18 WEDNESDAY
APRIL 30, 2008
Expat living is a page dedicated
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Can we learn from
migrant workers?
By Lairam Vapual
We don’t learn from you; you
learn from us. That is the gen-
eral perception most natives,
the world over, have of migrant
workers who have come to
their land for mostly demand-
ing physical labor. But, as long
as they are willing and hum-
ble, and if pride and a sense of
superiority do not get in the
way, host people can, and in
many cases do, learn valuable
lessons from their guest popu-
lation.
When it comes to the issues
of immigrants, many are quick
to detect different cultures,
lifestyles, ways of thinking,
and language barriers, and
then to express critical opin-
ions. But, by deliberately
blinding ourselves from seeing
the essence and meaning of
pluralism, we are effectively
barring ourselves from enjoy-
ing the scintillating beauty
that diversity offers.
It is very important to look
beyond the notion of immi-
grants as learners only.
Immigrants — migrant work-
ers in particular — bring with
them their skills, their sense
of responsibility, volunteerism
and other qualities that are
positive contributors to soci-
ety.
It is very important to get beyond the
notion of immigrants as learners only.
When Bik Te began his ca-
reer at a mid-sized company in
Gwangju city, Gyeonggi
Province, at a lower-than-aver-
age wage, not one of his
Korean coworkers had ever
imagined that he would later
become a master in his field of
work. After years of obedience,
loyalty, hard work and perse-
verance, he slowly and steadily
moved his way up to one of the
highest places, in terms of
skills and quality. His experi-
ence and expertise had carried
him through the financial ups
and downs of the company,
which saw many native work-
ers come and go.
Every time the company re-
ceived important orders, often
during the weekend, his boss
would plead with Bik Te — not
demand or order — to give a
few extra hours to the compa-
ny, which the young Asian
gladly did. He also shared his
expertise with his Korean col-
leagues, earning him the re-
spect of all those within the
company.
Back in 1998, when he and
another migrant friend were
waiting for a train at Ichon
Station in Seoul — bound for a
morning church service not far
away — a Korean lady in her
20s fainted and fell off the plat-
form onto the track. The two
men immediately risked their
lives by jumping down to res-
cue her, while other passersby
idly looked on. The lady later
expressed her heartfelt thanks
to the men.
A man with a sense of re-
sponsibility, Bik Te had never
let himself be confined to his
work alone. Fluent in Korean,
there were even many occa-
sions when he was mistaken
for a Korean.
When he joined a one-day
volunteer trip to a city in
Gangwon Province in 2006 to
help the locals in their efforts
to repair flood-damaged
buildings and plantations, no
Korean in his group noticed
until very late that a foreign
volunteer was among them —
despite his lively conversa-
tions with them.
Bik Te always gave a helping
hand to other migrant work-
ers, and assisted with lan-
guage classes and as an inter-
preter for those who found
themselves faced with social
problems such as industrial ac-
cidents, poor health, workplace
abuses, and unpaid or delayed
wages.
When the young man bid his
farewell to his company and to
Korea in October 2007, his col-
leagues were not very happy at
his departure and at the
thought of losing one of the
company’s most valuable as-
sets. Now, in a different Asian
country, Bik Te is enjoying a
different experience and life.
But when his former boss was
finally able to track him down
in February, he called Bik Te
more than a dozen times, try-
ing to persuade him to come
back to Korea to work for the
company, with promises of
higher wages and more bene-
fits, this time including legal
costs and transportation back
to Korea.
In another case, a migrant
worker named Bawi Lian did
not hesitate to sign up to help
in Taean, where the country’s
worst-ever oil spill took place
late last year. The young man
considered himself lucky to be
able to join other volunteers in
cleaning oil off rocks one by
one, despite the icy January
winter.
On another occasion, when
he and another migrant friend
were going home around 10
p.m. in a city in Gyeonggi
Province in early February,
the men encountered a drunk-
en man who was vandalizing
cars parked along a roadside
in the quiet of a Chinese New
Year night. Intolerant of van-
dalism, he and his friend
shouted the vandal down. But
the two young men could not
stop the middle-aged man
from damaging more vehicles.
