Happy New Year to Korean Women :
Happy New Year to Korean Women For women, the Lunar New Year is one of those contradictions in Korea _ a major holiday when most would rather be at work.
Let’s face it, girls, this weekend is going to suck the big one.
There’s going to be tons of food to prepare and dishes to wash and drunken relatives to put up with.
If you’re under 25, you don’t have to do that much. But you’ll be anxious to get out of family situations. When the ceremonies are over, you’ll probably be off to the movies or to Starbucks with your friends.
But, be warned: this frivolous innocence is about to end. Soon there will be no escape. You will be entering a realm of pain that, as you get older, will shift and change shape like a headache but will never quite go away. By Michael Breen
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The special annoyance in store for single women over 25 -- and they know it’s coming -- is the endless interrogation from relatives about when they are going to get married. The problem with this question is that it carries an implicit criticism: You’re not married yet. What’s wrong with you? There’s also a loaded moral judgment that is difficult to reject without losing respect for yourself. It’s the suggestion that by not being married you are not fulfilling your filial obligations.
This moment is the frontline in the war of family interference in the lives of individual adults that, frankly, is far more important to Koreans than the six-party talks, the breakup of the Uri Party or any other tedious big-picture stuff that fills newspapers. Such bullying pushes people into making big decisions about their life that are not in their best interest.
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It represents, therefore, an unacceptable intrusion.
So, girls, we need a strategy. You have to treat family members who ask such questions as the enemy. If you’re a Christian, imagine at that moment that you have arrived in hell and Satan has just spoken. To get out, you have to handle him with love and courage. The best defense is the truth. Whatever the reason is for your single state _ you’re not interested, you’re not in a hurry, you broke with your boyfriend, you can’t find anyone who wants to marry a pole dancer _ is your truth. Say it.
The second line of defense is aggression. You could say, ``Because all men are idiots,’’ or ``Because I don’t want to end up like you’’ or ``Oh, didn’t you know? I’m a lesbian.’’
This last one may seem very rude and shocking, but you can derive comfort from the fact that I’ve never yet met a man who, if he were reborn as a woman, would not want to be a lesbian. We’re right behind you on that one.
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What the relatives, male and female, are not telling you is that when you do get married, you become the daughter-in-law of Mrs. Evil. The government should institute a 10-minute silence on Lunar New Year and Chusok for daughters-in-law. Sirens should go off, people should stand still where they are, cars should pull over, farmers should stop work in the fields and hold their hats over their hearts.
At this time of year, doctors and psychiatrists get a surge of patients coming to work out mother-in-law issues.
But let’s not be mean to mothers-in-law. Older married women may be nasty to their daughters-in-law, but they, too, are victims. How about this year, girls, we divide up the chores, like, get men to make some of the food? Or, if they’re totally useless, do the washing up afterward?
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If they refuse, you can use your wiles to pressure them. Like, withholding rumpy-pumpy…. Oh, you’ve been doing that for years. Now that’s stupid because, like Kim Jong-il giving up his nuclear weapons, you’ve lost your best bargaining chip.
Oh well, maybe there’s no solution.
Happy New Year.
Michael Breen is the president of the public relations agency, Insight Communications Consultants, and the author of “The Koreans.”