Korean Job Discussion Forums

[cat12345]

Full disclosure: My minor area of research for undergrad was human development, so sorry if this is long and detailed, but it is interesting to me and I think it could be to people on this board.

Soooo this topic is actually one I'm posting as an offshoot of another one I started yesterday on family hassling you on coming to Korea.

To wit, I had posted that I was worried about my family worrying about me and how I could make them feel better. Among many replies about how I need to grow up (which was besides the point, because I had already moved away and travelled, just not to a different country- one of the things about this board is that they tend to preach a lot and ignore what you are actually asking, which in my case was suggestions on how to make them stop freaking about about Korea in particular) my ears pricked up because I got this! Yaaasss, social role discussion!


I was told one reason they may be worried is that "You're a single woman at the age of 28. Your family, although they haven't told you directly for fear of hurting your feelings, are afraid that when you eventually do return from Korea, you will not be of a marriageable age and will live the rest of your life collecting cats."

I honestly was kind of devastated by this. Do a lot of people still think like this? I live around Amish people and used to live around Mormons, so I know this kind of thinking still exists, but is it really that prevalent?

I even looked up average age at first marriage, and saw this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_at_first_marriage


Now, assuming we all live in English-speaking countries and are therefore part of the first world, here is a list of the top ten OCED countries (2013 rating) and their average marriage age for women:


Norway: 32

Australia: 27.7

United States: 27

Netherlands: 30.4

Germany: 30

New Zealand: 30

Ireland: 32.0

Sweden: 32.5

Japan: 28.8

Canada: 29.1

South Korea: 29.4

Hong Kong: 28.9

Iceland: 32.1

Denmark: 32.4



This leads to an average age of 30.2.


Now, let's paint a picture of what someone like me may do. If I were to arrive in Korea at the age of 28 and one day, and stay for approximately one year, and then return at begin graduate school (my original plan), then I would be putting myself in a large group of potential men at the age of 29, and following a normal relationship trajectory, perhaps dating a year or two and marrying at the age of 31. This still leaves 9 years of prime childbearing years and a chance to be married and have a family while still travelling beforehand.


The reason this is so interesting to me is that I have lived in very different parts of the country (Ohio and San Francisco) where the idea of what is marriageable age is very different. In one, it is not unusual to be married (working class) right out of high school. The other, this would be seen as foolish and a waste of potential, with marriage happening around 30.


The reason I think the age is so low in the United States is that we have a very large working poor population that doesn't aspire to continue their education or see the world. They have a void after schooling stops that is filled by starting a family. I understand this and do not criticize it because I come from this background and there is nothing wrong with choosing this, even if I myself want to do different things.


The presence of ultra-conservative religious groups like Mormons and evangelicals in the South also skew our age lower. Teenage pregnancies and shotgun marriages could also account for it, although I couldn't find anything on the internet to substantiate this.



One reason I am so interested in this is my experience meeting Arab women in graduate school (which led to my minor), many of which are scholarship students from Saudi Arabia. Their reality is muddled and contradictory: their country pays for them to come over to our country to get advanced degrees (my friend is unmarried and 27, while her grandmother got married at 12 and had her mother at 13) but when they go home, they will find that most of their friends have been married for upward of ten years. They will also be mostly unable to use their degrees, and won't even be allowed to drive. When they do marry, they'll have to legally get the permission of their father.


What, then, is really preferable? Is 29 or 30 really considered "unmarriageable" to the people that use this board?


PS: If this is about looks...suffice to say I have had people approach me on the street. I take care of myself. I am not bragging...I'm not a cover model but I'm not fat and I'm definitely not ugly. I have also had Asians guess my age 4-5 years lower than it really is, and they are epidermal vampires who think all white people look old (or so I've been told...). So I'm just really confused on this. Perhaps this poster is just really old school/older generation? What exactly is the thinking on this subject now, from a contemporary pool of people like the posters on this site? Is this something teachers going over there in my age range actually worry about?!

[tardisrider]

Whatever, bro.

[Ginormousaurus]

[Hokie21]

[Ginormousaurus]

Unmarried young woman teaching in Korea != future spinster.

Don't overthink what one poster said. Develop a thicker skin and you might get along fine in Korea. A good way to develop said thick skin is to engage in gender-related discussions on this board.

If you remain uber-sensitive, well, just wait until your Korean coworkers suggest you'd be prettier if only you'd lose some weight.

[Hokie21]

[Ginormousaurus]

^ This is a very likely scenario, Cat12345.

[cat12345]

[cat12345]

I'm not really worried about being called fat or old by Koreans...I kind of assumed that would happen after reading stories on here. I just didn't expect fellow North Americans or Europeans to join in.


BTW, is 5'6" and 127 lbs considered fat there?


....wait, I think I already know the answer. Brb, have to go vomit up my lunch.

[Ginormousaurus]

[Hokie21]

[Lucas]

OP - you think too much for Korea, choose a different country to teach in

Although tongue in cheek, one word you need to (almost) delete from your vocab when coming to Korea is 'why?'

This single three letter word causes sooooo much stress for NET's and their CT's.

Another phrase to delete from your vocab is 'in my country we do.......' or 'back home we think that X is Y'

[/quote]

[Fox]

[forvalor]

I'll give you two replies again, as I did in the original thread that caused you to start this topic:

Mainstream: Absolutely, most people get married later these days, so you have plenty of time. Age is just a number, if a man can’t accept that, then he’s not worth your time anyway. Besides, who said you have to get married? You’re a strong, independent woman; you will be fine either way. Seize the day and stop worrying about what the future holds. It’s your life after all.

Alternate: You’re already 28, and by the time you return from Korea you’ll probably be close to 30. A cruel reality of life is that men are biologically programmed to value youth and beauty above all else in women, just as women value height and status in men. You may still be able to meet a man when you return, but he will be low status, divorced with kids, old or ugly. Of course, there are always those cats. Tick Tock...

[bigverne]