Mr. Kim came to Canada; he had dreams; did he realize them?

(지난 호에 이어)

“I know that it is advantageous to go to French speaking universities, but it is not easy to overcome the barrier of French. I went to French CEGEP but my French is ok for daily life, but it is not good enough to do university studies. So I went to McGill”, stated one of the students”.

“But, suppose that you go to a French speaking university, does it guarantee a job? No, I don’t think so, because we, Koreans have neither internal nor external networking”, declared a lady.

“ I agree, we do not have internal networking, because, Koreans are not united; they are loners. They do not like to be a part of large group, because they are afraid of exposing their personal matters. 

But they do not like to share their experiences. They do not like to join networking. Even if they wanted, they do not have any community-wide unity, because they are separated by alumni, home provinces, blood connections and above all churches.

There are fifteen protestant churches and one Roman Catholic Church. It may be possible to have networking inside the church, but it is inevitably short and narrow. In the Korean community, it is just impossible to have networking long enough and wide enough to be of any use”, a men argued with passionate voice.

“How about the external networking? You know very well that it does not exist. Parents have too busy to survive; the youth have just terminated their studies. What I do regret is that many Korean parents have anti-Quebec sentiments, which their children emulate so that they are having difficulty in mingling with French Quebecers”, a senior member offered his analysis.

“I totally agree with the observation. I like to add this. You see, if you want that your children do adapt themselves to the Quebec way of thinking and doing, you should expose them to the Quebec culture right from the kinder garden period. As an English philosopher said, 75% of the personality of a person is formed before the age of seven”, a middle aged man volunteered.

“My kid is doing OK. Right from his childhood, I and my wife have encouraged our son to invite white kids, join the neighborhood soccer team, go to birthday parties of non-Korean kids”, said another man.

“What is the solution then?”, asked a student.

A middle-aged man volunteered to answer: “You see, as far as I am concerned, somebody or some organization should do the following: improve the collective image of the Korean community; create internal and external networking, provide a data base for employment and teach the youth the strategy of finding job and advancing in their career”.

“You see, a visible minority person such as a Korean is judged first by the ethnic community to which the person belongs and then by his qualification and personality. This is called ‘profiling'.

In other words, it is important to project a “good” image of the Korean community. A good image of the Korean community depends on the frequency and intensity of the community’s participation in the collective activities of the Quebec society such as St Jean Baptist Festivity, the Week-End du Monde, the Intercultural Week and so on”, continued the middle-aged man.

“Let me cut in here. I totally agree with the analysis we heard. In fact, some president of the Korean Association did a lot to improve our image and I am grateful. The trouble is that there is no continuity in this kind of activities”, said another middle-aged man.

“Now, as to the creation of networking, the preparation of database and training in the job-related strategy, we need a new organization managed by younger first generation people of 40 to 60 years old who have language ability and who know Quebec”, said the same man.

“I agree with that. You know something? In fact, some years ago, a group of young first generation leaders of the Korean Association tried that. Do you know what happened? I will tell you! These young people were labeled ‘Red’ by a group of senior people, who ended up by inducing the key leader of the young group to abandon the project.

Since then, the Association has been controlled by a group of seniors of extreme right-wing and the Association’s activities have been limited to a few commemoration activities such as the 8.15 Day”, explained a lady with somewhat angry voice.

Kim remembered the incidence with sadness. The incidence showed the typical dynamics of Korean communities in Montreal. The Koreans cannot unit; they fight all the time; they have no sense of common interest; they cannot accept the success of others, they are always jealous. These are some of the characteristics of Koreans.

The question is why? Kim remembered a professor who explained during a seminar on the topic. Here is professor’s explanation.

The combination of Daoism, Buddhism and Confucianism and the absence of the belief in the Christian love neighbor produced the strong feeling of belonging to a family, the same-town people, the same-school people or some other small entities and exclusiveness of group allegiance.

Unless one belongs to the same entity, the person is a stranger and cannot trust. In other words, Koreans must belong to some entity and they dislike to be left alone. It is rare to see, on the golf course, lone Korean golf players. This is why Koreans are divided into so many small groups and sub-groups.

The multiple divisions of the Korean community produces a situation where the common interest of the whole of the Korean community has  low priority; what is important is the narrow scoped interest of the small group of which one is a part. In other words, Koreans are not interested in the common good of the community as a whole; they seldom participate at seminar meetings unless the seminar is related to some immediate problems related to personal gains.

(다음 호에 계속)

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