Seoul/Mokpo, South Korea – In 2018 when Kim Ji-ung lived within the South Korean capital, Seoul, he felt alone on a regular basis. Single and in his early 30s, the salesperson spent most of his day at work or holed up in his condo.
“I contemplated about dying throughout my morning commute,” Kim instructed Al Jazeera.
“Essentially the most troublesome factor was that I had nobody to speak to. After work, I might be at residence scrolling by TV channels or taking part in video video games,” he stated.
Discovering it troublesome to make connections at work, Kim was feeling more and more determined and remoted. Then an in depth good friend of his collapsed at their office and died.
“That’s after I actually began to ask myself, ‘Will I be subsequent?’” he stated.
It was then that Kim made one of many hardest selections of his life – to pack his luggage and transfer away from Seoul, a metropolis of 9.6 million people who supplied him the very best probability of a profession and a secure wage.
The capital’s inhabitants, which peaked at 10.97 million in 1992, has been lowering steadily in latest many years, sparking alarm amongst officers. Town’s inhabitants of these aged 19 to 39 has been on the decline as nicely, falling from 3.18 million in 2016 to 2.86 million in 2023.
Whereas Seoul continues to attract individuals with its promise of high-paying company jobs, census figures present town is failing to retain its younger inhabitants with practically as many leaving it as transferring to it over the previous decade.
‘Hell Joseon’
This pattern comes regardless of South Korea’s capital turning into a technological and cultural powerhouse that’s constantly ranked among the many world’s most enjoyable cities by worldwide travellers.
Fortune 500 corporations reminiscent of LG, Hyundai Motors and SK Group make use of hundreds of younger professionals of their headquarters within the bustling downtown. The ultra-fashionable Gangnam district hosts one of many premier artwork gala’s on this planet, Frieze Seoul, and the nation’s cosmetics and sweetness trade, popular culture and delicacies are common worldwide.
Seoul’s worldwide attract can also be evident within the hip bars, eateries and golf equipment within the Hongdae and Seongsu neighbourhoods, the place overseas vacationers flood the streets seven days per week.
However Seoul’s younger adults – disillusioned by a housing bubble that has made properties unaffordable and a aggressive work tradition marked by lengthy hours and low pay – have branded the capital’s work-to-survive life-style “Hell Joseon”. The time period references the traditional kingdom that was as soon as primarily based the place Seoul is at this time.
“Our society is thought for its notorious jobs that pressure workers to work lengthy hours, minimize off the careers of ladies who give delivery and make it laborious for males to use for paternity go away,” stated Yoo Hye-jeong of the suppose tank Korean Peninsula Inhabitants Institute for Future.
“Seoul’s abnormally excessive prices for housing and youngster schooling translate to issue in making a secure financial basis for households,” Yoo stated, describing an incompatibility between work and having a household life within the capital.
‘Don’t Fear Village’
For Kim, his probability to maneuver away from Seoul got here by coincidence when he noticed a web-based advert for a getaway programme at Don’t Fear Village.
Situated in Mokpo, a metropolis tucked away within the southwestern nook of the nation with a inhabitants of 210,000 and an abundance of deserted buildings, the village bought its begin from one other deserter from Seoul, Hong Dong-joo.
After receiving his highschool schooling in Seoul’s upmarket Daechi-dong neighbourhood, Hong was destined to enter a high college within the capital and work for a serious company – a direct path to the higher echelons of South Korean society.
However when he turned 20, he knew that “life in Seoul, working at a high-paying job was not the life I needed,” the 38-year-old instructed Al Jazeera. “I didn’t wish to spend lengthy hours on the workplace day-after-day.” And so, when Hong turned a mechanical engineering main at a Seoul college, he did the inconceivable: He moved away from town.
He got here up with the plan to create Don’t Fear Village after establishing a journey company and assembly a whole bunch of younger adults who shared tales of isolation and battling company and social life in Seoul and elsewhere.
“The blueprint for our village was to make a hometown that may act as a group – one thing that so many individuals in our nation lack of their lives,” he stated.
“In some methods, I used to be within the enterprise of offering safety for individuals in our society who wanted it.”
‘Nationwide emergency’
Analysts describe the state of affairs for a lot of younger individuals within the nation as a “nationwide emergency” that’s being largely neglected.
