婚介所裏朝韓統一 Seoul dating agency practises its version of Korean unification

Han Seol-hyang blushes as she recounts her memories of teenage dating in Pyongyang.

韓雪香(Han Seol-hyang，音)講述起自己十幾歲時在平壤約會的往事，她的臉紅了。

“Everything was in secret. It wasn’t all out in the open like in South Korea,” says the 30-year-old daughter of a North Korean government official. “It wasn’t that we were scared of being punished; that was just the culture.”

韓雪香今年30歲，是一位朝鮮政府官員的女兒，她說：“一切都得保密，不像在韓國這麼開放。倒不是說害怕受處罰，而是文化使然。”

South Korea’s brash dating scene is one of a bewildering range of cultural differences confronting more than 25,000 North Koreans who have made their way south over the past 20 years, with many struggling to integrate socially and economically.

過去20年逃往韓國的朝鮮人超過2.5萬人，他們面臨着各種令人無所適從的文化差異，令許多人無論從經濟上還是從社會上都難以融入韓國，大膽的約會場面便是其中之一。

But Ms Han and 51-year-old Kim Min-jeong, her business partner, have turned the situation to their advantage by establishing Eve, a matchmaking agency aimed at helping fellow North Korean refugees find husbands.

但韓雪香和她的生意夥伴——51歲的金敏貞(Kim Min-jeong，音)將這一文化差異化作她們的優勢，倆人合作創建了婚介機構Eve，旨在幫助朝鮮難民同胞找到如意郎君。

On the wall of their office in a western district of Seoul is a whiteboard listing a dozen meetings arranged for the next few days between women born in North Korea and South Korean men. The dates of two imminent marriages and an expected birth are noted in red.

Eve位於首爾西部某區，辦公室的牆上掛着一面白板，上面列出了未來數日安排好的十幾場約會，女方都是朝鮮人，而男方都是韓國人。其中有三個標紅的日期，分別是馬上要舉行的兩場婚禮，以及一個預產期。

Next to a large framed photograph of one of the weddings they have helped to bring about — there were 29 last year alone — one of their 10 employees is explaining the service to a shy-looking man on the threshold of middle age.

這家婚介所有10名員工，其中一個員工正向一位面露羞色、即將邁入中年的男士介紹服務項目。他們身邊的牆上掛着一個大相框，裏面是Eve促成的一場婚禮的照片，僅去年這家婚介所就促成了29樁婚事。

Eve promises to arrange up to six introductions for each man within the first year, with further dates to follow if he remains single after that time. About 200 men paid Won2-3m ($1,788-2,667) last year to register at Eve; more than double that number of female North Korean defectors signed up at no cost.

Eve承諾每位男士在第一年內最多可相親6次，如果一年後該男士仍爲單身，還可爲他安排更多約會。去年約有200名男士在Eve註冊，註冊費在200萬韓元到300萬韓元之間（約合1788美元到2667美元），女性會員都是脫北者，去年她們的註冊人數是男性會員的兩倍以上，無須繳納註冊費用。

Seated on adjacent leather armchairs, both sporting white shirts, miniskirts and auburn-tinted hair, Ms Han and Ms Kim explain how they help clients to bridge the inter-Korean cultural divide.

韓雪香和金敏貞挨着坐在皮革扶手椅上，兩人都穿着白襯衫，迷你裙，頭髮染成茶褐色。她們介紹了自己如何幫助客戶跨越朝韓之間的文化鴻溝。

“The North Korean women are like 60-somethings in South Korea; they’re very conservative,” Ms Kim says. “So I tell the men to take things slow. If you grab her hand on the first date, it will scare her.”

金敏貞說：“朝鮮女性的思想相當於韓國60多歲的人，她們非常保守。因此我告訴男士們要慢慢來。如果你第一次約會時就牽她的手，會嚇到她的。”

Ms Kim plays down the difficulties of becoming an entrepreneur in a dynamic capitalist economy after spending her first four decades in one of the last socialist states. She thinks she gained useful skills from working for 20 years in a regional accounts department of a state-owned restaurant company, before emigrating in 2005.

金敏貞人生的頭四十年是在社會主義國家度過的，之後她又在這個充滿活力的資本主義國家裏成了一名企業家，她並不認爲這有多不容易。2005年金敏貞從朝鮮來到韓國，此前她在一家國有餐飲公司的分區會計部工作了20年，她認爲自己從中獲得了有用的技能。

Ms Han had left North Korea two years before at the age of 18, having felt isolated, like “a frog in a pond”, after spending hours watching television footage of the outside world. They met in 2007, when both were working at a Seoul matchmaking agency. But in 2008 the two women decided to go it alone. They used their modest savings to put down a Won10m deposit for a rented office and lured a few male clients from their previous employer.

韓雪香比她早兩年離開朝鮮，當時18歲，在連續看了幾個小時外面世界的電視後，她覺得自己與世隔絕，像只“池塘裏的青蛙”。她與金敏貞相識於2007年，當時她們在首爾一家婚介所工作。2008年兩位女性決定出來單幹。她們用微薄的積蓄繳納了1000萬韓元定金，租下一間辦公室，還從前僱主那兒挖走了幾個男客戶。

Eve has attracted only one male North Korean client and no South Korean women. The lopsided gender mix reflects the fact that North Korean refugees earn a third less than the South Korean average. In one 2013 survey, all the women polled said they disliked the idea of marrying a defector. But 69 per cent of the men said they would, reflecting North Korean women’s reputation for being “docile and submissive”, according to Ms Han.

Eve的客戶裏只有一位朝鮮男性，沒有韓國女性。這種極不平衡的性別結構反應出一個事實，朝鮮難民的收入不抵韓國人平均收入的三分之一。在2013年一份調查中，所有女性受訪者均表示她們無法接受嫁給一個叛逃者。但69%的男性受訪者表示他們願意娶一名叛逃者，據韓雪香說，這反映了朝鮮女性“溫順”的美名在外。

This has led critics to accuse Eve and similar agencies of exploitation. Ms Han counters that the service can help female defectors integrate in the face of prejudice, recalling how she nervously pretended as a student to be from the north of South Korea.

批評者因此指責Eve之類的機構利用脫北女性。韓雪香反駁說，她們的服務可以幫助女性脫北者在面對偏見的情況下融入當地社會。她回想起自己當初如何緊張地裝成一個來自韓國北部的學生。

The troubles faced by North Korean defectors are an ominous sign of the challenge that Seoul will face in dealing with a greater influx, should Korea reunify. In the meantime, Ms Han adds, “we are doing our own version of unification”.

脫北者面臨的麻煩預示着首爾可能面臨的挑戰，如果朝鮮半島真的統一，那麼韓國將迎來更龐大的移民潮。與此同時，韓雪香說，“我們正在進行我們自己的統一事業”。