Eventually, a passer-by called
the police.
Aware of the imminent ar-
rival of the police, the drunken
man tried to flee, but the mi-
grant workers were in hot pur-
suit while the whistleblower
remained behind to guide the
police. When, with the help of
the three men, the police final-
ly apprehended the vandal and
checked the vehicles, they saw
large cracks on the front win-
dows of three expensive
sedans.
The police thanked the mi-
grant workers after registering
Bawi Lian as one of the key
witnesses of the incident. “It’s
my responsibility to protect
public and private property, de-
spite my being a foreigner
here,” he recounted.
It is true that hardworking
and responsible ordinary peo-
ple like Bik Te and Bawi Lian
have proved that, contrary to
the stereotype, migrant work-
ers do have valuable lessons
and services to offer their host
society.
We can take them or leave
them. The choice is ours.
The writer is a foreign resi-
dent in Gyeonggi Province. His
e-mail is indochina777@ya-
hoo.com — Ed.
COMMUNITY
Abuse in international marriages
The increasing number of in-
ternational marriages is a nat-
ural phenomenon that, of
course, does not constitute any
inherent sort of human rights
violation in and of itself. In
Korea, however, many interna-
tional marriages are arranged
by matchmakers, and some of
these lead to grave human
rights concerns.
First, the tradition of match-
making in Korea has existed for
a long time. With respect to in-
ternational marriages, we must
question what differentiates in-
ternational from domestic mar-
riages, as well as the specific
problems we could have when
Koreans and foreigners marry
each other. The difficulties that
originate from matchmaking
arise at the onset, when match-
makers promote international
marriage as the “alternative” to
getting out of the status of “ag-
ing single bachelor,” which is
called nochonggak in Korea. Of
course, most brokered match-
making between Koreans and
foreigners is between a Korean
man and a woman from abroad.
These unwed males usually
want to escape from a status
that has a social stigma.
Additionally, matchmakers
ask for a considerable amount of
PHOTO CHALLENGE — An
aged hand holds a baduk
stone in the traditional man-
ner — between the index
and middle fingers — in
Jongno, Seoul last weekend.
Tomasz Roszkowski
Torch riot extravaganza
The Olympic torch relay
came and went, and, as hap-
pened elsewhere, the main
event was overshadowed by
side festivities involving anti-
China protesters and what ap-
pear to be well-organized
groups of mostly Chinese stu-
dents.
The fun kicked off in
Olympic Park, where pro-
Beijing Chinese students
clashed with members of a
North Korean human rights
group protesting China’s repa-
triation of North Korean
refugees. Perhaps clash is too
kind a word; reports indicate
that the Chinese attacked the
protesters with water bottles,
stones and garbage. A photo
reporter with a Korean daily
paper was injured after he
was hit in the head with a
stone.
Next, it was the pro-Tibet
protesters’ turn. In front of
Deoksu Palace, a couple of
Western protesters wearing
pro-Tibet T-shirts were sur-
rounded and assaulted by a
large band of young Chinese.
They were fortunately able to
escape before anyone sus-
tained serious injury.
The worst round came in
front of City Hall, where stu-
dents attacked more protest-
ers. One protester made the
mistake of trying to escape
into the lobby of the Seoul
Plaza Hotel, where he was cor-
nered and beaten by a crowd
of chanting Chinese. This inci-
dent was caught on video. It
does not make for pleasant
viewing.
Susan Kim
on Human Rights
money from one party in order
to select a foreign spouse-to-be,
who is treated more like a com-
modity than a person with fun-
damental rights. Matchmakers
have also been known to fail to
present foreign spouses-to-be
with adequate information
about the Korean nochonggak,
given that these marriages are
quickly arranged for purposes of
convenience.
