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Kisaeng it all bood-bye?
By Andrei Lankov
September 2, 2004
Many Koreans believe that prostitution was completely alien to the Korean
tradition until the early 1900s, when it was first introduced by those naughty
Japanese. However, the North Korean experience should make us skeptical about
this idea. North Korea once was quite successful in the extermination of
prostitution, but in the last decade it has come back with a vengeance.
Once upon a time, prostitution was common in the North. Prior to the Korean
War, the kisaeng houses - a cross between an elite club, a restaurant, and a
brothel - flourished in the cities, and in the years 1945-1950 even the leaders
of the new Communist regime would occasionally choose a kisaeng house for a
confidential meeting. Suffice to say that the first encounter between Kim
Il-sung and the leader of the North Korean Nationalist Right, Cho Man-sik, was
arranged by Soviet officers in Hwabang, the then famous kisaeng house (this
meeting took place on Sept. 30, 1945).
However, changes to the structure of North Korean society soon made kisaeng
obsolete. In the late 1940s, the North Korean government embarked on an
anti-prostitution campaign. The kisaeng houses were closed down by the
beginning of the Korean War, and in the elaborate system of hereditary "class
classification" of the late 1950s their former employees were defined as
members of the "hostile class." This means that neither ex-kisaeng nor their
children had access to many privileges - including, as a rule, a good college
education and the right to reside in Pyongyang.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the North Korean authorities went to great lengths to
promote the traditional mores of the Korean village community. Prostitution,
promiscuity, extra-marital or pre-marital sex would have no place within the
utopia that they were constructing - and the government was usually strong
enough to enforce its regulations (it was easy since these views were shared by
a majority of the population). Obviously, the spoilt brats, sons of the
Pyongyang elite, could dally with the pretty actresses and singers, but these
exploits of the young aristocrats can hardly be described as commercial
prostitution.
It is not clear when and how prostitution made its comeback in the North.
Perhaps the turning point was reached around 1980, when the authorities opened
the so-called Ansan Club near the small but luxurious Potonggang Hotel. In this
club the patrons (exclusively foreigners) were entertained by hostesses from
Southeast Asian countries. However, the authorities kept Korean women away from
this dirty business - and the club did not last for long.
Things changed in the late 1980s when Pyongyang staged the 13th International
Festival of Youth and Students. This gathering attracted several tens of
thousands of foreigners, and some of them were interested in sex-for-sale.
Rumors persisted that during the festival the North Korean police had
instructions to turn a blind eye to sexual liaisons between local women and
foreigners.
Around the same time, with the tacit approval of the police, professional
prostitutes began to ply their trade in major international hotels. This is
still the case. The girls’ ranks are often swelled by hotel personnel - the
allure of hard currency being too strong to resist…
And then the early 1990s changed everything. The dissolution of the communist
camp triggered a collapse of the North Korean economy. An estimated
three-quarters of the industrial plants ceased to operate by the mid-1990s.
After the floods of 1995, the government was unable to issue rations, and most
people in the countryside were left to their own fate.
Under the new circumstances the government was both unable and unwilling to
enforce the regulations. Private commerce boomed, and millions of people began
to make their living independently of the state. Crowds of small merchants hit
the roads.
In this new environment domestic prostitution was bound to appear and flourish.
The merchants needed easy sex - and could buy it from the crowds of
impoverished, displaced women. The hookers appeared in the markets, or near
large shops and restaurants. Some private eateries began to provide a "special
service,’’ sending girls to please the patrons after they finished their meals
(the owners received a commission equal to some 20 percent of the girl’s fee).
Prostitution became an important source of revenue for private inns - and such
inns have sprung up in great numbers in the last decade.
Some North Korean women even found themselves - often against their will -
caught in the sex industry of China. But that is another story…
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