By Hyon O’Brien
Korea Times
May 16, 2008
When the feminist movement (also known as Women’s Liberation or Women’s Movement) storm was gathering in the United States in the 1960s, many companies began to target women as a distinct group of consumers for their products.
One of the most successful was Philip Morris, which introduced a new extra-thin cigarette called Virginia Slims in 1968 and saturated the nation with the slogan “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby.” Some media watch groups regard this highly effective Virginia Slims marketing campaign to be responsible for a rapid increase in smoking among teenage girls.
I have never smoked. So this slogan didn’t achieve its hidden agenda of persuading me to equate smoking with liberation or as a declaration of women’s equality to men. Fortunately I don’t have to smoke to know that. However, the catchy phrase has stuck in my vocabulary and I think of it often. I use it frequently t to compliment people’s progress and achievement in a light joking way.
Korea gets this every day from me: “Hey, Korea, you’ve come a long way, baby.”
In 2005 when I visited Brasilia to see a friend in the Korean diplomatic service, I learned of an intriguing method of arranging the location of the embassies. In 1960, when the Brazilian government moved its capital officially from Rio de Janeiro to Brasilia some 1,148 km (713 miles) inland, many embassies took their time relocating to the new and not very exciting site.
To give them an incentive to move, the government (so I am told) allocated a piece of land to each country to build an embassy and ambassador’s residence. The order in which embassies were lined up was according to the per capita GDP at that time.
The layout of the city was in the shape of an airplane (architect Oscar Niemeyer’s concept). The pilot seat was occupied by the three branches of the Brazilian government and the wings were for foreign missions. The right side of the wing was for the developed countries and the left side for the developing or underdeveloped countries.
So the Korean embassy and ambassador’s residence was located on the left side far behind those of many other countries, reflecting its meager economic status of 45 years ago. For instance, I noticed that the embassy of the Philippines was much closer to the center than Korea, reflecting its higher GDP at the time. Yes, Korea, you’ve come a long way, baby!
I’d like to give Korea a pat on the back (if Korea has a back) for many brilliant improvements and advances. At the top of the list is the wonderful transformation from the primitive public toilets of my youth to the world-class toilets that one finds (almost) everywhere in Korea today.
We even have a city, Suwon, that promotes its wonderful public toilets for people to visit as tourist attractions. One of them is a house in the shape of a toilet. I know I will miss these clean, well-designed, readily available public facilities when I return to the amenity-challenged United States.
The second is the amazing extent of cultural programs available for the public. I am constantly impressed by the festivals Korea puts on each year, celebrating everything from red pepper and garlic to bamboo and mud! Numerous world-class performing artists appearing in Korea attest to the arrival of Korea on the global stage.
The other month it was awesome to sit in the audience to listen to the New York Philharmonic Orchestra playing Beethoven the day after its historic appearance in Pyongyang. The other day we had an occasion to marvel at the superb a capella singing of the Norwegian chorus Schola Cantorum, visiting from Oslo.
Another cultural offering that has become abundant in Korea is museums. Our biannual fund-raising house tour for Friends of Love (www.friends.co.kr) last month included a stop at an owl museum in Samcheong-dong, where 2,000 or more owls were on display. Last fall, we paid a visit to a museum entirely devoted to locks.
One of our acquaintances owns a museum exclusively devoted to world jewelry. These boutique museums are small and focused on one theme. Other major museums, the National Museum of Korea (currently its special exhibition is “The Glory of Persia”), the Leeum Samsung Museum of Art, Ho Am Art Museum, Seoul Museum of Art, History Museum, War Memorial Museum (its exhibit on the Dead Sea Scrolls will be on until June 7, 2008) and many others are all delightful places to visit to widen our minds.
According to an American psychologist, Abraham Maslow (1908-1970)’s theory of hierarchy of needs presented in 1943 in his paper, “A Theory of Human Motivation,” cultural needs are the last needs people feel, coming into play only after the basic needs (physiological needs, safety needs, love / belonging needs, and esteem) have been met. If that is the case, Koreans have way passed the point of lower level of needs some time ago and arrived at the area of highest needs. Bravo, Korea. You’ve come a long way, baby!
However, I caution against complacency. I think Korea has miles to go before it can truly be qualified to be a world-class country in every sense. The top of my list for Koreans to improve is obeying all traffic rules. Some of my Western friends joke that a red light in Korea is a mere suggestion.
The shock of cars moving even with red light is beyond cultural shock. It is a matter of safety. Pedestrians have to be always alert for a possible car zooming by ignoring the light. Ubiquitous riders of motorcycles and bicycles for deliveries on sidewalks are also extremely hazardous and backward.
Another annoying thing is how people enter subway trains, buses and elevators before others have time to get off. And I have to mention people loudly using their hand phones (cellular phones / mobiles) everywhere.
Once we had to suffer through one hour of listening to a young man calling everyone under the sun during our ride from the Incheon International Airport to downtown Seoul oblivious of others riding the airport bus with him (now that they are talking about allowing cell phones to be used on airplanes, I shudder to think of the noise we will have to endure on the long haul to the United States).
Yes, Korea, you’ve come a long way, baby. Let’s also remember that you have miles to go to get the prize.
Hyon O’ Brien, a former reference librarian in the United States, has returned to Korea after 32 years of living abroad. She can be reached at hyonobrien@gmail.com.