On Korean TV programs, we can easily find foreigners broadcasting. Korea, a racially homogeneous country is changing into a multicultural nation.

The number of people who marry women from Southeast Asia or China is increasing. According to a survey, about 12.8% of men marry women from overseas. The women are mainly from China and Vietnam. Especially, the rate of international marriages with Vietnamese is drastically rising. Because brokers of international marriage make a business of bridging connection between Southeast Asian female and Korea male.

However, the idea of immigrating for international marriage is not highly praised. Our prejudice, discrimination against the immigrants for international marriages and absence of a firm system make the situation hard for them to live in Korea. In western society, it is obvious that the whites discriminate against the colored while the oriental people are also discriminate against other oriental people in Asian society.

The problem of an international marriage in Korea is that women, immigrants for marriage, cannot adjust themselves to Korean society. Although their culture is similar in terms of geographical features, unfamiliarity with Korean language, circumstance and other people causes suffering. The only person to help them overcome this is a husband or the husband’s family. However, they often have a hard time helping them as they face language barriers. This problem affects their children. The foreign mothers hold responsibilities for their children. In fact, at the educational institution for immigrants founded in Ansan, Guri, Namyangju and Suwon, many immigrants’ children have difficulty in communicating with their mothers. Furthermore, they cannot understand simple idioms. In consequence, when going on to a kindergarten or a primary school, they become the pest to their classmates and suffer racial discrimination.

The problem shows that there is no end in sight. Nevertheless, specific solutions and systems are not properly made out yet. Fortunately, the number of charity organizations that help the immigrants to adapt themselves to new circumstance is increasing. ‘Multi-culture lover community (www.dalove.or.kr)’ is one of the representative charity organizations. The community makes people to recognize their problems, hardship and ways to settle down in Korea. Specifically, they teach Korean and cultural differences from their homeland. They also provide a mentoring service to pay deeper attention to their personal problems. Recently, the system of Korea toward immigrants for international marriage has been changed. Previously, they could automatically obtain Korean nationality after 2 years from marriage registration. However, in 2009 they should pass the test of naturalization to acquire ROK nationality. This system will encourage the immigrant wives to put more effort into adjusting themselves to Korean culture. As an IT powerful country in Korea, the Internet has become a necessity for life and Internet education has become an essential part of Korean culture, which may sound a little unfamiliar to them. Online education is performed through few educational institutions to foreign wives and children, and they are satisfied so far.

First, to have a multi-cultural society in Korea, our attitude of acceptance toward other cultures should be changed. Acceptance of multi-culture changes foreigners’ negative view toward us. This attitude could remove ill feeling and protests that have recently taken place in several Asian countries. In addition, in this Korean age, foreign residents are now close to a million. Figures suggest a melting pot of various races, like New York City, could be seen in Korea very soon. However, I doubt if our opinions have been changed much with these external changes. We should also consider the immigrants’ human rights and think about our perspectives toward them. Have you experienced racial discrimination abroad? If you have, how did you feel? If you have experienced it, then you would not recklessly want to segregate in Korea

A single ethnic group and multi-cultural society could sound strange to many of us. However, this is an unavoidable phenomenon, which we should overcome to form a multi-cultural society. To achieve the goal, people should remove prejudice toward immigrant wives who marry Korean men but rather encourage them to adjust themselves in Korean culture.