriate to meet someone outside of work of the opposite gender. If that were to happen it’s pretty certain that they’re having an affair her. The chances of a committed man meeting a female co-worker outside of work and there’s not something going on is slim to none in Korea. Now let me glaze over why none of my friends are girls…

1. It’s a nightmare to try get a conversation out of a girl because they’re too busy trying to be cute, or they just awkwardly avoid eye contact with me. (not sure why)

2. If I wanted to meet a girl just me and her, then that’s classed as a date here. If I’m dating a girl, then I can’t be friends with Sai. 

3. If you think I can try and be diplomatic about it, then you severely underestimate how crazy Korean girls can get over this subject. (besides, Sai went through a lot of crap with her current and previous boyfriends over me, I would never abandon her like that.) 

So, if you couple this relationship factor along with all the hierarchy stuff I talked about in my last blog, well…this is why it’s difficult to maintain any form of friendship in Korea, and why people are so happy when they meet someone of the same age and gender. It means they don’t have to watch their language, they can relax, and they don’t have to abandon me after they get a girlfriend. Though…they will still disappear for lengthy periods at a time. 

Also, unlike in the west when it takes a certain amount of time and interaction with someone before you really consider them a friend, in Korea, it’s not like that. Because someone who fits all your criteria is hard to come by, not to mention someone that you actually get along with, they jump head long into their friendship. Most of the people who I’ve become friends with I’ve been to their house and met their parents and slept at their house after only meeting them once before. In England that’s kinda crazy, and dangerous.  I would never invite someone into my house who I’d only met once before. But then again, Korea is a lot safer than England. 

Ok I think I’m done, again this is such a long blog, with few pictures. No idea what my next blog is going to be yet but I’m sure you’ll find out in a week’s time ^^. 

Age differences and honorifics in Korea

So age and respecting your elders in Korea as you know is a big deal, even if it’s just a 1 year difference. Does this get in the way of making friends…yes and no, but I’ll talk about making friends and how friendships are different in Korea to the west in a different blog.

So how much of an issue age and honorifics are depends entirely on the person that you’re talking to. I’m approached by quite a lot of people, particular students around my age, who are interested in making foreign friends, they have studied English from a very young age and are aware of our social differences, and they’re quite quick to scrap Korean social rules bound by age, job and marital status and trade them with western social rules. Most students now speak a pretty decent level of English anyway, because they’ve studied English so long in their compulsory education, even if they’re studying mechanics or something in university, many still study English. Those that are actually English students will have lived abroad before in most likely America and can very easily snap between each culture. However, I’m pretty much speaking for my age and under, that still leaves a large amount of the Korean population to speak for and it’s really obvious when a Korean person has been outside of Korea before or not.

Koreans who have had no experience with foreigners before nor were very good at languages in school will be noticeably uncomfortable when talking to foreigners. They’ll ask you the typical Korean like, what’s you age, marital status, job, I’ve even been asked how much you get paid, what my height and weight is. It’s not that they’re trying to be rude or anything it’s just that these things are important to know when speaking Korean so they can know how to address you properly, and the type of relationship that they can or cannot develop with you.

In Korean there are technically 4 levels of formal speech which affects every sentence you say so knowing these things really important to know how to speak to someone. Quick example: I would never say sorry the same way to my student and friends(mianhe), as I would to my co-teacher and people socially higher than me(mianhe-yo/mianhabnida). And I would never say sorry the same way I say sorry to my principal (jwaesunghabnida).   

As well as affecting each sentence pattern, it affects titles. Getting the right honorifics is kinda important and this is where I still get rather confused…

For example: In university, the person who is a grade above you would refer to as “Seonbae”, this one doesn’t matter if they are a boy or a girl is it just a generic title. In this situation you are the younger person and you would be referred to at the “hubae”. But! Should the two of you become close friends, then these titles are subject to change. The “Seonbae” might start to feel uncomfortable being called that title because it emphasizes the age gap and his/her authority. They can change the title to one which represents a closer bond but still maintains the age divide (this is an epic bonding moment). Between two girls, the older girl’s title would become “Eonni”, and between two guys, the older guy would become “Hyeong”. Between an older girl and a younger guy, the older girl becomes, “Noona” and between an older guy and a younger girl, the guy becomes “Oppa”. The ungender-specific title for someone close to you but younger than you is “dongseng”, or if you are in a group he or she would be referred to as the “maknae” of the group.

