Quickie: Matchmaking in the ROK

I've seen a couple people link to this silly little article about finding a wife for Kim Jong-un (mostly a goofy promotional gimmick to coincide with White Day). But I thought this snippet was really telling:

The agency claims to have matched 23,000 people over the past 20 years using Korea-specific criteria that emphasize their clients’ jobs and educations, their families’ assets and their parents’ levels of education, especially which universities their fathers attended.

This is what matters in South Korea—or maybe what South Koreans want to believe matters, at least when it comes to interpersonal relationships. Titles, jobs, education, and other assorted things you can list on a resume. Things that are not of you but are around you. I wonder what those matchmaking professionals would say about my own relationship, with a boy whose education and familial assets are in no way similar to mine. Our fathers went to universities in different countries, even.

I've been busy hammering out the details on my new contract in Uijeongbu. With any luck, I'll start on May 30th. I look forward to re-immersing myself in Korea soon!