Korea

            It was only June but the weather was already hot. Just walking around made me sweat like crazy. Despite of the hot weather, Andy, Sumin and I were excited to see the homeless shelter where we were going to volunteer at. It took us about an hour to get there from where we stayed. Interestingly enough, I have never realized that Seoul was such a big city even when I lived in Korea. It was not the same place I used to know.

            When we got to the closest subway station to the homeless shelter, I called the shelter. However, the man who answered the phone was not aware of our arrival. The man said that we had to wait since the shelter is a restricted area; therefore, we waited as we were having lunch together. After the lunch, we decided to just walk toward the direction where we thought the shelter would be.

            We walked about 30 minutes but we could not find the place. Finally, I found a police officer and asked him where the shelter was located. My question, however, made the officer confused.

“I never heard that there is a homeless shelter around this area. Let me ask the police station.” The officer pulled his waki talky out and asked about the homeless shelter. Unfortunately, no one could tell us the location.

We had to walk aimlessly for another 5 minutes. All of sudden, a car came by and stopped right in front of me.

            “Are you Issac?” The driver asked.

            “Yes.” I answered without knowing what was going on.

“Come this way.” The driver parked his car right next to a building we were standing by and started walking inside a narrow alley.

The driver was the director of the homeless shelter. He led us to his office and made us seat down around a round table. We briefly introduced ourselves and started talking about homelessness in Korea.

            According to the director, the homeless people got their attention around 1997 when Korea went through IMF financial crisis. The government forced people to make shelters to take care of the homeless. As the economy got better, people began to forget about the homeless people and now there are not many shelters available for the homeless. Even Chun-ae homeless shelter was going through hard times.

            The director told us people’s perspectives on the homeless people. Out of many things he told us, I learned something interesting: the reason there were no signs and no one knew about the place is land price. Due to NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) effect, people do not want such facilities like the homeless shelter.  

            From the conversation with the director, overall, I got an impression that the biggest problem with Korean homelessness is people’s misunderstood and judgmental perspectives on the homeless people. Most of people usually look down on the homeless; however, it seems like Koreans almost despise the homeless people. We are only at our beginning process of learning. Hopefully, thing will be much more clarified for us.  

Issac Won