love in asia

even if i live here in korea, i don’t watch a lot of korean shows… when i first came i thought i’d enjoy all the dramas shown on the three terrestrial channels… unfortunately, they don’t have subtitles and i’m not very fluent in korean… it isn’t that enjoyable to watch tv here… luckily, we have cable but even that is not enough since most channels are in korean anyway… i’m usually tuned in to discovery, AFN, onStyle and RealTV… we don’t have HBO, Cinemax, CNN, nor Arirang in our cable!…
anyway, i do watch a few korean shows… not regularly, though… some of them that i like are “love in asia”, “solomon’s choice” and a weekly drama show about divorce…
“love in asia” is hosted by ms. yang mi kyung (of “dae jang geum”/”jewel in the palace”) and shin young il… it is about korean-asian couples (like my husband and i)… i truly enjoy this show because it gives us an insight on the lives of other asians married to koreans… truly, it is not an easy thing to be married to a korean… like they say, you don’t only marry your husband but his family (nuclear and extended) as well… plus discrimination towards mixed koreans do exist here in korea…
there are some who are very cynical about interracial marriages… specially now that korea is richer than a lot of asian countries, the philippines included… there are times when it is assumed that asians marry koreans to live comfortably… well, the show has proven that it is not always the case… one time, i saw an episode of a bangladeshi girl whose family owns a garments factory in her home country… and another one of a kyrgyzstani who obviously is well-off in her home country…
in the program, they interview the couple and the kids and show the lives of the family of the non-korean spouse… they also tackle the joys and hardships faced by an interracial family in korea…
the show is broadcast on saturdays at 5:10 in the afternoon on KBS1… VODs are available on their homepage