There are many more titles than just this one situation, but as you can see from just this one example, there is always this implicit barrier which is reminding you that you cannot be “friends” with someone who is not the same age as you. Whenever I meet someone new who is Korean and they realize that we are the same age, a lot of the time the reaction is, “Oh my God, we can be friends!” When I’m speaking English to someone these rules don’t really take affect at all, but when speaking Korean they’re really good to know. When speaking Korean, at first I didn’t care about these things, but I’m slowly becoming more aware of when someone younger than me speaks too informally to me or out of turn, and I’m becoming more aware around people older than me about speaking the right level of formality.

And it doesn’t end there…oooh no. Once you find out about someone’s social status in comparison to yours, it’s meant to affect how you interact with that parson as well. Especially in the work environment!

Another example:  When going out for meals and such with the other staff at my school. The younger people should be the ones handing out the chopsticks setting the table etc, pouring people’s water for them and all that. Now when it comes to drinking in these situations, people pour each others drinks, they never pour their own. How you receive and give your drinks is again dependant on age and social standing. If you’re younger, then you should receive a drink with your right hand holding the glass and your left hand supporting the right arm or around your body so your hand is just below your arm pit. Or you can just  receive the glass with two hands. If you’re the older one you just kinda pour with your right hand and it’s fine. When you go to say cheers and you clang your glasses together, if you’re younger, then your glass should be lower than the older person’s glass when it makes contact, and when you drink your drink, the younger/lower person should turn away from the higher person to show respect. If you have an higher person in front of you, and on either side of you, turn all the way around before drinking… if that happens and there’s an old person sneaking up behind you, just don’t drink. Lol.

This also comes into play when you’re drinking with friends, even the really westernized ones. I actually have 1 friend who is older than me, but because he’s a student, and I’m a teacher, he still turns away from me when he drinks. And again, this is just one example. Trying to remember the different sentence structures, honorific titles, the correct behavior, and speak a different language which you’re relatively new to, whilst drinking, really isn’t easy. But I’m getting there. ^^

As you can see, with all these things reminding you that you are either superior or inferior to someone it’s kinda hard to get really close with someone at the moment for me unless they are reasonable westernized and they can drop some of these Korean rules. Luckily for me I’ve met a few of these people because I only have one Korean friend the same age as me. Most are younger than me by a year or two and only 1 is older than me.

The kind of relationship I have with my co-teacher is pretty much the kind of relationship I have with everyone who is not all that accustomed to western social rules. Me and her get along just fine together but she is 3 years older than me. In western terms that’s nothing, I’d treat her the same as someone the same age as me but even though we speak in English to each other, I’m still very aware of my social standing in relation to her, which at times makes things a little awkward. Her grandmother died a few weeks ago and had she been a westerner, I would have given her a hug, talked with her for a bit and made sure she was ok. But she’s not western, so I couldn’t hug her, or really display any level of affection that wasn’t appropriate, so it made the situation a little bit like a matter of fact. There are more reasons why but when I do my blog about friendships and gender interaction, I’ll come back to this anecdote and explain in more detail.

But there you have it, a brief insight into Age and honorifics in Korea. ^^ 

Jindo sea festival etc.

So this past 7 days I've been really busy with travel. I was lucky enough to have school trips and a few days off rolled all close together and I took advantage. I'm not going to write about each one in detail  because I would be here forever but instead of telling you I'll show you ^^.

It was the start of spring and so it's blossom season which is fleeting to say the least. All the trees come into bloom at pretty much the same time and the trees are all different shades of white, pink, red and yellow for about a week and a half to two weeks. Then all the blossom falls all turns green for summer. So you'll see many random pictures of flowers where I've desperately tried to get a nice picture of flowers that I won't see again for another year.

 
Tuseday 24th April

This was our monthly hiking trip with all the faculty at our school again.

