Foreigners Appreciate Safety of Streets

This is the first in a series of articles highlighting the 10 Most Wonderful Things about Korea.

By Jon Huer
Korea Times Columnist

``Fifty Wonders of Korea,'' one of those publicity works by an oddly-named office called "Korean Spirit and Culture Promotion Project,'' was published here in recent years.

The ``50 Wonders'' literature, presumably showing Korea's proudest achievements, lists "Invention of Moveable Metal Type," "Invention of Lead-Based Type," The World's Oldest Woodblock Print," and so on. Down the list at number ten is the "Golden Crowns of Silla," followed by "Golden Earrings of Silla," "The Sarira Reliquary of Kamunsa Temple," and so on. The list goes on with other relics of Korea's past culture, such as "Joseon Ceramics."

These are the ``50 Wonders of Korea"? The 50 greatest things about Korea? World tourists would flock to Korea to see the first lead-based type and the world's oldest woodblock print? Or the gold crowns? Or the Sarira Reliquary of Kamunsa Temple?

I decided to save Korea's tourism and started thinking about its "Greatest Wonders" that would have other nations envying and wishing they had them. This was an easy process, as we simply counted the reasons why we like living here. For drama's sake, I decided to keep the wonders to 10. The first in our own selection follows:

SAFE STREETS

One of the most deeply felt comments from Americans living in Korea, especially those visitors with children, is on how safe Korea is from crime and delinquency. Travelers know how few places in the world are truly safe from dangerous criminals as well as from pesky hucksters, which only increases their appreciation for Korea's safety. This is one of Korea's greatest national treasures that neither money nor force can produce. True, Korean society is changing and so is this great treasure of safety on the streets, and someday this safety haven might just become a memory. Still, Korea is one of the few nations where street safety is a most precious national asset.

With rare exceptions, most foreigners, most of the time, feel ― and are ― absolutely safe in Korea, both in the city and in the country. For most visitors, an encounter with the excessively inebriated is the extent of their experience with anything resembling deviation from perfectly safe streets.
What makes this treasure of safety in Korea so wonderful and endearing is that it is part of ``natural'' Korea. Neither severe laws, nor soldiers, nor policemen are prominently involved in making Korea safe. Street safety, and the safe feeling that foreigners have on Korean streets, is part of Korea itself. Indeed, it is one of Korea's greatest national assets that few foreigners seem to appreciate enough.

Sure, even in Korea, there are the ungainly scenes of protesters and riot police in conflict, public drunkenness, and sights of urban blight, just as in most societies. But Korean society, for all practical purposes, is remarkably crime-free and street-safe. For a nation of close to 50 million people in a small space with a thriving ``anything-goes'' economy and culture, this fact is truly one of the greatest blessings for Korea as a nation.

Contrast Korea with images of Thailand or Hong Kong. Both are havens of tourism, and Korea nowhere near matches their success in that regard. But Korea is far superior to either in terms of street safety. Singapore or Japan can match Korea in terms of safety, but both are very repressive societies. In Singapore, every violation is severely punished or threatened with punishment by the government, and in Japan, a very closed society, almost xenophobic nationalism is at work to keep the nation safe.

Without measures of a repressive government, without constant threats of punishment, without national xenophobia, yet with a dynamic society and affluent culture, Korea's safe environment and psychology are truly one of the greatest wonders in the world, which is all the more reason for great celebration. Just on native shame and personal conscience, Korea has accomplished the nearly impossible. Other Wonderful Thing About Korea are:

(2) The sweetness and charitable disposition of Korean women over 60.

(3) Korea's countryside people's unique attitude to foreigners. Visiting the Korean countryside, foreigners can find true Korea and Koreans before these disappear into distant memories.

(4) The famous Korean fighting spirit is among their greatest traits, refusing to accept fate or impossibility. The Korean heart seethes at what it considers injustice.

(5) Spontaneity is one of Korea's most endearing cultural traits ― it knows neither formality nor propriety. Koreans settle anywhere anytime to get a roadside party started; they throw down a mat, and spread out food as eating, drinking and dancing to follow.

(6) One of Korea's greatest treasures is a group of songs called ``Lyrical Songs of Korea.'' Mostly composed during the Japanese colonial rule, they include the ever-popular ``Bongseonhwa,'' ``Gago-pa,'' ``Bahwi-gohgae'' and ``Yet-dong-san,'' to name just a few among the most famous.

(7) Someone once called Koreans the ``Irish of the East'' for their sense of humor and gaiety. Korean's sense of humor, one of their greatest tribal gifts, is not the witty or sophisticated kind. It is utterly coarse, ribald and lowbrow. By being so unrefined and vulgar, Korean humor is perhaps the most precious window into Korea's true soul.

(8) Loosely translated into English as ``traditional Korean narrative song'' or ``classical one-person dramatic opera,'' pansori, or its shortened from sori, is regarded by many as Korea's greatest folk treasure.

(9) The way the lower-class are treated, sociologically speaking, is one of the most interesting and uniquely intriguing things in Korea that casts Koreans in a different light. Koreans are extraordinarily forgiving toward those less-fortunate than themselves.

(10) Most English teachers in Korea may not agree but Korea's ability to create new English words and concepts, contrary to the purist concept of English, is one of Korea's noteworthy achievements.

johnhuer@hotmail.com