Korean Job Discussion Forums

[bangnangja]

Here are a few pictures I just scanned from when I lived in Korea.
Do women still carry things on their heads like this?

[hubba bubba]

In the rural areas, yes.

[OiGirl]

Yes, occassionally, especially older women and women in the countryside/small towns.

[Bibbitybop]

And in the Seoul subway stations on occasion.

[bangnangja]

I guess the coalmen are pretty much gone also?
I remember these guys lugging that stuff up to all the houses on the hillsides.

[Qinella]

I saw a lady exiting E-Mart the other day with her shopping back loaded up on top of her head. It was kinda weird.

[Pak Yu Man]

I was at the gynacologists visiting my wife. The I saw a younger woman (in her 30s) come out of her room and she had a cellphone in one hand, her IV pole in her other hand and a hot water bottle on her head. She was going to get a refill of hot water. I myself would have stuck the empty rubber bottle under my arm. To each their own.

[poet13]

They sure do where I live.

On market day, you will see an old man get off the bus, then you see an old woman plump her cloth wrapped parcel on the bottom step. Then she gets down with another smaller cloth wrapped package. She puts down one cloth wrapped package, hoists the other to her head, picks up the first...... and hurries to catch up to her husband who never looked back.

[Chicoloco]

[cdninkorea]

I imagine this is another tradition soon to disappear; I can't imagine too many of today's urban young women carrying things on their head considering how much time they take and money they spend on their hair. What would they carry up there anyway- the Gucci shoes they just bought?

Of course in rural areas this tradtion may not die. But as more and more women leave rural Korea and as more and more of Korea becomes urbanized, it'll happen there too.

Of course they may turn into their grandmothers as they get older, so who knows...

[RACETRAITOR]

Damn, things have changed a lot. In Seoul, all old women have an Indonesian or Filipina servant who follows them around and carries everything.

[JongnoGuru]

[poet13]

I have seen a few women with servants. It didn't seem strange until you mentioned it. At home, my wife and I have several people to do the shopping and stuff.

[bangnangja]

[poet13]

"...and had these bells that operated by pulling a lever that would then run a smaller wheel up againt the front wheel and give this continuous loud ring to warn you..."

That sounds interesting. Do you have a pic of that mechanism?