“Within the means of turning into a developed nation actually quick, our society forgot to determine a assist web for our younger inhabitants,” stated Kim Seong-a, a researcher on the Korea Institute for Well being and Social Affairs (KIHASA),
“The uncomfortable side effects of a society going by excessive industrialisation in a really quick period of time was the gradual disappearing roles of households” within the trendy life-style and work turning into its major focus, she stated.
Findings from a 2021 Pew Analysis Middle survey assist her evaluation. Members from 17 superior economies had been requested: “What makes life significant?” The commonest reply for individuals from 14 of the 17 nations – which included Japan, america and New Zealand – was household. South Korean respondents, nonetheless, selected materials wellbeing as their high reply. For them, household got here in third place.
Kim, the KIHASA researcher, stated South Korean society now prioritises “cash over individuals”.
“We’ve seen important enhancements within the nation’s GDP, life expectancy and different areas that may be improved by coverage modifications,” she stated. “However social components like religion in others, belief in society and generosity in direction of others have comparatively been much less developed in our nation.”
In surveys of satisfaction with life, South Korea ranked 33 amongst 38 member states of the Organisation for Financial Co-operation and Improvement (OECD), scoring 6.4 on a 10-point scale in 2023. It additionally has the very best variety of suicides amongst OECD international locations with a suicide fee of 24.3 per 100,000 individuals. Evaluate that with Lithuania, which got here in at a distant second place with 18.5 per 100,000 individuals.
Within the ensuing years, the South Korean suicide fee has solely elevated, reaching 28.3 per 100,000 individuals in 2024, a 13-year excessive.
Younger individuals account for a big variety of the suicides. Of the 14,439 instances of suicide reported final yr, 13.4 % of the instances had been individuals of their 30s.
“In our nation, there are various younger individuals who bear all of the social dangers that they accumulate from failing to get a job, struggling in class and going by household troubles,” Kim Seong-a stated.
“They’re by themselves, so there’s an excellent probability that they will turn out to be remoted. They want somebody round to speak to or ask for assist once they’re going by a setback. This manner, they will take care of it or overcome it,” she stated.
Official figures, nonetheless, present the variety of younger individuals residing alone in Seoul is on the rise. In response to the Seoul Metropolitan Authorities, greater than a 3rd of town’s inhabitants lives alone with younger individuals accounting for 64 % of single-person households, up from 51.3 % a decade in the past.
A latest survey of three,000 single-person households within the metropolis by The Seoul Institute, a number one suppose tank, discovered that 62.1 % of respondents skilled persistent loneliness. One other 13.6 % had been recognized as socially remoted, a time period that refers to people with no assist community throughout occasions of emotional misery, bodily sickness or sudden monetary issues.
‘Seoul With out Loneliness’
South Korea’s authorities is nicely conscious of the problems of social isolation and a punishing work tradition in Seoul and has moved to handle the difficulty lately.
Final yr, it launched its “Seoul With out Loneliness” plan, which is investing 451.3 billion received ($322m) over 5 years in initiatives reminiscent of a 24-hour emotional assist hotline and group centres referred to as Seoul Maeum Comfort Shops, the place individuals can search counselling and drop in without cost bowls of ramen noodles.
Authorities in Seoul have additionally promoted particular date nights for singles within the metropolis, and the federal government has launched quite a few stimulus packages for newlyweds and new mother and father to handle South Korea’s declining birthrate, which is at the moment ranked the bottom on this planet.
The federal government can also be searching for options exterior Seoul’s gates.
Actually, Don’t Fear Village was one of many first prototypes for inclusive communities exterior Seoul that might doubtlessly grow to be youth-centred areas that create properties and jobs for younger adults whereas populating rural areas.
With sponsorship from the Ministry of Inside and Security, candidates to Don’t Fear Village obtain monetary help to relocate to Mokpo and attend workshops organised by Hong on helpful expertise required in the area people and networking with fellow residents.
Kim Ji-ung, the previous salesman from Seoul, attended one such workshop in 2018 after which ultimately moved there. After he did so, he stated he was stunned by how simple it was to type social connections.
“As a result of town is sort of small, it’s probably that you just’ll meet different younger individuals by a method or one other,” Kim stated. “Individuals ask favours to one another, and also you make associates right here by simply saying ‘hello’ to them.”
