SOUTH KOREA \u2013 It\u2019s 10.30am and Madam Park (not her real name) is out prowling the streets of central Jongo district, Seoul, waiting to make a quick sale.
This 78-year-old targets grey-haired men, in practising the world\u2019s oldest profession.
At Seoul\u2019s heart, next to the busy business district,\u00a0is a street where sex is for sale by women old enough to be grandmothers. These so-called \u2018Bacchus ladies\u2019 — named after a popular energy drink — are the subject of an investigation by Channel NewsAsia\u2019s Get Rea! documentary on South Korea\u2019s elderly poor, which premieres on Jan 31.
At her age, Mdm Park should be at home, surrounded by her children and grandchildren. Instead, she stands on the streets for at least 6 hours a day, waiting for customers.
\u201cIn order to survive, I just close my eyes and get it over with,\u201d she said in Korean. \u201cIn one day, if there is good luck, we meet three to four men and receive about 100,000 won (S$120).\u201d
She does this so that she can afford the US$250 (S$350) worth of arthritis medicine a month. Her arthritis is so severe that she can barely walk.
When Channel NewsAsia approached her on the street, she said: \u201cYou came to play? To meet someone? The room fee is US$10. The fee for the woman is US$30.\u201d
Mdm Park said that she married when she was 19. When she was in her late 20s, her husband gambled away the family home and left her alone to raise four children.
She was working as a kitchen helper and couldn\u2019t afford to send them to school. Today they don\u2019t earn enough to support her, and she claims that they do not care about her. She currently lives with her relatives in a small house and they have barely enough to live by.
Mdm Park said that her knees gave way when she was in her early 70s and she couldn\u2019t find a job. Desperate for food and medication, she became a Bacchus lady.
\u201cEven if I am going to die, I need the medicine. The day after next, I will go to the hospital and get an injection for the bones. It is so painful,\u201d she said.
Prostitution is illegal in South Korea and Mdm Park said that she has been caught and fined several times by the police. However, desperate times calls for desperate measures.
\u201cIt is embarrassing. I am embarrassed because I am old,\u201d she said. Aside from the 82-year-old grandmother who is the street\u2019s oldest sex-worker, \u201cI am the next oldest. And next is 60-plus years old. There is no one below 50. All of them have grandchildren,\u201d she said.
South Korea has one of the world’s fastest ageing populations and nearly half of its elderly live in poverty.
Its pension and welfare systems for the elderly lag behind other developed countries; nearly half of South Koreans aged 65 and older live on less than half the national median income.
Professor Lee Ho-Sun, from the Korea Soongsil Cyber University in Seoul, who has been studying these \u2018Bacchus ladies\u2019 for years, said that most only started selling sex later in life.
She said that between 2013 and 2014, the number of \u2018Bacchus ladies\u2019 peaked at about 300 to 400 in the Jongno neighbourhood alone.
\u201cI cannot tell when they (Bacchus ladies) started but most of them were neglected during the currency crisis in 1997. Families could not really support their parents as before. So, the senior citizens became homeless and\u2026 since they do not have much skills, all they could do was become a prostitute,\u201d she said.
She described the basic pension in South Korea — about 200,000 won a month — as insufficient.
Some of the elderly are unwilling to burden their children with their financial difficulties. Others were left behind in the countryside while their children moved to the cities to seek employment and education.
Dr Lee said: \u201cTimes are changing — in the past, it was enough to get by on one person\u2019s income. Now even a dual income isn\u2019t sufficient. Children are not in the position to take care of their parents. The elderly problem in South Korea is very shameful.
\u201cUnless the young adult\u2019s problems are solved, we cannot solve the elderly\u2019s problems.\u201d
Watch the Get Rea! documentary on South Korea\u2019s elderly poor on Jan 31 at 8pm SG\/HK.<\/p>\n