Category: Korea-General Topics

That is what this grandmother writing in the Korea Times believes:

It seems true that 50 percent of marriages end up in divorce. A Korean friend of mine in New York told me that her daughter, 45, is in a divorce suit after 25 years of marriage after having two children who are now in high school. The American husband told his wife that he wanted a divorce because she does not contribute at home while he has to work hard. He thinks it’s not fair.

In Korea too, men are beginning to think that having a wife is quite expensive. And raising children, the product and main purpose of a marriage, is even more expensive. Young men are scared of having a wife and it has pushed many youngsters into marrying later resulting in a low birth rate which Korean and Japanese governments are concerned will mean their countries lose national competitiveness.

Actually it’s not a wife’s responsibility but blame should go to the profit seeking enterprises that first supplied all those kitchen appliances: refrigerator, kimchi fermenting machine, microwave ovens, automatic rice cooker, dishwasher, and so on. Then again there’s the food producers who sell a pantry full of canned foods, instant foods, ramen and instant noodles. The simplified cooking appliances and the factory produced foods have pushed women out of their kitchen.

Now it takes less than 15 minutes to prepare a family dinner and men who were reluctant to lift a finger now can easily do kitchen chores. So too do children who make their lunch or a snack without the help of their mother. Women have lost their status as a housewife.

It wasn’t always like that. When I married 54 years ago, I was the most important member of the family holding full control over the kitchen and laundry affairs. I knew the whole family would starve or wear dirty clothes for a month if I got sick or went on strike. Men didn’t know even know how to fire the hearth, not to mention boil rice without burning it or prepare side dishes.  [Korea Times]

You can read the rest at the link, but I think the biggest reason for a low birth rate is the cost of education in Korea. It is absolutely ridiculous when the costs for hagwons are factored into raising kids.  As far as the divorce rate that has more to do with women not being locked into poor marriage survive anymore.  If their husbands are treating them poorly women now have the option leave and still be able to support themselves without the husband.  I don’t think living without modern appliances is going to do much to lower the divorce rate in Korea, but cooking a home cook meal and having dinner together as a family would definitely help.

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It looks like the program is working as intended:

The Justice Ministry tightened visa standards in April last year for foreign women who marry Korean men and started requiring them to pass Korean language tests to obtain visas to come here. The aim was to stem the chronic marital strife resulting from communication problems that has led to many of migrant wives seeking refuge in shelters.

But a lack of educational institutions abroad teaching the language is making it tough for women from abroad to join their Korean husbands here.

According to the Korean Embassy in Vietnam, the number of visas granted to Vietnamese brides fell from 5,708 in 2013 to 2,967 in 2014.

Justice Ministry data also show that the overall number of foreign brides who entered Korea fell from 98,965 to 98,364 over the same period.

In January and February, the number fell nine percent on-year to 17,522.

Now some critics say the rules are unfair to bona-fide married women who already have marriage licenses. One man in the southern port city of Busan killed the owner of a matchmaking company after his new wife was unable to enter Korea because she kept failing her language test.

Lee Soo-han at the South Gyeongsang Province chapter of Women Migrants Human Rights Center said, “The aim of the revised regulations is reasonable, but the problem is that the rules are too strict since brides who fail the test have to wait six months to take the next exam.”  [Chosun Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link, but could you imagine the claims of racism that would be made if such a language test was required in the US?

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It looks like IU and Kim Yuna will need to wait a few years before doing any more alcohol endorsements:

A bill to restrict people who are 24 years old or younger from appearing in ads for alcoholic beverages passed the National Assembly’s committee on health and welfare on Thursday.

If it gets approved in the plenary session of the National Assembly, singer IU, who was born in 1993, will have to stop ads she’s been doing for a soju brand.

The committee said the bill proposed by ruling Saenuri Party lawmaker Lee Elisa in July 2012 to ban young athletes and other celebrities from appearing in liquor ads was partially modified and passed.

The bill was proposed when figure skating star Kim Yu-na modeled for a brewery in 2012. Many argued that someone such as Kim who is idolized by young people can encourage teenagers to drink alcohol.  [Chosun Ilbo]

Once again I ask why is the Korean taxpayer being asked to pay for this while Chonghaejin Corp. was fined less than $10,000.

South Korea announced plans Wednesday to salvage the ferry that sunk off the country’s southwest coast a year earlier, claiming 304 lives.

The retrieval will likely begin in September and take up to 18 months, the Ministry of Public Safety and Security said after a meeting of the relevant government agencies.

After making a sharp turn, the 6,825-ton ferry Sewol capsized off Jindo Island on April 16 last year en route to the southern resort island of Jeju from Incheon, west of Seoul.

Most of the victims were teenage students on a field trip, with nine bodies still missing.

President Park Geun-hye Thursday vowed to raise the sunken ferry as soon as possible and to take all measures to recover the bodies of the victims who remain missing.

Some of the families of the victims, however, insisted that the government immediately come up with plans for the salvage of the wreckage.

Thousands of demonstrators staged a violent rally at Seoul Plaza in front of Seoul City Hall Saturday after a ceremony to mark the first anniversary of the Sewol sinking, leaving scores of police officers injured. Police rounded up more than 100 violent demonstrators.

In a news conference, Public Safety Minister Park In-yong said priority will be given to preventing the loss of the bodies of the nine people still missing and minimizing any possible damage to the hull.

