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S. Koreans struggle with sky-high wedding costs
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Troglodyte



Joined: 06 Dec 2009

PostPosted: Sat May 05, 2012 6:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

cdninkorea wrote:
Troglodyte wrote:
I've been paid twice to be a friend of the lovely young couple. There are agencies in Seoul that do this. I just found out about it because I had a Korean friend who did it and introduced me to the manager. You don't get paid much. I got 30,000 Won each time and I hung around for about 2 hours at the reception. My friend said that she also got 30,000 Won. There were drinks and buffet/snack food, so that was a small bonus. Mainly I just did it for something to do.

From what I've been told, they mainly hire young, good looking people (I suppose I was the exception to the rule) who pretend to be friends of the couple. It seemed like both the bride and groom both know that you're a fake guest but the other real guests don't. They give you a simple cover story about how you know the couple (e.g. I play tennis with the groom, or me and the groom went to university together). I didn't hear anything about only one or the other hiring fake guests. I DID appear in some of the group photos. After the general reception, the bride, groom and some of the close (real) guests go off to have a small personal reception elsewhere.


Are you Korean (citizen or ancestry)? I would be interested in doing this just for the experience, but I figured they wouldn't want a visible non-Korean because I'd stand out too much.


No. I'm caucasian. I guess having the a foreign guest adds a little variety or it's a novelty.

If you're interested in doing it, just ask some of your Korean friends in their 20s. They can probably point you towards an agency. You need to know at least a bit of Korean so that you can mingle with the other guests.
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tiger fancini



Joined: 21 Mar 2006
Location: Testicles for Eyes

PostPosted: Sat May 05, 2012 9:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

cdninkorea wrote:
Julius wrote:
I noticed that. K-chicks are often fairly solitary, they lack girl-friends. perhaps they tend to view other females as competition. Which in fact they often are in this voracious, highly competitive society.


I disagree with a lot of things you write on this board, but this has to be the most ridiculous: Korean women don't have friends? I'll be charitable and assume you mean that they don't have many (as opposed to them having none), but it's still absurd. Either:

1) You know a strange group of Korean women who don't have many friends and never see/notice Korean women shopping/eating/talking/walking/hanging out with female friends, or
2) You just plain hate Korea and make things up to justify your bitterness.


Classic Dave's. Accuse/Complain about Koreans being small-minded/xenophobic/microaggressive/blah blah, then go on to make sweeping generalisations of your own.

I also think this is a gross exaggeration, even by Julius's standards. Seems like he doesn't get out much.
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Julius



Joined: 27 Jul 2006

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 5:48 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

tiger fancini wrote:
cdninkorea wrote:
Julius wrote:
I noticed that. K-chicks are often fairly solitary, they lack girl-friends. perhaps they tend to view other females as competition. Which in fact they often are in this voracious, highly competitive society.


I disagree with a lot of things you write on this board, but this has to be the most ridiculous: Korean women don't have friends? I'll be charitable and assume you mean that they don't have many (as opposed to them having none), but it's still absurd. Either:

1) You know a strange group of Korean women who don't have many friends and never see/notice Korean women shopping/eating/talking/walking/hanging out with female friends, or
2) You just plain hate Korea and make things up to justify your bitterness.


Classic Dave's. Accuse/Complain about Koreans being small-minded/xenophobic/microaggressive/blah blah, then go on to make sweeping generalisations of your own.

I also think this is a gross exaggeration, even by Julius's standards. Seems like he doesn't get out much.


thats my observation. K-femmes tend to have lots of guy-friends but few close agasshis.
Maybe its only the hotties.
Other females are jealous of the attention they get, so avoid them. And they themselves are jealous of the ones who are hotter than them, and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.
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jfromtheway



Joined: 20 Nov 2010

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 8:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

From women that I've known here, their friendships, which I've heard about from the second hand mostly, tend to boggle the dung out of me. I pry into them with it because it's interesting to me, and a lot of it is just, well, weird after hearing the response. I don't really understand the dynamic myself, but it seems to be much of same, as far as "friendship" is concerned in this country. Strongly irrational, age-based power dynamics.

Quote:
and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.


I was taken to a, I guess it was, "booking club," in Gangnam relatively recently on a Friday night. Supremely upscale place, massive (and the big places are always underneath hotels, aren't they?). The main bar area looked like the set of a film where some Triad club gunfight scene took place. Anyway. The rooms cost somewhere around $800. And the "staff" was busy hustling girls around, dragging them by their arms into various rooms. I'm not completely sure how this whole deal works, but wow. And there were simply an obscenely amount of beautiful young women scantily clad sitting alone or in pairs at tables all around the place, apparently waiting to be dragged into one of these rooms. I don't want to say the name, but the place was huge, and the amount of beautiful women there looking for who knows what (I'm guessing Dr. Samsung), was unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it. I assume they were fairly normal young women, using a medium for finding a rich guy who is willing to pay $800 for a room and a few bottles of liquor. But, I don't know, you tell me.
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Troglodyte



Joined: 06 Dec 2009

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 9:34 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

jfromtheway wrote:
From women that I've known here, their friendships, which I've heard about from the second hand mostly, tend to boggle the dung out of me. I pry into them with it because it's interesting to me, and a lot of it is just, well, weird after hearing the response. I don't really understand the dynamic myself, but it seems to be much of same, as far as "friendship" is concerned in this country. Strongly irrational, age-based power dynamics.