Wednesday 25th March

This day was a school trip to an educational environment centre for kids in 서천 (Seocheon). I chose to go with my 4th grade students purely because they're my favourite.

Friday 26th - Sunday 28th April

This was the weekend I went to the Jindo sea festival. Basically was a festival centred around a naturally occurring parting of the sea, along with it's associated legend. First I travelled to Daejeon on Friday night, and then I got the KTX (Korea's answer to the bullet train I guess), to Mokpo. There I stayed with one of my Korean friends who is a staff Sargent in the army. He actually lived in a really cool old style Japanese house which I wanted to take photos of just because of the layout and architecture style but I didn't want to be all like, "Hey can I come into your house and take photos of your home." but maybe next time. The next day we travelled to Jindo and we bumped into some of his English friends on the way and we all spent the day together.

Now, I've made it quite clear that I don't like spending too much time with foreigners in Korea, and this trip was no exception. At first everything was fine and I was enjoying being with like minded people who enjoyed shared a sense of humour, but that's as far as it got. the problem started with the alcohol. When English people say festival, they think of Leeds or Glastonbury festival, which is tents, alcohol, drugs, mud and loud music. to Korean people a festival is family and culture time. So all these guys brought their own booze, and progressively drank more throughout the day. At first they weren't so bad, but it got to the point where I was involved with THAT crowd of loud obnoxious foreigners and I was embarrassed to be around them. Not only that but they also stole something from one of the stands, and I was horrified. Never the less, I was there for the sea festival not for them so I tried to just enjoy my time.

That night me and "Seosamh" went back to his place in Jindo where I met his grandmother, who didn't speak a word of English but I liked her none the less and I spoke enough honorific Korean to her so i think she liked me too.

Anyway, the next day, He showed me around Mokpo and we did a little bit of mountain climbing before I had to leave.

From Mokpo I then got the KTX back up to Iksan. There I met another one of  my Native Korean friends who is a student in his final year studying to be a mechanic. I definitely enjoyed my time here! His friends were all lovely and I really enjoyed being around other students again. At the moment I really feel like I get along with Koreans more than westerners. My only close western friend at the moment is Sai. bar her they're all Koreans. I didn't get many photos here, but we went to a Buddist lantern exhibition at the university campus on Sunday night. Then on Monday he showed me around the campus, and we went for a little shopping before I had to leave that night.

and alas...I then had to be back at work on Tusday 30th April. But! then I had another day off on Wednesday 1st May. I had not a great deal to do other than head to Daejeon again to run some errands and get some paint to finally start decorating my apartment. Though, a local foreign girl got in touch with me about going for a picnic since the weather was good, and where they were planning to go was pretty much the last place in Korea with blossom left. So I thought why not, I can go for a nice picnic in the morning, then go do my chores in the afternoon and be back for tea. I think I must have hit my head or just completely forgotten what the Saturday before was like with foreigners.

So we arrange to meet and get the bus station and get the 11am bus, naturally one of them is late, so we have to wait an hour for the next bus pushing back my schedule. I then had to spend an hour with them being loud in public which i thought was ok because soon it would end and we would be away from Korean people where they can be loud all they want, only I get into an argument with some american girl (who had been in korea for years) about Korean vocabulary. It didn't take me long to realise that many, including this group of foreigners don't socialise with native Koreans at all. They don't understand nor care to try to understand their culture, and don't bother to try to speak the language. they just stick to their little western bubble.

In any case we got the bus where naturally, they were all loud and knowing bus etiquette I sat a little away from them, and naturally an old woman told them to shut up. When we got to our destination I was much happier. The scenery was pretty and apart from the Americans complaining about how hard it is to walk whilst panting for breath, I was more comfortable being around them when I wasn't around any Korean people. When we got to where we were going to have lunch, we were all supposed to bring things to share korean style...like one other person besides myself brought some kimchi, and that's it. everyone else brought beer or candy for themselves. and when they all saw real food, they all tucked into my food. >.> not happy. I cut things short and left them to climb the rest of the way on their own.

got a couple of nice photos though...

And that's me. Hopefully my next blog will be a little less ranting about how much I really don't like foreigners in Korea.