This week's TL;DR is a question that we've been asked a lot since we've been living in Korea
What is it like to be Muslim in Korea?
So here's a little bit of background info on Korea:
Nearly half of Korea is irreligious
Is irreligious a word?
Yes!
It means just not religious?
-They don't practice religion -Hm!
Of the people that practice religion, Buddhism takes up around a little over 20%
Protestantism takes around 15%
and Roman Catholicism takes around 10% or so.
I like how Buddhism is the most practiced religion here,
yet there's nothing vegetarian available for anybody.
When it comes to being Muslim in Korea, there are around 45,000 Ethnic Korean Muslims
and around 150,000 practicing Muslims altogether.
And that's actually a very very small percentage.
and it's not because Muslims aren't welcome here,
it's just that Korea is overwhelmingly homogenous
and it's just not very multicultural at all.
In fact, for those of you who don't know, Korea is 97% Korean people.
Compare that to the US, where roughly 5 to 8 million people are practicing Islam,
and in Canada, where roughly 1 million people are,
and consider that Canada has 15 million less people than South Korea.
-Less. It's so crazy! -Less!
-Canada is so big and then-- -It's so huge--and nobody lives there!
All the bears in the middle are like,
-"That's okay I'm a bear! Just stay up there! -"That's fine by me!"
And the majority of the Muslim population in Korea
are actually migrant workers mostly from Pakistan or Bangladesh.
But we do see a lot people in Seoul and they are usually exchange students.
When it comes to practicing Islam in Korea,
Muslims are free to practice their religion in Korea,
there are no religious restrictions here.
It might not be easy for you to practice Islam in Korea
because there aren't really that many mosques here.
There's a sole, central mosque in Itaewon that's been around since 1976
and that's really the biggest, most popular one from what we read.
and they hold lectures in English, Arabic, and Korean!
and there are other cities in Korea that also have mosques
Like Busan, which we just came from
and there's Gwangju, there's Cheongju, and there's Daegu.
I feel like there might be one in Ansan.
I would guess that there might be.
I just didn't actually look it up, but--
-Right, I didn't see that. -Ansan's another place where like
a lot of migrant workers come to live and it has such a cool multicultural feel to it.
-I took you for your birthday -Right!
We went to Ansan and we had friends that used to live there.
I feel like Ansan is a really big foreign hub in Korea,
and then in Seoul you're looking at Itaewon.
Otherwise, you're gonna find most of the things that you will need
as a practicing Muslim, in Itaewon.
Now Itaewon is a name you're gonna see coming up a lot
if you're looking for halal food, and restaurants, and mosques
and that's because it's the foreign neighborhood of Seoul,
Including Islamic street, where you can find a lot of halal food.
Also in Itaewon, you're gonna find an Islamic pre-school and elementary school
which is open to non-Islamic students as well.
Yes, I heard there are non-Muslim students that are actually attending.
Okay, so what are some difficulties you might find if you're living in Korea and you're Muslim?
I think one of the big ones is going to be food.
-Right. -And going along with that is going to be MT,
which is membership training and also 'huishik',
which is like team building exercise
AKA let's eat and get drunk together.
-Like a meeting with your company -Right.
So it depends if you're at school or if you're working for a company.
Now the biggest problem you might find with 'huishik' and MT
is that drinking is really part of that culture
and you might feel pressured to drink but you don't have to drink.
We know lots of people that have gone to these things and don't drink.
So whenever you're supposed to drink together,
instead of putting alcohol in, you could have cider, you could have water instead.
It's just the act of doing that together
that communal eating and drinking that you could do.
And I should mention, cider is actually 7-Up or Sprite.
-Yes. It's a Korean word, I forgot. -It's soda--that's right, I just realized.
Really a lot of people feel like, "I can't go to these because I don't drink."
but it is really about the bonding.
So even if you tell people at the beginning, "I don't drink",
You don't have to be like,"I'm religious and I don't drink--"
You can just be like,"I don't drink" or
-Lots of people in Korea don't drink. -Lots of people don't drink for many reasons.
Yes, exactly
So you can just say,"I don't drink, but I still want to take part in this".
Hang out with them, laugh
Just make sure that you're taking part of the team activities,
which is a big part of Korean culture along with grilling pork.
-Yes -Yes
So that might be a little bit tougher for you
and I heard that that's the biggest issue
is like eating halal food properly in Korea
is very very challenging because it's such a meat based culture here.
-A pork based culture too. -Yeah
Things are starting to change in Korea but there's a program here called 'Our Home',
which is trying to make halal lunchboxes
and buffets for Gwangju summer program.
Okay, you know where they're from by the way, 'Our Home'?
Ansan
-There you go! Yes. -That's right!
And they're also trying to actually create
in the Incheon National Airport
They're trying have a halal food place in the food court.
-Yes -Which is great,
-because it's an international airport so..yeah -Exactly
And it's really important, I think, when it talks about bringing it for the school
because Leigh told us that a lot of her friends that she attended school with
that were practicing Islam
had a lot of difficulty and left after 6 months to a year
because eating here is very challenging.
But the biggest problem being here is that
if you're actually attending a university class in Seoul
and you're staying in a dorm
and you get up every morning and you go down to the cafeteria
and they don't have anything
-that's halal, vegetarian or vegan -No meatless options
You eat what they-- that's it.
-Like rice and beansprouts? -Allergies? Forget about it.
They give you one thing, that's your only option.
Now remember, this makes sense, because as our earlier stat,
Korea is 97% Korean people.
-Buuutt-- -Very homogeneous, yes.
If you're going to open up international school programs,
-You should probably think about-- -Maybe you should be a little more sensitive
-Exactly -to the needs of international students.
So what I'm gonna say is that
if you are a practicing Muslim and you're coming to Korea for international school program,
make sure you get to know Itaewon okay?
-It is not the coolest Korean place to go to -Right
But they do have at least four grocery stores that sell halal food,
as well as lots of halal restaurants which means
You gotta get used to making your own food okay?
If your mom and dad are cooking for you back home and you're coming to Korea--
-It's time to learn how to cook for yourself. -Right!
So there's a lot more to talk about
but we can't include everything in this video
So make sure you check out our blog post, we're gonna talk about more things there
as well as includes some helpful links so that when you come to Korea.
You can find out where to go for your halal food needs.
And here's our question for you today:
I know some of you guys have either dietary restrictions,
maybe you have an allergy or you're vegetarian or vegan
or maybe you have a religious practice that you can't eat certain types of food,
What was it like when you traveled to Korea and other countries?
How did you get around these issues?
Let us know in the comments section below.
So that's it for this week's video, I hope you found it useful.
Next week you have a very special video because it's our anniversary~
-Eight year anniversary~ -Anniversary~
Are we gonna be in Korea?
-No -Where are we gonna go?
-We're going to Bali -Oooh!
-anniversary~ -For our anniversary~
It's our anniversary~
We were gonna say that we're not going to film any videos, but we totally are, because we're addicted
to filming videos on our--
ANNIVERSARY~
I'm gonna learn how to cook a whole bunch of foods!
-On our anniversary~ -Anniversary~
I'm so excited! I wanna make lots of curries
and I wanna eat lots of cool foods
and i wanna go to--!!--I wanna get mi goreng.
Anniversary~