As the bodies of the missing people are believed to be inside the hull, the vessel will be lifted from the sea bottom without changing its current position, according to the ministry.

The main part of the recovery will involve divers drilling scores of holes into the hull that’s lying on its left side and chaining it to two cranes that will pull the vessel out of the sea, the ministry noted.

About 100 divers will likely be employed for the underwater work, according to experts.

Up to 150 billion won, or about $139 million, will likely be required for the recovery, although the cost could increase further if the project is delayed or any unexpected technical issues arise.

Still, the retrieval also has safety risks and uncertainties, including the possible destruction of the 20-year-old vessel, typhoons in the summer and a strong current in the shipwreck’s location, Park said.  [Korea Times]

You can read the rest at the link.

Now the UN Secretary General has been dragged into the corruption probe which is one of the biggest stories of the year in South Korea:

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has denied media reports stating that he had an amicable relationship with a late construction tycoon who claimed to have provided money to politicians for years, attempting to distance himself from a snowballing political scandal in his home country.

In an interview on Thursday with Yonhap News Agency shortly after meeting with U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, the chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, at the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, Ban denied alleged ties to Sung Wan-jong.

Shortly before his death, Sung, the former chairman of Keangnam Enterprises and a former lawmaker, said that he had put money into the pockets of top politicians and government officials for years, and also claimed to be one of Ban’s patrons.

“This scandal has nothing to do with me,” Ban told Yonhap News. “I saw him at a few public events, but there was no special relationship.”

“I have no interest in Korean politics, and I don’t have time to pay attention to it,” Ban added. “I have made this position clear in the past, and I am baffled to be facing this situation again.”

Despite Ban’s continued denials that he will begin a political career in Korea after his tenure at the United Nations is complete, speculations have lingered at home that he is being groomed by opposition lawmakers to run in the 2017 presidential race.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link, but Sung Wan-jong has a long history of bragging about his special relationship with Ban Ki-moon.

It was only a matter of time, but it looks like the Korean left is now trying to use the Sewol tragedy to their political benefit by trying to turn it into another 2008 mad cow like violent protest:

Protesters try to topple a police bus at a rally in downtown Seoul on April 18, 2015. (Yonhap)

Police said Sunday they will trace violent demonstrators at a street rally here the previous night that left scores of police officers injured.

“We will run after those who organized the violent rally and acted violently so they could be subjected to legal punishment,” a spokesman for the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency said in a news conference.

As many as 74 police officers were wounded, three of them seriously, the spokesman said, adding that 72 police vehicles were damaged and 368 police cameras, walkie-talkies and other equipment were either damaged or stolen.  (………)

More than 13,000 police were mobilized to blockade the road to Cheong Wa Dae and they used hundreds of trucks and other vehicles to seal off the roads nearby.

Some demonstrators destroyed police vehicles and took out fire extinguishers to spray them against the police.

Several of the police vehicles were turned over by some protesters using ropes.

Police rounded up 100 violent demonstrators, including 20 members of the bereaved families of the ferry sinking.

Nine demonstrators were brought to nearby hospitals for injuries suffered in the clash.  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but as we have seen before the leftists are trying to get the police to over react and then use carefully taken picture to create the perception that South Korea has become a police state just like Park’s father once administered back in the 70’s.  All it would take is the leftists getting violent and the policing responding heavy handedly and then the leftists inserting one of the mother’s of the Sewol victims into the scuffle.  They would love nothing more then having pictures of what appears to be a Sewol victim’s mother being beaten by police and they may have gotten them:

“After countless attempts and struggles until the break of dawn, we are here at the Gwanghwamun Gate with a blanket,” Kim Young-oh, who lost his daughter Yu-min in the accident, said on a social networking service on Friday. “In the meantime, the mother of one of the victims broke four of her ribs and 10 others were taken by the police.”  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

What is actually ironic about the Korean leftist is that this time they actually have a legitimate complaint though President Park is not entirely to blame for the Sewol tragedy.  The lack of safety and corruption in Korea has been going on long before Park ever became President.  Probably the worst thing so far I have seen in the aftermath of the Sewol tragedy is how the captain and crew took nearly all the blame while the company that owned the boat received less than a $10,000 fine.  If the leftists really cared about this tragedy they would be protesting in front o f the Chonghaejin Marine Company demanding that they pay compensation to the families and raise the Sewol themselves instead of protesting President Park.

This is going to be a very expensive operation to do.  The Korean government should force the ferry boat company to pay for this instead of the taxpayers:

South Korea’s president on Thursday vowed to raise the Sewol ferry — which sank a year ago killing 304 people — as mourners marked the anniversary of the disaster.

Most of those killed in the sinking, off the country’s southwestern coast, were high school students. Some 295 bodies were retrieved but nine remain missing.

Speaking in the port of Paengmok, near the disaster site, President Park Guen-hye said she would take “the necessary steps to salvage the ship at the earliest possible date,” the BBC reported.

Park’s announcement — the first time she explicitly mentioned the recovery operation — came soon after the National Assembly adopted a resolution calling for the swift recovery of the ferry, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported. The president said all measures would be taken to recover the bodies of the missing.

“I have a heavy heart and my heart aches to think how painful it is” (for the family members), Park said, according to Yonhap.  [USA Today]

You can read the rest at the link, but for causing this tragedy Chonghaejin Corp. was fined less than $10,000.  They should pay to raise the ferry and compensate all of its victims.