The lack of protection for hu-
man rights in international
marriages in Korea sometimes
results in relationships that are
unequal, hierarchical, and pos-
sessive. There have been report-
ed cases in which Korean hus-
bands have taken theirs spous-
es’ passport or forbade their
wives from meeting with fellow
foreign nationals because they
want to prevent the spouses
from fleeing the country.
In other cases, foreign spouses
have been the victims of verbal
and physical abuse, and this has
sometimes culminated in the
murder or suicide of some wives.
To put an end to the vicious
practices that characterize some
international marriages, a bill
Robert Koehler’s
Talking Points
Needless to say, the scenes
of organized bands of young
foreigners running riot, at-
tacking civilians and police
personnel alike have not gone
over particularly well with the
Korean media and public.
Police say they will take legal
action against the Chinese
students who participated in
the attacks. One English-lan-
guage daily, meanwhile,
warned of rising anti-Chinese
sentiment in the wake of the
disturbances.
For its part, the Korean
Foreign Ministry called in the
Chinese ambassador to ex-
press its displeasure over the
incident. The ambassador in
turn expressed regret over the
behavior of some of the young
Chinese involved in the distur-
bances.
The police, meanwhile, have
come under some fire for being
ill-prepared to deal with the ri-
ots, which some say were pre-
dictable, given what took place
in San Francisco, London and
elsewhere. Yonhap News quot-
ed one police official as saying
that the cops thought the
Chinese embassy would be
able to control the demonstra-
tors. This is somewhat bewil-
dering. News reports on
Tuesday morning carried ac-
cusations (thus far unsubstan-
tiated) that the Chinese em-
bassy helped organize the
protests.
On a positive note, reports
to regulate matchmaking has
been enacted by the Korean gov-
ernment and is awaiting imple-
mentation on June 15.
However, the National Human
Rights Commission concluded
that the drafts of the bill’s presi-
dential decree and enforcement
regulations have to be improved.
This April, the Commission pre-
sented its opinion to the Ministry
of Health, Welfare and Family
Affairs, proposing that the bill
include some clauses to ensure
that spouses, both Korean and
foreign, disclose critical informa-
tion to each other, especially
criminal records involving do-
mestic and sexual violence, prior
to the marriage.
The second issue of concern is
that a variety of human rights
issues arise in the immigration
process for foreign spouses. In
July 2007, one Pakistani who
was sojourning in Korea on a
business investment visa filed a
complaint to the National
Human Rights Commission. He
claimed that the Korean em-
bassy in Pakistan had refused
to issue a visa that would allow
his wife to accompany him be-
cause marriages between close
relatives, like cousins, are pro-
hibited by Korean law. But it is
not within the Korean govern-
indicate that the North
Korean leg of the relay went
without a hitch.
In case anyone has forgot-
ten, the torch relay began in
1936 for the Summer Olympic
Games in Berlin. Yes, those
Summer Olympic Games in
Berlin.
More pot-smoking
English teachers
You’d think, given the fre-
quency of reports of English
teachers getting nabbed for
drugs, that people would have
wised up by now, but appar-
ently not. Police recently bust-
ed six English teachers, a
Korean national and an illegal
alien from Ghana for violating
Korean drug laws.
The Korean served as a
middleman between the
Ghanaian supplier and the
English teachers who were the
users. The teachers lived
mostly in Seoul and Gyeonggi-
do, while the ganja was being
supplied from — you guessed
it — Itaewon.
One of the English teachers
arrested, an American, told a
local internet broadcaster that
he smoked for the same reason
people drank — because it felt
good.
Congratulations. Now you’ll
likely be deported.
Robert is the editor-in-chief
of SEOUL magazine, and the
administrator of The Marmot’s
Hole blog (www.rjkoehler.com).
— Ed.
ment’s mandate to decide
whether a marriage between
foreign nationals — having al-
ready taken place in another
country — can be forbidden.
Fortunately, the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs quickly recog-
nized the problem and told the
Commission that it would take
measures to prevent reoccur-
rences of such incidences.
