Multiethnic society
I think Korea is also quite famous for homogenous society along with Japan. I hardly saw foreigners wherever they were from until a few years ago. However, I can feel that Korea has become multi-ethnic society. I learned this from the class I’m taking at present. In fact, I see more foreigners and more tourists in cities than before. There must be many factors of that. I think the most interesting factor is international marriage. Intermarriage has become quite common in the countryside in Korea. These days in Korea, men in the countryside are having a trouble finding women to get married to, which make the men find women in other countries. Isn’t it interesting? Many Korean women don’t want to stay in the countryside helping their husband for farming or fishing and they want to get their own job in cities. Another reason for the lack of women can be the result of son preference. What about your countries?
My story – childhood
Jim, yes, I know very well about the weather in the UK. It really didn’t bother me. In fact, I’d like to be in England when it’s summer rather than in Korea. It’s incredibly hot here after the monsoon.
I’m okay with constant raining or sudden weather change, but the one thing that makes me want to go back to Korea was the very early sunset in winter, which really depressed me.
Well, I think I have got a story to tell from my childhood. When it happened, it wasn’t funny at all. Actually, I was quite severely injured by this accident that I’m going to tell you. It was quite dramatic, though, from the point of a 7 year-old little girl. I was playing with my brother in my dad’s office when I was seven and my brother was five. We were running around the office, making noises and there was nobody in there except us. Suddenly, my brother found a water spray bottle. (I don’t know what to call this in English. It is used when you iron some clothes. You spray some water first, then iron the clothes.) Then, he started to spray water to me, so I ran away from him and to get out of the office, I pushed the door, the part of which is made with glass. I still don’t know how fast I was and how strong I pushed that door. Unbelievably, the small girl broke the glass and flew through the door. Everything happened so fast. The splinter of the glass scratched just below my right arm pit. I was bleeding. My brother didn’t know what to do. Fortunately, a neighbor found me and called my mum and she took me to the hospital, and I had to have the cut stitched. The scar still remains. Even though what happened to me was serious, whenever I tell this story, it’s quite funny. How come I could fly through the door like a superman?
I still don’t know the answer.
I'm going to make some comments about your comments the next entry. By the way, Hyoshil, I like the expression " running around like a headless chicken. I think I learned it from the flatmates. When you really think about it, it's a kind of cruel to say, though, isn't it?
JIae
Comments
Hi Jiae, In my view not only Korea, but the whole world specially the industrialized countries have become multi-ethnic society. In UAE it's because of the secured economy and financial stability. People come over here from various destinations and get prospered. Giving preference to 'son' is depend on individual families, like some of them give superiority, and some, I would say, most of the parents these days give equality to both sons and daughters, and it's in every aspects. Girls of today are highly educated and got full freedom here. I guess men and women both, these days, are facing problems in getting adjusted after marriage. This could be judged by the increased divorce rates. Best regards and take care.
Hello Jiae. I’d like to boast having the same experience of flying trough door glass. Unlike you I was not injured and got know about that accident from my parents much later. Actually I remember nothing about that fly. I do remember many tiny crashes as well as the way I got some scares in early childhood, but there are only words of my mom about that particular happening.
It is really hard to image what it happened. It is incredible.
I'm surprised by your society.I leave in former Soviet Republic; Kazakhstan. On contrast, more then 100 ethnicities leave harmoniously together in KZ, side-by-side. It happened because of Soviet social engineering, internal migration and KZ was the place where vast steppe was used for huge prisons to where multiracial population was sent.
Hi jiae! you are older than me and i feel like calling you '언니' :-) everytime i come here for studying English. especailly i read your writing in blog. that is helpful for me. Thanks to your writing, i think reading speed will be better than before. i will back here again Bye
Hi Jiae, I do think that globalization is a contributor for the multiethnic society......and I guess in the near future, "nations" will become unclear and borderless (albeit wars still exist!!!) But I think it's really funny that we Asian mainly speak our own language, compare with those European who are multi-lingual ^^ Let's work hard for better English~~
Hi Jiae! Brazil is historically a multiethnic country. In general, Brazilian people is a mixture of three main groups: the indigenous native people, the Portuguese colonists and the African who were brought here. Throughout history, other groups (e.g. the Japanese, the Italian and the German) came here and settled smaller colonies, but with great influence in some parts of the country. And presently, as people of different parts of the world come here, Brazilian people is even more mixed. That's an overview of Brazilian people. I'm trying to imagine you flying through the door. Take care.
Hi Jiae, The korean community in Brazil has been seen for the brazilians as closed group, who avoid get married with the others nations, since the portuguese got here, my country was a land of a lot nations, then the portuguese brought several nations of africans to here for four centuries, and in the final of the nineteen century came the germans,italians, frenchs, japoneses, spanishes and now are coming the chineses, koreans, bolivians, and for free choice some africans too.a lot of nations speaking in the most part portuguese. for our lucky, get married here is easy as to take a candy from the hand of a child!!(please smile) in the big cities as são paulo or in the small cities, lots of europeans come here and get marriend..and have how many child they want, no problem if it is boy or girl. this definitily is not our problem, we are just 191 million people in the fifth biggest country in the world!! how many people are in korea? what is the size of korea? best wishes..
Hi Jiae, Imagine there is only a vast country on this planet speaking only English. Imagine people can freely nestle wherever they want to perch. Do you ever think it could happen donkey years later? I can't see it not occurring. Nothing can prevent people from moving from one area to another in search of jobs, finding partners and so on. The country where I live is full of immigrants. Early immigrants are called settlers who had built museums to show when and how to settle down. There are people from all over the place nowadays mostly Europeans though while the aborigine(Maori) is around sixteen percentage of all population.
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Thank you for your post, I really enjoyed your story about Korea, looking forward to you next post!
Hi Jiae, I think multi-ethnicity is growing everywhere. There are several factors involved in this for example, cheap transportation, TV, internet and wars etc. Years ago when people went abroad for better living or for other reasons, you wouldn’t hear from them very often. Now it is easy to travel and it is also easier to arrange everything quickly because of cheaper phone charges. People also have access to internet these days so they can find information about a place they want to visit and book their accommodation and other things on-line. These facilities make commuting more easier and I believe these are the reasons why we can see more ethnic minority groups in each country. To tell you my experience of living in Ireland there were very few people of other ethnicities when I first moved to Ireland 16 years ago but if you see it now, Ireland has become like a multicultural nation. You can see people from all backgrounds and intermarriages take place as a result of commuting so often. I believe that these same things happen everywhere. Like you I also don’t mind the change of whether in Northern Ireland. I have heard a lot of people saying that the weather in the UK is depressing but I don’t mind it all. In-fact, I like it when it is cloudy but I don’t like the rain so much. But even the rain here is not too bad here. It rains very gently. Occasionally you would see heavy showers. People usually take cars when they go to work or other places. Even to places which are walking distance, people take cars. So the rain here does not bother me at all. Your childhood experience was an unfortunate experience but if think about it, isn’t it amazing how children go through some terrible accidents but they are still not as badly hurt as they should have. In our culture people say that angles are there to care for the children and that is the reason children don’t get hurt so much when experience some bad accidents. Just out of curiosity, is it ok in your culture to leave children of such young age alone. Sorry if my question is too personal and you don’t want to answer. I must get off the soap box or you will be board with reading such a long comment. Actually I was a little busy and did not get the chance to comment on this entry and your next message is already in. So I will read your next message and comment when I have time. Rabail UK
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