That was such a stark distinction to Seoul, the place individuals would not have time to greet one another and don’t wish to turn out to be concerned in different individuals’s companies, he stated.
Kim labored numerous jobs in Mokpo till 2022 when he put his college diploma to make use of and began a one-person inside design firm. Hong is his neighbour, and the pair steadily seize lunch collectively. Along with doing what he loves, Kim stated the most important change he has skilled is beginning to take pleasure in leisure time.
“On random nights, I’ll simply go right down to the ferry terminal and get on a midnight boat to Jeju Island,” he stated. “I’ll simply keep there for the morning, however it’s the small issues like this that inform me that I’m having an excellent time right here.”
Wanting exterior Seoul
Hong’s life, too, has modified dramatically.
Again in his days in Seoul, he didn’t suppose an excessive amount of about getting married. However he quickly met the girl who turned his spouse in Mokpo and is now a father as nicely.
“In Seoul, the person has to sacrifice a lot of their very own lives for his or her corporations, to make a residing and for the great of society as a complete,” Hong stated. “However in Mokpo, I’ve management over my time. I’m capable of do what I need for work, and cash is just not that intimidating to me any extra.”
Two different residents in Don’t Fear Village, husband and spouse Park Myung-ho and Kim Min-jee, additionally gave up profitable careers in Seoul for what they described as a extra “relaxed life” in Mokpo.
Park, 38, labored for considered one of South Korea’s greatest arms producers whereas Kim was an worker on the nation’s largest promoting firm.
The couple married after assembly in Don’t Fear Village.
“There’s simply an excessive amount of competitors in Seoul. It appeared like solely individuals who possessed lots of capital succeeded in beginning a enterprise,” Park stated. “As somebody who needed to start out my very own enterprise, it was extra cheap to look exterior of Seoul.”
Park is now the CEO of an area property growth firm whereas Kim runs a guesthouse in downtown Mokpo that was developed by her husband’s firm.
Kim, 35, additionally gave delivery to a son greater than a yr in the past whom she didn’t count on to have so quickly.
“I all the time pictured having a baby late in my years or being married with out youngsters,” she stated.
“Working for a serious firm meant practically no time at residence and weekends spent within the workplace. It’s virtually inconceivable to lift youngsters in Seoul with out the assistance of fogeys or childcare providers, and discovering an reasonably priced housing association is even tougher,” she stated.
‘You’re judged for actually the whole lot’
Whereas Don’t Fear Village has turn out to be a prototype for greater than 50 youth-centred communities across the nation that the federal government has created lately, the truth for younger adults transferring away from Seoul to stay in rural areas has confirmed to be troublesome.
Workplaces, jobs and key infrastructure are nonetheless concentrated in Seoul.
And that’s the reason, regardless of Hong internet hosting greater than 21 workshops for individuals contemplating transferring to Don’t Fear Village and attracting greater than 2,000 guests, solely 20 individuals have remained there.
The Ministry of Inside and Security, which helped begin the youth villages, stated about 10,000 individuals have participated in workshops at youth-centred communities throughout the nation, however solely about 900 ended up transferring to them.
For a lot of South Korean youth, beginning a second chapter in life exterior the nation has turn out to be more and more common.
Brianna Lee is among the tens of hundreds of younger adults who apply yearly for working vacation visas to stay and work overseas for a set time.
“Life in South Korea is simply too intensive,” 30-year-old Lee stated.
“You’re anticipated to get a job, get married, purchase a home and have an amount of cash at a sure age. And also you’re judged for actually the whole lot,” she stated.
Working as a nurse in Ilsan, a metropolis simply north of Seoul, Lee stated there’s widespread discrimination inside hospitals, the place persons are vital in direction of nurses and consider them as socially inferior.
“On high of working 11-hour shifts, we might be requested to do duties that we weren’t required to carry out,” she stated.
After going through burnout, Lee utilized for a working vacation in Canada, the place she labored at eating places and attended lessons at an English-language academy for a couple of yr.
In the present day, she is again residence making ready to take a check to turn out to be a nurse within the US.
“They pay a lot better, and folks give lots of respect in direction of nurses within the US,” Lee stated.
“Most significantly, individuals aren’t nosy,” she stated.
“I feel individuals care much less about what you do for work and the way you select to stay your life there.”