How lucky can you get?

I’m getting maybe just the slightest bit tired of people telling me how “lucky” I am.

Believe me, I know how bitchy that sounds. But when I hear it lately, it most often refers to just one thing:

I am lucky to be married.

Don’t get me wrong. I am lucky. David’s a sweetheart and I was very fortunate to find someone so wonderful and have him fall in love with me. And, I am thankful every day to share my life with him. But when people here say, “You’re so lucky,” the tone is less like:

“You’re fortunate to have found someone to love,”

and more like,

“You should get down on your hands and knees every morning and thank God you have a man otherwise you’d be a worthless spinster!”

I don’t think I am exaggerating. My single Korean friends tell me that a woman here is considered an old maid if she is not married by 30 at the latest, and 28 or 29 is pushing it. And, it goes without saying, that remaining unmarried is seen as a tragic fate. Expat friends of mine who are single are the objects of an excessive amount of pity, in my opinion.

Given the workload that a Korean traditionally wife bears, I’m surprised that more women don’t wait longer to get married. From what people tell me, wives are expected do all of the housework, pay the bills, and care for the children, in addition to maintaining a full-time job outside the home. The costs of living being what they are in Seoul, only people who are fairly wealthy can afford to have one parent stay at home. The husband’s duty is to bring home the bacon, which means working 14 hours a day and entertaining clients at long dinners at night, if necessary. (And the government wonders why the birth rate isn’t higher.)

All of that I find disturbing on an intellectual level, but it’s really not my problem. What *is* my problem, is the number of women (and some men) who don’t mind telling me what an attractive mate my husband would make for the aforementioned worthy and available single females. (The not-so-subtle implication being that, of course, he would want to upgrade me for a better, i.e., Korean, model.)

A few months ago, we went to the wedding of one of David’s customers. During the meal afterward, David offered to pour a glass of beer for the others at the table. (It’s considered rude to pour your own glass of beer from the bottle. So, if you want any beer, you’ve got to pour others a glass first, thus encouraging them to start drinking and then do the same for you.)

In doing this, he also offered to pour a glass for me and the other woman at the table, the date of one of the other guests. As he did this, another of David’s clients remarked to me, “Oh, wow, David is so polite! You should worry, Cathi, Korean women really like men who are nice like that.”

I realize he probably meant that as a compliment to me, actually. His way of saying, “Hey, that’s a really nice guy you’ve got there.” But at the time, I thought, “If all a guy has to do to impress a woman is show her some basic courtesy, it’s not me who needs to worry, buddy.”

Then, I resented the assumption that just given any opportunity, David would cheat on me. But that was before the “luckies” started. Since that time, I’ve gotten at least 20, ‘You’re so lucky‘ comments when people find out I am married. Or, when they meet my husband.

Then, there are even stranger situations. Like at our salsa class, when one of the female instructors remarked as we were leaving, “I wish I could dance with my husband!”

“Oh, he doesn’t like to dance?” I asked.

“Oh, I don’t have a husband,” she said, looking pointedly at David. “*sigh* I don’t even have a boyfriend. [pause, turns back to face me] You’re so lucky.”

O-kaay. Well then, see you next week!

After class this Saturday, we headed over to a friend’s birthday party at a wine bar in Itaewon. As David was impressing the group with his mad 한극말 skills (he’s been studying like crazy and is getting pretty good at basic conversation), I heard one of the women next to him say (in English), “You know, if you really want to learn Korean, you should to get a Korean girlfriend.”

Um, what?

We had all had a lot of wine, and I figured she was probably joking around, so I continued conversing with the two people sitting on my other side.

“But I’m married,” David tells her, gesturing to me, in case she forgot the introduction she received about five minutes prior.

“Oh, you should get one anyway.”

At that point, I turned away from the other conversation and sort of looked over at her like “Did you really just tell my husband in front of me, that he needs a Korean girlfriend? ”

Glancing over at me, she laughs and says, “Sorry, Catherine!”

But her tone was less “Sorry, I was only kidding” and more “Sorry, Catherine, too bad for you!”

Maybe I am overreacting. As I said, it was a weekend particularly full of the “luckies,” and I am just not used to people being so openly …. what? I don’t even know how to describe it, other than it’s just so weird.

It’s not that I feel threatened. I trust David. And, I don’t see his fidelity as something I have control over. He sees beautiful women all the time. If he wants to go for one, then there’s not much I can do about it.

But it bothers me when women blatantly attach so much of their self-worth, and their societal worth, to whether or not they are married or partnered with a man. And, that they assume a woman’s worth is largely based on her looks and ability to run a household, rather than her personality and who she is. Implicit in a lot of the comments is that it is the woman who is lucky, and the man who is deserving or entitled to a wife.

Mostly, when people tell me I am lucky, though, I try to receive the comment in the spirit in which it is intended, which, I assume, is to wish me well, even if it is tinged with more than just a hint of jealousy. I assume that they are expressing hope that one day they, too, will be lucky to find someone to love. I wish that for everyone, but I also hope that the guys will also realize how lucky they are.