Korean Job Discussion Forums

Yu_Bum_suk · Joined: 25 Dec 2004

My school is building a gym / cafeteria / multi-purpose building and every day when I look out the staff room window it gets higher and higher. I've counted between 4 and 12 workers on the site at any given time. I just cannot get over how up to a dozen men and a crane can build something so quickly. Last week Friday there was just a foundation and now their working on the second floor. How do they do it? Ridiculously long hours? Cutting corners and lax building codes? Extremely simple construction? Masterful efficiency? A combination of the above?

Has anyone here familiar with the Korean building industry? In Canada I'd expect such a building to be a year-long project and it looks like they'll have it ready shortly after the new school year starts.

Demophobe · Joined: 17 May 2004

Mr. BlackCat · Joined: 30 Nov 2005 Location: Insert witty remark HERE

Last year, they demolished a house and built a four story building right next to the four story building that I lived in. It was done within two months or so. They would begin pounding away at 5am every morning, 7 days a week, right outside my window.

It was one of the most unsafe workplaces I've ever seen. Guys hanging off beams with no support soddering without eye protection.
We had to walk directly underneath it to come and go and sparks would spary down, loose cables and wires would dangle. There was always spare equipment and scraps laying about. A lot of days we had to squeeze through working concrete mixers, cranes and other machinery to get to our door. It didn't make me feel safe, let's just say. Between the obvious lack of care to human life and the 5 am starts, I was glad to see the project over so quickly. I don't understand how we didn't see bloodied bodies outside our door every afternoon.

Cerebroden · Joined: 27 Dec 2006

little bit of both...look around you, you think there is housing code here?
Not to mention they don't have to wait a week for an inspector to tell them that they put the concrete up wrong and to tear it up and redo it.
Also, they probably get paid by the job not by the hour. Much more incentive to get the job done.

sadsac · Joined: 22 Dec 2003 Location: Gwangwang

One of the more frightening elements of builders here is they pour foundations in the rain and then don't even bother to let hem cure properly before throwing up the building and that is one of the major reasons why you see so many buildings with cracks in them, after such a short period of time. Bali, bali, we've got ten more to complete this week. Smile

cdninkorea · Joined: 27 Jan 2006 Location: Seoul

I don't know about the rest, but I can say I see Korean construction workers on the job very long hours- I once saw a group of them doing road work (underground, no less) at two am!

tzechuk · Joined: 20 Dec 2004

Don't you remember how buildings collapse in the ROK?

A couple or three years ago they were building a new place at KAIST in Daejeon... half way through the construction the building collapsed and one of the workmen died.

My architect brother in law says that things are not very well built here and it's all because of the *8282* culture.

ajgeddes · Joined: 28 Apr 2004 Location: Yongsan

The buildings are terribly built, plus there is no internal air systems so a lot of work just doesn't exist here.

Example: They just put a new addition onto the Mokdong ice rink. After they had finished the brick work outside, we were all taking a look and they were all uneven and you could even see through the bricks inside. It was pathetic. It's a good thing there are no real earthquakes here.

eamo · Joined: 08 Mar 2003 Location: Shepherd's Bush, 1964.

Any building more than 15 years old is considered ancient and ready for demolition. Why build to a high standard if the thing only has to last 15 years? It's like a disposable approach to buildings. The construction industry in Korea keeps the wheels turning by building cheap and building often.

excitinghead · Joined: 18 Jul 2005

My biggest gripe this winter is how so many Korean buildings seem to be designed as if winter never existed. Sure, I've been here 7 years and so my memory is getting a little hazy, but I'm pretty sure that I wasn't freezing to death inside buildings less than 10 years old. Here? I'm scared to go to the bathroom at my institute, and would rather keep the warmth inside thank you very much.

But all countries have their building blind spots. When my family emigrated from North England to Auckland, NZ, when I was a teenager, they were always moaning about how lovely and open and breezy the houses were in the summer, but impossible to heat in the miserable and wet Auckland Autumns and winters.

billybrobby · Joined: 09 Dec 2004

blaseblasphemener · Posted: Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:32 pm Post subject:

Yu_Bum_suk · Joined: 25 Dec 2004

kotakji · Joined: 23 Oct 2006

I watched from my dormitory at SNU as another 8-10 story dorm was built literally over the course of a single semester. The answer is rebar- or rather the lack of it.

Cerebroden · Joined: 27 Dec 2006

I saw the road that runs between Yongsan Main and South posts dug up, repaved and painted in 4 days and it took them 2 of those days to paint the lines. It took almost 2 months for Korean workers to do the same length of road on post.