Lesson #1 Learned While in Korea: For Filipinas Who Want to Marry Koreans

I want to say to Filipinas who dream of marrying Korean men: “Think again!” Why? Not because Korean men, more than other nationalities, make bad husbands. Inherent in an international marriage is the compounded risk for miscommunication and misunderstanding owing to very different cultures and cultural definitions and expectations of husband and wife roles in the family. The Korean definition of the role of wife is so tough and demanding, and I am afraid that generally Filipinas will have a hard time and in many cases fail to fully satisfy the Korean husband’s and his family’s expectations, resulting in disappointments, or worse, in the break-up of marriage. On a basic level, miscommunication can be due to the fact that the Filipina wife most probably does not speak Korean and the husband does not speak English. How can the “union of souls” take place in such a situation as this?

I believe the situation is urgent because I see many Filipinas enter into this kind of marriage without, first, really knowing the facts and hence, second, preparing themselves for the consequences. How can they know the facts when match-making agencies, in their desire for profits, lie to Filipinas about the profile of these Korean men looking for foreign wives? For instance, these match-making agencies will never inform potential wives that this particular Korean man is mentally or physically or emotionally handicapped. Instead, they will say that this or that Korean man has much money and has a good job, when in reality he has no money and is dependent on his mother for subsistence. I personally know a Filipina who was so shocked to find that the Korean that she had married actually is a Mama’s boy, controlled by the mom and had no mental and financial abilities to be independent. He had no house of his own and they had to live in the property of the Korean parents. She suffered a lot in this situation because her mother-in-law was so controlling; she felt so choked. The mother-in-law suffered too because the Filipina was so hard to bring under “full control.” Guess the outcome: divorce, and in this particular case it was initiated and pushed by the mother-in-law.

The blame must not be heaped on the Korean side only. One reason why there are Filipinas who marry foreigners from developed countries is the desire to escape poverty from back home. This desire is not bad. But it is bad if it becomes the motivating factor for marrying a foreigner. I’m reminded of a Filipina who is now divorced from her Korean husband. She didn’t want to divorce him, but he couldn’t live with her anymore. So he initiated and pushed for the dissolution of their marriage. His main problem with her was, she wasn’t devoted to him; she only wanted to earn money and send it to her family in the Philippines. He felt that she just used the marriage as a way to get visa to enter Korea to find work here and earn money. The court sided with him and did not require him to compensate the Filipina for damages.

While I discourage marriage with Koreans if that marriage is arranged and mediated by match-making agencies, there are exceptions. I myself have an international marriage, my wife being a foreigner as well. The key here is, marriage must be built on the foundation of love, faith, and mutual acceptance and trust. The couple therefore must have enough time to know each other’s backgrounds and cultures. In this process, they can confront crucial differences and be challenged to accept and adjust to each other. Given these healthy ingredients, I believe, and in my personal experience, an international marriage can be very rewarding, fun, and pose a lot of adventures for both the husband and wife.