Recently one of my close friends in Korea, Shooter, decided to leave the country after a couple of years here. He loved it here, he had a great job and a ton of friends, and never had any trouble getting attention from women when he went out. So why did he decide to leave? Why did he decide to go back to being jobless in the states living with his parents?
Because of a breakup.
This young, good-looking, and otherwise happy guy had a girlfriend here for the better part of two years, and when they broke up he lost it and left. I knew the girl and she was a pretty cool chick, but certainly not worth losing your mind over and making huge life decisions. So this begs the question: What made this happen? How can this fate be avoided? It’s very simple really.
Don’t get too invested in the Korean women you date.
The worst part for Shooter was that the breakup was caused because she found out about his side piece… That he had also been seeing for more than a year. That made him doubly vulnerable because unless your frame is rock solid, breaking up with someone after that amount of time dating can easily unhinge a man.
The problem with becoming emotionally invested in Korean women is that they will never return that investment to you. You will always be a foreigner, no matter how long you live here, and they will always treat you like a fling. This also goes for foreign women here, if you choose to go down that path.
99% of all foreigners that come to Korea will leave at some time to return to their home country, and the Korean girls know that. They natively understand that you are not from here, you don’t belong here, and you never will. And think about it from their perspective – If you met an exchange student while you were in college and started hooking up, would you treat it like a fun fling or like marriage material? Of course it would just be a fling.
Korean girls have a way of charming the foreign men they meet here with their long hair, tight bodies, and high level of femininity. Occasionally you’ll meet a foreigner who’s married a Korean and decided to stay here to make their home. I wouldn’t recommend marriage in general, but I would especially not recommend this idea, because of all the ones I’ve met I can only think of one man who’s happy with the choice he made. And believe me when I say that he’s punching way above his weight with his wife.
On top of that, the deeper commitment and investment you make, the more vulnerable you become to all sorts of nasty repercussions. If she decides to leave you for some younger player with tight game, you’re destroyed emotionally. If you two get divorced, let’s hope you speak Korean well enough to navigate the court and legal systems. If you need emotional support, you’re thousands of miles away from family and the lifelong friends that have your back.
The more attached you are to her, the more she holds your balls in her hand. Never give her that chance by getting too deeply attached. Remember that it’s always just a fling.
[…] other day, I briefly touched on this subject while writing about commitment with Korean girls, but I wanted to expand on this subject more for the sake of people who don’t live […]