[First post by Yeochin!]
Apparently, Korean sex trade accounts for 1.6% of its GDP.
Yeochin finds this one very amusing as she has read MANY articles about Korea's crackdown on prostitution and red light districts through out Korea. However, Yeochin lives on a five way intersection called Ganseokgogori and can see the red light district from her apartment. Most of the time when Yeochin tells a cab driver to take her to Ganseokgogori, that is where he will drop her off. She has walked down this street a few times and it is very obviously a sex trade street. The city council has to be blind, deaf and dumb to not notice it.
Yeochin also got lost on the bus and got off at the red light district of Nam-gu. Not to mention she accidentally checked into a motel in Itaewon in Seoul that turned out to be a whore house on Hooker Hill. If she wanted to turn off the bedroom light she had to pull a string over the center of the bed.
Which reminds Yeochin of a story that happened to a friend. The friend also mistakenly wandered upon Hooker Hill expecting to meet another friend at some bar there. When she opened the door a tall amazonian prostitute kicked her in the crotch knocking her to the ground and then slammed the door on her. The prostitute didn't want any competition coming into her bar! Yeochin's friend only remembers a giant leg coming through the door and having the wind knocked out of her. She can laugh about it now, so that's good.
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OMG that last one was so funny; obviously not for your friend, but holy hell!
ReplyDeleteI've heard that an Anma is a type of brothel, in hangeul it's... oh, crap, this keyboard is English only. But in any case, there are very large neon billboards advertising these services where I live, two train stops east of Seoul in Guri-si. I got this information from an expat blog about types of Korean prostitution, how much it costs, and where to go to get it. Clearly it's ubiquitous enough that it is openly advertised, and likewise, has a large enough market to justify such a presence. I guess that's what happens when you never see your spouse and work until midnight and then go drinking. It's like a bachelor party five nights a week. The haesawon put frat boys to shame.. and to think I once thought that Phi-Delts were the apex of drunk philandering... Also though friends who have used these 'relaxing services' who also have Korean girlfriends who invariably discover their boyfriends' wandering seem to be less upset than one might expect in the West.. as long as there's no love, this behavior is tolerated as a necessary evil. As far as Hooker Hill goes (and I steer clear of Itaewon these days) whenever my fiancee and I go to the foreign foods market or to What The Book, it doesn't take much for her to get evil, evil glares from the prostitutes, or juicy girl, or whatever the hell the term is. I guess they're pissed about the competition.
ReplyDeleteI think it would be great if the Gisaeng traditions would be brought back again. ^_^
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