Jamerican Queen on Being “Beautiful” in Korea

Hey guys I am new to BB & W.  I follow Christelyn on YT and relayed that I have been a stalker of this site for a couple of weeks :))  She told me to come on over 4 real.  Just wanted to comment on this article.  I am retired military and was stationed in Osan Korea back in 89'.  While there I was routinely stopped and told "you so beautiful".  I think many foreign nations are so used to lies that others tell them that they are shocked to see myths shattered in person.  I had a couple of young Korean military guys hit on me, however at that time it was rare to see a black woman & asian man.  Fast forward to my last tour in 2006 in the capital city Seoul, I saw a good number of black women and asian men.  This probably has something to do with the "military effect".   

Had to create account to thank you for the blog.  Great post  the beautiful comments reminded me of the day I spent in Busan waiting for the Rain concert to start @ BEXCO.  Several events going on that day and a few men walked up to me and said i was beautiful and they liked my eyes.  Comments caught me off guard really not expecting that but it put a smile on my face.

I think the difficulties that may face BW  when it comes to love in Korea are *cultural* rather than *racial.* BW shouldn't export whatever racial view of the world we've inherited from American culture to the rest of the world since our history is unique and a big part of why we have a tendency to think about everything in race terms...

There are Koreans as dark or darker than AA, but in general they value white skin (not necessarily white people)  and it's thought to be more desirable. But I don't know that, that preference would extend to non-Koreans. Koreans also think of themselves as 'one race' and believe they are a pure bloodline so any foreigner is already considered different. (These are generalities of course) I think what would matter more than race since you're already a foreigner is class. Class is much more overtly apparent and dominant social factor in Korea than in the US where millionaires walk around in jeans and black turtlenecks (ala the late Steve Jobs). I think education, career/job title and wealth or potential for wealth are more important than just being brown or not. White women have as many potential cultural issues over there also since we're all foreign to them. I would say most of their racial issues are with Southeast Asians (who are often darker in skin tone) who come to work in Korea in lower paying jobs or who come as brides for men out in the countryside. Koreans and Japanese people also have a lot of animosity towards each other and see each other as different races...the Chinese think they are all Han people though -read: Chinese, crazy, but I digress.

That being said, Korea specifically is not a bastion of multiculturalism. Black people are exotic and Koreans don't necessarily know the kinds of things that would be offensive to Black people and especially AA, hence the bizarre and rather common instances of blackface in Korean entertainment, especially in music videos and variety shows. (As an interesting side note though Korean popular music freely references R&B, motown, hip-hop and rap.  Believe it or not, Korean R&B, hip-hop and even rap is some of the best and most creative and entertaining examples of these genres coming out today. Korean popular music is all over itunes and a lot of it is very good.) Koreans are having their own national conversation about race and color etc. (although it's nowhere the level of intensity in the US). This is an interesting video that was made by Koreans for Koreans, but has stirred a lot of conversation on the internet. Ignore the Youtube comments since they are always ignorant.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ave6yOWKlj4

In the end though I think love is personal, between the two people involved and their respective families. If you can make it work with your partner and their family then you guys as a family can deal with society's BS just fine.

Great post and good luck to you in Korea and beyond!  Looks like you are having a ball.

This is really refreshing to hear.  People who don't travel--esp. people in the majority--often assume that tastes are universal.  I was in the Peruvian Amazon when a fellow American traveller, a white male in his fifties, commented that of course the male staff at our lodge were talking to the Swedish girls staying there *hint hint wink wink*.  All I saw was non-flirtatious, staff-to-customer interaction, but he automatically assumed our bartenders would be bowled over by their beauty because HE was.  I just looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language.  And despite what I've heard about blacks' reputation in the Philippines, I had a black girlfriend in college tell me men gushed over here there, including both locals and white European ex-pats.  Some try to turn black women's attractiveness in non-black countries into a negative, snickering that they're only interested in you because they think you're a prostitution.  Well ya know what--blondes in the Middle East have the same reputation!  Anyway I look forward to the day a bw gets to host her own travel show on a major network like PBS or The Travel Channel etc.    

Who's that guy in the picture above? He looks like freaking Superman without the cape.  

