Hwang Yoon-hee, a 24-year-old in her final semester at a university, had a definite plan for her future: graduate school, followed by a career working with an international organization. But her determination wavered a bit when she got a call from "Madame Tu."
"She offered me a man of wealth to meet with," Hwang said. "Such chances come very rarely."
As South Koreans try to strike a balance between traditional arranged marriages and the newer trend of marrying for love, the country has seen rising numbers of Madame Tus -- the slang for female entrepreneurs in the lucrative matchmaking field.
Matchmaking in South Korea has grown into a 50 billion won (US$49.3 million) business, a 20 percent growth since the late 1990s. The number of small and large private agencies -- including Madame Tus -- has increased to more than 1,000.
The industry is a mix of tradition and modern values. It allows young people to avoid having parents choose a mate, but still recognizes the importance of family background, social status and a mate's earning power. And it takes into account good looks and compatibility -- and the hope that love will blossom.
With the help of Madame Tus and matchmaking firms, many find their partners with less hassle.
Jo Hyung-joon, who works at a computer consulting company, is now selecting a company to find his ideal wife.
"My colleagues suggested I contact a company and meet girls from there," said Jo, 26. "I have such limited time to see even my friends ... and knowing that I'm slightly picky, I think matchmaking counselors will be a great help."
In June, Kim Young-hwan and Moon Jae-in married after meeting the previous November through DUO, the largest South Korean matchmaking company with 20,000 men and women registered as "members."
The company said their vows marked the 10,000th marriage arranged by DUO.
Kim, 30, and his 29-year-old bride praised marriage consultant Song Young-lae for encouraging them to keep looking for the right person.
"We thank Song from the bottom of our hearts for cheering us up whenever we wanted to give up," the couple, both company workers, said in an interview posted on the DUO Web site.
DUO, citing privacy concerns, refused to provide contacts for the couple.
Not everyone, however, can use these matchmaking services to find their special someone.
Kim Joo-kwan, who has a disabled leg, filed a suit a year ago against the two biggest matchmaking companies, DUO and Sunoo, for refusing to take him as a client. Kim, set to begin working as a lawyer in February, says he was outraged to see discrimination in the companies' membership qualifications.
"I called them up and asked whether I could be accepted, but they refused, citing their standards," he said.
"This is against the basic human right of equality and against our law," he said.
In August, South Korea's National Human Rights Commission urged the matchmaking firms to revise membership qualifications.
Most South Korean matchmaking companies do not accept the disabled, bald men, women considered unattractive and people without a university degree.
"These restrictions should not be interpreted as discrimination," said Lee Min-hee, a spokeswoman for DUO. "Even if we accept these people, they are wasting their money ... for others would avoid them."
"It is commonly known that these companies grade their applicants with numbers," adds Lee Yun-suk, a professor of urban sociology at the University of Seoul. Women get more points for looks, while for men it's their job.
Being a business school graduate or lawyer earns special treatment by the agencies, but such people can also be asked to pay twice as much as ordinary clients.
At DUO, for example, "Nobles" class membership for a year costs about 1,590,000 won (US$1,600) for men and 2,150,000 won (US$2,100) for women.
Women pay more because having a successful husband is considered an important factor for one's social standing, just as having a good job is for men.
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
‘ABSURD MISTAKE’: The election commission said that there had been a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations ran short of ballot papers South Korean riot police yesterday cleared protesters from a Seoul polling station after a 35-hour blockade sparked by a shortage of ballot papers during local elections earlier this week. Wednesday’s election was the first nationwide vote since South Korean President Lee Jae-myung took office following the ouster of Yoon Suk-yeol over his short-lived martial law declaration. Lee’s ruling Democratic Party swept most races, but failed to flip the crucial Seoul mayoral seat. The South Korean National Election Commission apologized, blaming a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations in Seoul ran short of ballot papers. Some polling stations stayed open until 10pm to
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
RSS