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Post by brooklyn on Nov 11, 2008 22:43:32 GMT -5
It's probably the same as it is in Jamaica, puppy, if you get therapy, people label you as mad/crazy/weak and no one wants to be called that nor would they want any of the neighbours to know they had to get their head checked out lol
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Post by puppy on Nov 12, 2008 8:56:16 GMT -5
As a member of an extended Rastafamily, I should have known that. No wonder I'm so drawn to Koreans!
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Lila
Junior Addict
Posts: 80
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Post by Lila on Nov 17, 2008 20:48:22 GMT -5
I believe that, in addition to the stigma that mental/emotional disorders carry even in most modern societies, a country such as South Korea that has pretensions about familial bloodline purity would worry about introducing something socially unacceptable into their own family bloodline through marriage – possibly causing all unmarried blood relatives to risk being seen as unmarriageable. We see that reflected in the dramas through the way orphans are treated and the horror that a family expresses if one of their offspring states that they’re in love with an orphan, or if someone in one’s family says that they’re considering adopting. Perhaps the advent of genetic/DNA testing will be beneficial.
It’s kind of eyeball-rolling, IMO, for a people who have been conquered and occupied by numerous other countries repeatedly down through the centuries to place such importance on bloodline purity, when it’s no secret that rape is part of the “spoils of war.” You’d think they’d be more tolerant. On the other hand, perhaps it’s actually because of the shame of it all that seems to permeate that society that such a pretension comes to exist. According to reading I’ve done, Confucian-based societies place more value and importance on “face” and relative status than on truth, reality, and individuality. As a Westerner, I find it difficult to get my mind around those inversions when I watch the k-dramas, which appear to be more reflective of actual Korean life and values than American soap operas are of American life.
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Post by puppy on Dec 2, 2008 18:03:50 GMT -5
Lila, is modern S. Korea really that tradition-bound? To the point, as I said before in another post I can't remember where, that adherence to tradition defies common sense?
Hanja asked for a divorce in last week's episode because she SOOO unhappy. I guess, according to tradition, her son married an orphan (NOTE: he's deleriously happy) her younger daughter is marrying into a family where the MIL hates her (NOTE: but she adores the guy and he filthy rich) and her eldest has a divorced boyfriend with a kid (NOTE:t hey're totally compatible and in synch)
Does Hanja want her children to be as miserable as she obviously is with her husband, a sweet teddy bear, who seems to dote on her?
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Post by PippiBella on Dec 2, 2008 21:52:41 GMT -5
it is funny how the queen talks to her hubby. She talks in this baby like childish tone. I think it is so funny!!
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Lila
Junior Addict
Posts: 80
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Post by Lila on Dec 3, 2008 0:35:49 GMT -5
Puppy, from what I’ve read (not being Korean or having traveled there), not all of South Korea is modern. The country is going through a schizophrenic phase. Much has happened in what is, historically considered, just a short time. 50+ years ago they were in a vicious war, fighting for mere survival. 40 years ago most of the country was poverty-stricken, a third-world country. Things have gotten much better for many South Koreans in recent decades. Many are still living who went through those traumas and miseries and who still strongly value the “old ways”, just as many have been born during more affluent times and view the world through different lenses. (Not a few of those younger people who are beating their chests about how South Korea and South Koreans are the best in every conceivable way are also having their eyelids operated on, their noses reshaped, their jawbones filed down, etc., to look less Asian and more Western. Schizoid much?)
As for your question about being tradition-bound to the exclusion of “common sense”, my impression is that many still are, while many others are fighting for modernity. And perhaps what’s considered common sense in one culture is considered inexplicable or ridiculous in another. Is it common sense to drink oneself s—t-faced several times a week with one’s co-workers, or for employers to insist on it, “or else”? And in a country with a very high incidence of liver diseases and alcoholism and who are beyond-obsessed with herbs and potions and “medicines” and mysterious “cures”? Not to me, but apparently to those who want to keep their jobs. And wouldn’t many Koreans be befuddled by the American style of a young, unmarried person leaving their parents’ homes as soon as they possibly can? What would they think of a culture in which even the firstborn son is considered to be somehow defective if he’s not out on his own by his mid-twenties? It wouldn’t be seen as common sense.