 I happened upon a blog by accident which was by a racist for racists. The topic was that black women  were the ugliest of all women and we were being delusional for fighting that fact.They sited statistics etc. to prove that to their bias audience. The author had a picture of Gabrielle Sidibe as an example of what black women called beauty. Needless to say that I have heard enough of that arguement from too many people and it can be demoralizing. So in order to pick my spirits up, I made a google image search of black women. Dare I say that us black women are some damn beautiful set of females. Then I felt so much better :-) The point is there will always be people will play the favourite and the bully. I also did a google search of dark skin women and there are quite a variety of equally beautiful women from all over. In order to feel superior, someone has to be inferior and for some reason being black and a woman is it. It's a myth and a lie. There are ranges of beauty in every shade and colour of women and we are no different. So the fact that people will pick one person to judge a whole group shows ignorance to the Nth degree. Stay beautiful ladies   

Too many black women are made to severely underestimate their unique beauty. Thanks for this post. :)

This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine!!!

LOL...if only Black womben knew the truth!  I lived in a country that's pretty homogeneous (Turkey) and I swear, I felt like a racially ambiguous video girl over there.  Never paid for ANYTHING.  Never opened a door.  Never carried a single bag.  Never felt remotely unsafe.  The men over there ate me up.  I used to walk out of my apartment building and the men sitting outside the cafe across the street would applaud and if my Black American friend was with me, we got a standing ovation, LOL!

Not only were we Black but we were Black AMERICANS.  We would make up dances in the club and folks would instantly start imitating because they just assumed we were the coolest things coming.

People are really invested in making us believe we're not revered.  Just step on out of this bs box for one second...you'll see you've been HAD.

I miss that place!

And all of this is in SOUTH KOREA!!!

Korea, which fancies itself 'The Cleanest Race On Earth', where the South Koreans secretly admire the racial purity found in the DPRK to the north.  Yet, Korean men are telling the author she's beautiful.  

Think long and hard about this.  In the USA, with all of its alleged "diversity" worship, which I call 'crap diversity' because it's all crap, most of the women on this blog are constantly, to the point of weariness, fighting the soul-deadening, life-sucking stereotypes of mule, mammy, sapphire, jezebel and welfare queen just to get through the day to go home, alone, to rest up for another crappy day in a long string into the future of identical days.  Yet, in South Frickin' Korea, you can be beautiful, admired and desired.  

She goes to a resort area in Thailand, teeming with Thai girls, and random French men buy her gifts!  

There's another post today about travel.  Read it if you will, but this one gets to the heart of the matter.  

With things spinning out of control here in the USA and Our Cultural Masters congratulating themselves at the devolution of this once-great nation, which was once, IDK, "The Golden Door" lit by "A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles", into chaos and ruin, you need, nay, must have experiences beyond these shores to truly understand and experience your great worth both to yourself and to the world at large.

You may even find some place you like better and choose to remain there.  In case of further societal meltdown here in the USA, it could become your refuge, your new home.

[I really natter on, don't I?  Well, back to dictation and seeing patients]

I couldn't agree with this post more. No one has the right to tell you who you should marry, which ethnic group you should stick to, blah blah blah. You live your own life, so go out there and experience it for yourself. And isn't the source of this website to really get black women to stop having society tell them who, what, when, where, and why their life to the max? Instead, we should roam about with open minds and see the world for what it really is.

This is what I tell people all of the time. To most its not about race but about social class but we equate that with race in this country. When I was in Italy, I was hit on by Pakistani and Indian men--one Indian man that I was Indian too, still trying to wrap my brain around that one--what we go through in the States honestly and in most case are the walls we ourselves put up. Let it go and go with the flow, you'd be surprised..

Nice post.

Daniel Henney!

That man is gorgeous

Excellent observations!  I was stationed in Korea when I was in the Navy and had a ton of female Korean friends.  The men weren't as open to saying anything to me but a few came up to me wanting to practice their English and I did get a few stares.  I went to an expat Lutheran church in Seoul so I met a lot of Korean men there who were very open and friendly.  And yes, you are correct in that Korean women keep their family name when they get married (but go from "Miss" to "Mrs." in title) but, in this day and age, we, as American women, don't have to "lose" our family name.  I am married and kept my maiden name.  My sister hyphenated.