Quote:
and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.


I was taken to a, I guess it was, "booking club," in Gangnam relatively recently on a Friday night. Supremely upscale place, massive (and the big places are always underneath hotels, aren't they?). The main bar area looked like the set of a film where some Triad club gunfight scene took place. Anyway. The rooms cost somewhere around $800. And the "staff" was busy hustling girls around, dragging them by their arms into various rooms. I'm not completely sure how this whole deal works, but wow. And there were simply an obscenely amount of beautiful young women scantily clad sitting alone or in pairs at tables all around the place, apparently waiting to be dragged into one of these rooms. I don't want to say the name, but the place was huge, and the amount of beautiful women there looking for who knows what (I'm guessing Dr. Samsung), was unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it. I assume they were fairly normal young women, using a medium for finding a rich guy who is willing to pay $800 for a room and a few bottles of liquor. But, I don't know, you tell me.


Are you sure that the girls were working there?
Wink
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jfromtheway



Joined: 20 Nov 2010

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 10:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Troglodyte wrote:
jfromtheway wrote:
From women that I've known here, their friendships, which I've heard about from the second hand mostly, tend to boggle the dung out of me. I pry into them with it because it's interesting to me, and a lot of it is just, well, weird after hearing the response. I don't really understand the dynamic myself, but it seems to be much of same, as far as "friendship" is concerned in this country. Strongly irrational, age-based power dynamics.

Quote:
and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.


I was taken to a, I guess it was, "booking club," in Gangnam relatively recently on a Friday night. Supremely upscale place, massive (and the big places are always underneath hotels, aren't they?). The main bar area looked like the set of a film where some Triad club gunfight scene took place. Anyway. The rooms cost somewhere around $800. And the "staff" was busy hustling girls around, dragging them by their arms into various rooms. I'm not completely sure how this whole deal works, but wow. And there were simply an obscenely amount of beautiful young women scantily clad sitting alone or in pairs at tables all around the place, apparently waiting to be dragged into one of these rooms. I don't want to say the name, but the place was huge, and the amount of beautiful women there looking for who knows what (I'm guessing Dr. Samsung), was unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it. I assume they were fairly normal young women, using a medium for finding a rich guy who is willing to pay $800 for a room and a few bottles of liquor. But, I don't know, you tell me.


Are you sure that the girls were working there?
Wink


Weren't working there, you mean? Possibly, I don't know. There were too many of them to make me think they were all being paid to sit around. I guess it's a possibility. I'm pretty certain someone could hold down a successful club, or even a coffee shop here, if they just paid people to stand in line outside of their business establishment. Robot behavior, Koreans will flock towards a line regardless of whatever the hell happens to be going on there. Standing Coffee, what a joke. Saw that in around Hapjeong, twenty Korean people standing in line for a cup of coffee at 9 pm.
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madoka



Joined: 27 Mar 2008

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 10:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

jfromtheway wrote:
I'm pretty certain someone could hold down a successful club, or even a coffee shop here, if they just paid people to stand in line outside of their business establishment. Robot behavior, Koreans will flock towards a line regardless of whatever the hell happens to be going on there.


It's comments like this that show why you make your living dancing and singing in front of children. Laughing
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jfromtheway



Joined: 20 Nov 2010

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 4:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

madoka wrote:
jfromtheway wrote:
I'm pretty certain someone could hold down a successful club, or even a coffee shop here, if they just paid people to stand in line outside of their business establishment. Robot behavior, Koreans will flock towards a line regardless of whatever the hell happens to be going on there.


It's comments like this that show why you make your living dancing and singing in front of children. Laughing


Short term, sport. And I don't dance or sing. It's comments like yours that prove you're nothing more than a defensive clown yourself.
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tiger fancini



Joined: 21 Mar 2006
Location: Testicles for Eyes

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 8:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Julius wrote:
thats my observation. K-femmes tend to have lots of guy-friends but few close agasshis.


You live in Seoul right? Pay a visit to Jongno, Myeong-dong, Apgujeong, Gangnam Station or any other commercial place on a Saturday afternoon and have a re-think.


Julius wrote:
Maybe its only the hotties.


Because of course, you are only interested in and observe hotties, right?

Julius wrote:
Other females are jealous of the attention they get, so avoid them. And they themselves are jealous of the ones who are hotter than them, and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.