I’ve missed enough episodes to not be sure about this next thing, but my impression is that Hanja was pretty spot-on with her expectations of misery for her two daughters. Only recently have things begun to balance out for the older daughter, and the younger daughter may adore her new husband, but would you consider yourself happy if you had to kowtow to such a vile mother-in-law? In her own way, Younger Daughter risks becoming as crazy as her M-I-L. For myself, I wouldn’t expect any mother, of any culture, to approach those potential marriages casually. “Oh, so you want to grovel at the feet of a lunatic with delusions of grandeur for the next 35 years? Cool. And you, you believe that your fiance’s bitchy, interfering ex-wife is going to someday become your BFF, and that the miserable little brat who treats you like spit will suddenly adore you? Heck, why not? Go for it. I always wanted my daughters to volunteer to spend their lives like slaves. In a different fashion, that’s what I’ve been. But I missed out on being victimized by psychotic egomaniacs. Well, we always want our children to have more than we did, and golly gee, that’s what you’re both about to do! Go forth with my blessing.” As if, right?
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Post by puppy on Dec 3, 2008 13:16:42 GMT -5
You really give me a new way to look at Hanja, Lila. I guess if I thought my child was walking into the lion's mouth, I'd try to stop him or her, too.
But, on the other hand, mothers have to know that marriage isn't all sweet. There are always hard times that love helps you get through. Loving one another counts for a lot, more than honoring tradition, to my way of thinking.
My family objected to my marriage all those years ago. (different religion, culture, race) Now Mom is elderly and I take care of her. My kids have their own lives and the relatives have either died or moved on. My best friend is my husband, pain in the a-s though he can be. If I had listened to the family and married the one they wanted me to, they'd still be off on their own business today but I'd be struck with a nice person I never loved.
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Post by door60 on Dec 14, 2008 18:45:16 GMT -5
OMG in last nite's episode in the NJ area, the wicked m-i-l told her adorable daughter-in-law (sorry I can't get the names straight) that she should relax her face because she looks too unapproachable ! Really, I could not believe my ears.
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Post by brooklyn on Dec 15, 2008 0:17:40 GMT -5
I think she's Yeongmi. All her husband did was whine like a kid and yeongmi humbly said yes, I had a million answers for the wicked witch last night lol.
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Lila
Junior Addict
Posts: 80
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Post by Lila on Dec 15, 2008 1:02:10 GMT -5
This weekend in Chicago's episodes, Euna threatened to immolate both herself and the motorcycle her husband had bought, if he didn't voluntarily give up the idea of becoming a rider, and save her the fate of becoming a widow. She even insisted that her son go right out and buy the gasoline. Yeongmi beseeched her F-I-L to give in, because she believed that her M-I-L would insist that Yeongmi be the one to strike the match, and she didn't want to be part of that. What got me was that Yeongmi said that she would HAVE to do what Euna told her to do. As extreme as that would have been -- setting an expensive motorcycle and her M-I-L aflame -- nobody contradicted her, and the marshmallow of a F-I-L gave up his dream. (Too bad Euna didn't get prematurely cremated last night, but we weren't that lucky!) That was just too over-the-top, IMO. I don't know where, if anywhere, the writers are taking the Euna character, but I do get the feeling that they're having a lot of fun trying to come up with newer and more extreme outrages for her to inflict upon others! The actress really does a wonderful job, with her subtle movements and expressions. You know who I'd like to see Ko Euna paired up with? The youngest son of our favorite elder. He's coming across as a really rotten so-and-so. Put those two together and we'd surely end up with one of them holding a lily they couldn't smell!
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Post by soapygrams on Dec 15, 2008 14:12:16 GMT -5
;D Thanks for letting me know what I missed in Saturday's episode. Had to attend a Christmas party so I missed it entirely. My VCR doesn't record CH41 very well as I have to keep moving the antenna sometimes to get a clear picture; it's too annoying to try to watch it from a tape that goes in and out of focus every few seconds LOL - Too bad he didn't tell the Queen to sit on the bike and HE would toss the match himself - I think that might have shocked her enough for her to faint and give up the idea LOL . .
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Post by brooklyn on Dec 15, 2008 20:06:46 GMT -5
I just hate how they pet her but it's the same old, same old of either backing down or standing up and getting ignored.
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Post by Lucy on Dec 16, 2008 13:00:18 GMT -5
Soapy, your solution to the motorcycle dilemma was hilarious. Why didn't they think of that?
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