Female refugees from the north are being paired with husbands in the south. But some fear that the patriarchy is the real winner\u2026<\/b>
\nDating had never been easy for Kim Jeong-soon. In her native North Korea, couples holding hands were chastised for \u201cdisturbing public order\u201d, and when she arrived in South Korea potential suitors were often repelled by the mere fact of the country of her birth.
It was with a certain reservation, then, that she went on a blind date with a South Korean man three years ago; Kim Jong-il \u2013 whose name in the south is pronounced slightly differently to the late North Korean dictator. They dined on fried chicken and beer and launched right into conversations about marriage, divorce and what a future together might look like. \u201cSouth Korean men are more attentive and considerate compared with North Korean men, and they\u2019re also more friendly,\u201d Kim said. \u201cBut I was really surprised when I first saw the way South Korean men dressed\u2026 in some ways they seemed to care about fashion more than women.\u201d
Six months after that first date they were married. Not only was it a cause for celebration for them, it was another success story for the woman who arranged their meeting. Han Yoo-jin has helped about 300 couples marry since she started her matchmaking company, Love Storya, four years ago. Amid a skewed gender ratio, cultural differences and a desire among many North Korean refugees for a sense of security in their adopted home, an industry has sprung up catering for lonely South Korean men and North Korean women interested in marriage.
Han\u2019s own relationship makes her the literal poster child for her business. She met her South Korean husband at a party for prospective clients, and photos of the two on their wedding day fill her company\u2019s website. Her service is part matchmaker, part therapist because frequently mediates conflicts between couples, sometimes even after their wedding.
\u201cThere\u2019s an old saying, \u2018If you manage to get three couples married, then you go to heaven\u2019, which shows how challenging it is for two people to get married,\u201d said Han.
Hong Seung-woo, another matchmaker, says the divorce rate among North-South couples is about 5%, lower than the South Korean national average. But the industry has its problems, not least the fact that in the south suspicion of North Koreans still remains.
\u201cIn South Korea, people are taught to think North Koreans are all bad people, and I thought something really bad would happen to me for engaging with a North Korean,\u201d said Hong, who started his matchmaking firm in 2006 after marrying Ju Jeong-ok, a North Korean woman.
The industry has also faced criticism for reinforcing stereotypes about North Korean women. About 72% of the 31,000 North Korean refugees living in the south are women, and the past five years has seen an even higher proportion of female refugees, according to data from the south\u2019s unification ministry.
\u201cThere are concerns that these women may be excessively commercialised,\u201d said Kim Soo-kyung, a research fellow at the government-funded Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul. She analysed marketing practices by marriage brokers and was dismayed by the overemphasis on \u201cpure Korean blood\u201d in describing advantages, and how women were portrayed as submissive. \u201cI\u2019m worried this will lead to the public perceiving North Korean women as sexual objects, rather than individuals.\u201d
Han\u2019s story speaks to this concern. She left North Korea at the insistence of her grandmother, who fled across the border to China during the 1950-53 Korean war and lamented the limited opportunities available for women in her home country. Han\u2019s aunt served as a cautionary tale. She studied physics and envisioned a career building weapons for the north\u2019s nuclear programme, Han said, but became a housewife after graduation.
It is this deeply entrenched patriarchy that has been instrumental south of the border in portraying North Korean women as dutiful wives fulfilling traditional gender roles, \u201clike how things were in the south in the 60s and 70s\u201d, Han said.
North Korean women tend to prefer financially stable men \u2013 those with bad credit are screened out \u2013 and \u201cbigger men, ones that look a bit like Kim Jong-un\u201d, Han said with a smile.
After three failed escape attempts, \u2013 each time receiving increasingly harsh punishments in one of the north\u2019s infamous labour camps \u2013 Han arrived in South Korea in 2001. She worked as a highway toll collector and then in a string of matchmaking firms before striking out on her own.
She is confident that her business will endure despite the proliferation of apps such as Tinder. \u201cNorth Korean refugees prefer handling things face-to-face,\u201d she said, adding that most were deeply sceptical of technology, and concerned about revealing even mundane personal details online.
Additional reporting by Kyungmi Choi<\/p>\n