This is pure projection of your warped view of what Korean people are like. What really amazes me are people who complain about Koreans lumping all foreigners together and making massive generalisations about foreigners, and then at the same time spouting nonsense like this.
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Adam Carolla



Joined: 26 Feb 2010

PostPosted: Sun May 06, 2012 10:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

madoka wrote:
jfromtheway wrote:
I'm pretty certain someone could hold down a successful club, or even a coffee shop here, if they just paid people to stand in line outside of their business establishment. Robot behavior, Koreans will flock towards a line regardless of whatever the hell happens to be going on there.


It's comments like this that show why you make your living dancing and singing in front of children. Laughing


Someone clearly has self-esteem issues.
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Captain Corea



Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul

PostPosted: Mon May 07, 2012 4:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Julius wrote:
tiger fancini wrote:
cdninkorea wrote:
Julius wrote:
I noticed that. K-chicks are often fairly solitary, they lack girl-friends. perhaps they tend to view other females as competition. Which in fact they often are in this voracious, highly competitive society.


I disagree with a lot of things you write on this board, but this has to be the most ridiculous: Korean women don't have friends? I'll be charitable and assume you mean that they don't have many (as opposed to them having none), but it's still absurd. Either:

1) You know a strange group of Korean women who don't have many friends and never see/notice Korean women shopping/eating/talking/walking/hanging out with female friends, or
2) You just plain hate Korea and make things up to justify your bitterness.


Classic Dave's. Accuse/Complain about Koreans being small-minded/xenophobic/microaggressive/blah blah, then go on to make sweeping generalisations of your own.

I also think this is a gross exaggeration, even by Julius's standards. Seems like he doesn't get out much.


thats my observation. K-femmes tend to have lots of guy-friends but few close agasshis.
Maybe its only the hotties.
Other females are jealous of the attention they get, so avoid them. And they themselves are jealous of the ones who are hotter than them, and so on, all the way up the ladder to you reach the gangnam socialites. Who can basically catch the biggest jaebol piranha in the pond to ensure their genes live on in luxury.


I know a number of single, attractive (as in, beauty queen winner), k-females... and they have friends.

I really don't know the type you are talking about.

In fact, I think they have more female friends than male.
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Yaya



Joined: 25 Feb 2003
Location: Seoul

PostPosted: Mon May 07, 2012 6:12 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Back to the topic, I don't agree that the cost of housing and such should be included in the wedding fee. I say just what the wedding costs should be considered the wedding cost.

And well, not that I'm against marrying a Korean woman, but it seems love is far from the main factor when it comes to marriage in Korea and that's something I cannot accept.
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motiontodismiss



Joined: 18 Dec 2011

PostPosted: Mon May 07, 2012 7:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yaya wrote:


And well, not that I'm against marrying a Korean woman, but it seems love is far from the main factor when it comes to marriage in Korea and that's something I cannot accept.


As much as I'd love to think that love can sustain a healthy relationship forever, it can't. I find the institution of marriage itself to be impractical no matter who the potential spouse is on the grounds that it's unsustainable.
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Julius



Joined: 27 Jul 2006

PostPosted: Mon May 07, 2012 9:01 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

jfromtheway wrote:
there were simply an obscenely amount of beautiful young women scantily clad sitting alone or in pairs at tables all around the place, apparently waiting to be dragged into one of these rooms. I don't want to say the name, but the place was huge, and the amount of beautiful women there looking for who knows what (I'm guessing Dr. Samsung), was unbelievable.


If you're fortunate enough to win the dna lottery then you get to contract your own samsung wage slave, who is most likely to push your spawn through the same old formula of endless hogwons, universities and jaebols.
A sort of Korean elite bilderburger society is gradually forming in these dingy cattle markets.

tigerfancini wrote:
Because of course, you are only interested in and observe hotties, right?


Hotties tend to want to trade in their beauty for maximum won before it fades.

Booking clubs enable them to dramatically increase their available selection and shorten the time taken to find Supersalaryman, thus ensuring the best provider for their offspring.

Paying 800.000W is a small price to pay for access to fine fillies if you lack the b a l l s to go over and chat up women. Its a continuance of the whole "everything can be paid for" logic.

Its a simple biological imperative, not much different to the mass emergence of mayflies.
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edwardcatflap



Joined: 22 Mar 2009

PostPosted: Mon May 07, 2012 2:46 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Because of course, you are only interested in and observe hotties, right?


Hotties tend to want to trade in their beauty for maximum won before it fades.

Booking clubs enable them to dramatically increase their available selection and shorten the time taken to find Supersalaryman, thus ensuring the best provider for their offspring.



Nicely sidestepped. Tiger was questioning the implication that you only know about the social interaction of Korean hotties (with regards to having female friends) as supposed to normal looking women
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