Episode 4: Lies

By Wade Xiang

This episode begins with a recall of the name of an acquaintance that attended the wedding. On April 1st, 1994, Najeong worked as a substitute for her parents and did housework at home alone. Chilbong found Najeong cute when she spoke dialect. Najeong is touched by Sseuregi's kindness after an exhausting day and visits his room to confess her feelings. At the end, the time returns to 2013 and Najeong called out her husband’s name, but all 5 men sitting on the sofa looked at her.

In this episode, everyone found out that Chilbong’s parents were divorced. This quickly caused Najeong, Haetae, and Samcheonpo, who are not from Seoul, to be surprised. In their mind, divorce barely happens. Chilbong is the first person from divorce family they met. In their provinces, the couples are supposed to live with each other until they die. While in Seoul, the phenomenon of divorce is not rare (Ep 4, 10:58 - 12:28). These phenomena showed that in the 1990s, South Korea people living in cities began to think about marriage differently from rural people. Another fact is, in the 1990s, the divorce rate in South Korea began to rise significantly. Scholars have found that the annual number of divorces per 1000 population in south Korea increased more than twofold in 1998 and nearly threefold in 2003 in comparison to 1.1 in 1990 (Shim et al 2013, 580). The high elevated divorced statistic even made South Korea ranked third highest among the Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development (OECD) (Chung and Emery 2010). In addition to Sseuregi's mention of the change of the time period, it is not difficult to conclude that people’s perspectives towards divorce in 1990s was undergoing tremendous changes.

Besides, divorce had a huge impact on the child. Going back to the third episode, Chilbong was struggling to go to his mother’s new wedding during the whole time. He got mad with his mother’s remarriage and argued with her (Ep 3 45:50 - 46:06). In this case, it affects the relationship between the mother and the child.

Usually, children from divorced families tend to be more introverted. This happens because they witness the bad relationship between their parents for a long period of time. For example, the quarrel that happens between parents that will scare the children. This tends to happen to younger children. However, divorce can also have a positive impact on the child. In this drama, Chilbong learned to be more independent when his parents are divorced. He barely goes back home because of his mother’s remarriage. The Shinchon boarding home was becoming more like his home. Chilbong was not hugely affected by the divorce. He is not introverted, instead, he socializes well. He even became the ace of his baseball team.

Marriage might also change the idea of marriage to the children. Showing them that marriage is actually an unhappy thing to do. It might cause them to not believe in love as they slowly grow older.

Word count: 415

Here are some questions to think about:

Why do you think that divorce was first accepted in Seoul than in the rural city?
Do you think that the disadvantage of divorce weighs more to the children or the advantage weighs more?

Bibliography:

Chung, Yeonok, and Robert Emery. "Early Adolescents and Divorce in South Korea: Risk, Resilience and Pain." Journal of Comparative Family Studies 41, no. 5 (2010): 855-70

Shim, Hyunjoo, Insuk Choi, and Bailey L. Ocker. "Divorce in South Korea: An Introduction to Demographic Trends, Culture, and Law." Family Court Review 51, no. 4 (2013): 578-90.