Ultimately, the Korean govern-
ment allowed the complainant’s
wife to accompany him to
Korea. Yet, despite the success
of his case, almost half of the
complaints filed by foreigners
are related to the immigration
process, many of which must be
processed by the National
Human Rights Commission.
The third issue is one that has
not been met with an appropri-
ate amount of consideration —
the empowerment of foreign
spouses by Korean society. The
current outlook of this society on
foreign spouses is that such peo-
ple need assistance from the
Korean government; they are
not seen and treated as digni-
fied individuals and rightful
members of this society.
However, if foreign spouses
continue to demand that their
rights be honored by all sectors
of Korean society, and they ful-
In focus:
Sunny f16
By David Smeaton
I heard about a photography
rule called ‘Sunny f16’. It has
something to do with light. What
exactly is it? — Jenny, Seoul
The sunny f16 rule is a very
useful guide for photographers.
It’s useful because it can help you
shoot without the assistance of
light meters. Measuring ambient
light that enters your camera,
the light meter decides on the de-
sired settings for your photo.
The light meter inside a cam-
era can make mistakes.
Professional photographers and
studio photographers also use
hand-held light meters, which
are bigger and more accurate.
Light meters are indispensable
these days and most photogra-
phers can’t shoot without them.
So, what do you do if you want to
shoot without a light meter? Many
older cameras don’t have light me-
ters. Or, if the light meter is bro-
ken, then the camera is unusable.
Well, not exactly ...
This is where sunny f16
comes in. Sunny f16 is a general
guide for shooting conditions
without a light meter. To set
your camera using sunny f16,
you need to know three things:
Firstly, your camera’s ISO (or
ASA for film cameras). Secondly,
shutter speed. Thirdly, aperture.
Sunny f16 is an aperture of f16
with a shutter speed that is the
same, or slightly higher, than your
ISO. For example, if your camera’s
ISO (or film ASA) is set to 200,
then your shutter speed should be
fill their responsibilities as re-
spectful residents of Korea, the
problems above can be resolved
at least partially in the present
and near future.
Korean society has to create a
foundation and atmosphere that
is friendly to foreign spouses so
as to encourage them to stand
up for themselves as empowered
and competent individuals.
Also, this society must be one
in which spouses can comfort-
ably and easily question the
government, report domestic or
physical abuse, and demand
that their rights be respected.
This will result in a new percep-
tion of foreign spouses as mem-
bers of our society who are fully
capable and undeniably deserv-
ing of proper respect.
Susan is an investigator with
the Migration & Human Rights
Team at the National Human
Rights Commission. Before
working as an investigator from
2002-2005, she worked for the
International Affairs Division at
the Commission. She has an
M.A. in Area Studies from the
Graduate School of Interna-
tional Studies at Seoul National
University, and a B.A. in French
from Paichai University. — Ed.
1/200 or 1/250. If your ISO is 800,
then your shutter speed should be
1/800 or slightly higher.
On a bright sunny day, using
a low ISO combined with sunny
f16 will produce very good re-
sults. There are also some use-
ful variations on sunny f16. Try
using:
f11 for slightly overcast condi-
tions;
f8 for moderately overcast
conditions;
f5.6 for heavily overcast con-
ditions;
f4 for sunrise and sunset (or
in low ambient light).
All of those aperture settings
work when the ISO and shutter
speed are set to the same number.
The sunny f16 rule also has a
few extra advantages. Most
lenses have a “sweet spot” be-
tween f8 and f16 where the
colour and sharpness of the lens
is at its best. Most lenses —
even expensive ones — tend to
be softer at extreme apertures.
Sunny f16 is also useful if the
shooting conditions are fooling
your camera’s light meter. F16
will give your shots a nice depth
of field, which is perfect for land-
scape photography .
Happy Shooting.
Send David a message at
davidsmeaton@gmail.com or visit
his website at www.david-
smeaton.com. If you want to be a
part of the weekly Photo Challenge,
join the “Seoul Photo Club” group at
flickr (flickr.com/groups/seoulpho-
toclub). — Ed.