Weddingbee boards

In Korea this is where most of the international marriage numbers are coming from.  It's an issue very near to my heart since as I will be in an 'international marriage,' I get included in all of the stats the government and NGOs puts out.

There is an extreme shortage of women in the Korean countryside, so a great number of farmers are using marriage brokers and going on 3 day package tours to find their Vietnamese, Filipina, Russian, Chinese, Mongolian, etc. bride.  In some areas it is now estimated that within the next 10 years, 25-50% of children in school will be from these kind of marriages (shocking when just a few years ago children were proudly being taught that that Korea was a 'pure race country')  Some of these marriages work, but in many there is a huge age/wealth difference - and the women experience a lot of discrimination.  There have been some horrible cases of late - in one a woman killed her husband who beat her repeatedly while pregnant (his family defended him saying 'he was a wonderful husband because he bought her exotic fruit from her own country).  In another case, a Korean couple split up because they couldn't have kids.  The man married a poor woman from abroad - took her first child when she gave birth and gave it to his first wife - and then divorced her after her second child and remarried the first wife.  The last I heard, the court denied the foreign wife's petition for custody because they said she had spent 'a significant amount of time away from her children and the first wife was now the 'real' mother'!!!!!!!  These are perhaps extreme cases, but the rate of abuse amoung these couples is very very high, and some countries are now putting restrictions on Korean marriage brokers. Several of my friends have nannies from the Philippines who are married to Koreans.  They are okay because they are in the city where they have more access to jobs, churches, and services in their own language, but many women are in remote areas with much fewer resources.  This is considered a HUGE issue in Korea, but since the birth and marriage rates are extrodinary low in Korea - and the rural to urban internal migration is growing at a rapid rate - the government isn't really doing anything to stop it because the truth is...the women are needed......

Here's a few articles on the matter

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2009/12/202_13039.html

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2008/04/202_22150.html

Yeah i saw a documentary on the National Geographic Channel and it was called email bride and it IS sad for the women who come her and face discrimination. I know they are trying to make their lives better but if its not a good marriage then bringing up children in that family setting is sad.. interetesting to watch and that stat about children in the future is crazy..