The Korean Way (7): underground moves
The woman is quickly winding her way around the standing passengers in the subway car, placing small, printed cards on the lap of everyone sitting. Then she makes her second round, picking up the cards again. From a couple of the commuters she gets some coins or a 1000 won note, about one US dollar. She leaves a pack of sugar-free chewing gum in exchange. She is not begging. Begging is only for the ones that are really down on their luck, those who have hit the bottom, hard. She is selling chewing-gum, and still a part of the Korean society. But most of the travellers are sleeping, or talking on their "handypones". She changes to the next car, her backpack still almost full of chewing-gum packets.
The woman is deaf mute, but most of the travelling sales persons you see in the subway of Seoul are just poor and out of work. Some are housewives (ajummas), trying to scrape together the money needed to pay for the extra tutoring for their kids (a major expense for a lot of parents) or just to make ends met for the family, living costs being what they are in Korea.
And the people that buy their stuff still remember how it was during the economic crisis years 1997–1998, when hundreds of thousands of Koreans suddenly found themselves without jobs, and a lot of them without houses or apartments to live in.
Most Koreans remember how it is to be poor, so nobody seems upset when the next seller of toys comes aboard at the next station: this time it is a spinning top, flashing in all sorts of colours. They, the sellers, also have to make a living. Our friend F always buys something from the sales persons. She has a good heart, and as she says: "To do what they are doing, they really have to need the money".
A city is more than anything else defined by its public transport. The subway is the blood system, pumping life through the different parts of the city, joining suburbs with the downtown shopping and business areas, modern luxurious neighbourhoods with older, poorer blocks.
The Seoul subway is excellent, and it needs to be. Korea is an almost totally urbanised society. According to the latest figures, more than 80 percent of Koreans live in cities (including suburbs), about the same level as North America. In Europe the number of city dwellers varies between 77 and 89 percent.
As in most rapidly urbanised countries, the emotional connection with the countryside is strong. The family farm, or the land owned by the clan, is a powerful image even for people living in small, crowded apartments – maybe even stronger because of that. Nature is important, and luckily the subway can take you there.
In our subway car, the sales person trying to peddle step counters made in China is replaced by a blind person with a harmonica, then comes a preacher (the risk of being jumped by an aggressive catholic missionary is higher in Korea than almost everywhere else), then a plump woman with a boom-box wailing rather awful Korean pop covers, selling CD:s, then a thin. nervous-looking man selling batteries... life goes on.
The woman is deaf mute, but most of the travelling sales persons you see in the subway of Seoul are just poor and out of work. Some are housewives (ajummas), trying to scrape together the money needed to pay for the extra tutoring for their kids (a major expense for a lot of parents) or just to make ends met for the family, living costs being what they are in Korea.
And the people that buy their stuff still remember how it was during the economic crisis years 1997–1998, when hundreds of thousands of Koreans suddenly found themselves without jobs, and a lot of them without houses or apartments to live in.
Most Koreans remember how it is to be poor, so nobody seems upset when the next seller of toys comes aboard at the next station: this time it is a spinning top, flashing in all sorts of colours. They, the sellers, also have to make a living. Our friend F always buys something from the sales persons. She has a good heart, and as she says: "To do what they are doing, they really have to need the money".
A city is more than anything else defined by its public transport. The subway is the blood system, pumping life through the different parts of the city, joining suburbs with the downtown shopping and business areas, modern luxurious neighbourhoods with older, poorer blocks.
The Seoul subway is excellent, and it needs to be. Korea is an almost totally urbanised society. According to the latest figures, more than 80 percent of Koreans live in cities (including suburbs), about the same level as North America. In Europe the number of city dwellers varies between 77 and 89 percent.
As in most rapidly urbanised countries, the emotional connection with the countryside is strong. The family farm, or the land owned by the clan, is a powerful image even for people living in small, crowded apartments – maybe even stronger because of that. Nature is important, and luckily the subway can take you there.
In our subway car, the sales person trying to peddle step counters made in China is replaced by a blind person with a harmonica, then comes a preacher (the risk of being jumped by an aggressive catholic missionary is higher in Korea than almost everywhere else), then a plump woman with a boom-box wailing rather awful Korean pop covers, selling CD:s, then a thin. nervous-looking man selling batteries... life goes on.
posted by Pelle at Wednesday, May 03, 2006
2 Comments:
We just get "volare" sung by a guy with a guitar accompanied by his companion with a tambourine. The other day I took the metro 4 times and 3 times he was in my carriage and the 4th I could hear him in the next one... Mind you, today we had a guy with an accordeon instead, I have often wondered whether they co-ordinate their plans or what would happen if 2 "entertainers" were to target the same carriage!
I can imagine F buying stuff, she is such a nice person.
Just a couple of things I thought about while reading your article.. There are basically different types of people making money on the subway. The first are sellers. Those people selling umbrellas, batteries... are obviously not beggars, but not as poor as F. thinks. For them, selling something on the subway is not different from selling something on the street or even in a store. I saw a documentary once on TV about those subway retailers, and I was surprised that quite a few people do buy things from them. You may have realised that they change their selling items regularly so (those same) people can buy different things. They are on buses (especially buses to suburbs) as well. I know some friends of mine who wait for those sellers because they cannot get the same item from ordinary shops.
Then there are people between beggars and sellers. They are either doing something for charity, old ladies, not so old ladies with babies on their back, children or handicapped. There is a kind of rules to these beggars. Chewing gums are for old ladies (used to be for young children). Everyone knows the price of chewing gum from them is at least 1,000won. She leaves chewing gum on the lap every person and collects them later. There are also old ladies selling chocolates at 2,000 in bars (better margin than gums I guess). You encounter these ladies nearly every time you go out for drinks where a lot of Koreans are. For example, when I was a univ student, I met the same old lady for 10 years selling chocolates in bars.
Those people who leave a message on your lap can sell something or simply ask you to give money to them.
I think it all began from the fact that Korean people are emotional, and attaching a story into your selling obviously is good for the biz. But these stories all became too common, and Koreans don't trust these people any more. How could a message from 100 different people be the same??? (I am a mother of this baby. I was poor but had tried to make a happy home, but my husband has this disease. I do not have any money for him, nor for this baby.) 20~30 years ago, there were so many stories (and convictions) that gangsters used young children to beg on the streets and selling chewing gums. The money goes directly to these gangsters. I am sure there are innocent cases, but you don't know which ones.
Oh, about these religious people, they are not catholics. For some reason, catholic is a religion which is reserved and does not shout in public. It is usually protestants who shout everywhere. (even as a Protestant, I am fed up with them.)
I have to say, I don't buy many things from them just as I don't pick up any promotional cards that ajummas distribute at subway stations. I sometimes give money to beggars, but as a Korean living in Seoul, I want the city to be less bothering. I am afraid that by buying something from these people, I feed the system of having subway retailers. BTW, it is strictly illegal to sell anything on the subway.
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