It's possible that after having lived in Korea for almost two years, one starts viewing things through more critical eyes than in the beginning. In one of my earlier posts about Korea's quest to become a more global country (Lack of globalization?) I've already let my opinion about Korea's protectionism shine through. Korea's globalization efforts, although often elaborate and expensive, at times leave the impression of just touching the surface. Like the story of one of my foreign (white) friends, who was hired by a Korean company without really having a function besides to attend meetings (just to look pretty there) and photo shootings to show off how global and open-minded this company was because it employed foreigners.Another incident which suppported our opinion was Incheon Global Fair. With the main goal of promoting Incheon as a global city to attract foreign investments, this fair took a planning period of roughly 2 years and was announced with a lot of pomp. Curious on what Incheon had to offer to foreigners, my hubby and I drove there the first weekend it opened.
What we experienced there was quite sobering, if not to say disappointing. When we came closer to the site and tried to find out how to get to the fair's entrance, we found that all direction signs were just written in Hangeul. As we are in the meantime proficient enough to understand most of it, we're sure a lot of other foreigners are not. Moreover, there was no explanation whatsoever on how the parking system worked. We drove around for quite a while, and finally saw a marshaler on the road. As it is supposed to be a global fair, I asked her in English how it worked. The girl started to stammer a few English words which we hardly understood. So I asked her to explain in Korean, and she told us we were supposed to park on any of the parking lots and then take the shuttle bus to the entrance. But what about other foreigners who do not speak Korean at all?
The first thing we visited at the fair was the "Green Growth Hall". Curious on the country's recently announced Green Initiative, we wanted to know what new technologies were on the market for it. But we were disappointed again. Most of the exhibitors were Korean companies - nothing against that, but most of them didn't have any information in English - pure Korean only! A few of them made a feeble effort, such as LG, but we walked out there not a tiny bit brighter than we were before.The other halls offered somewhat more information in English as the exhibitors tended to be more foreigners, but much of it was also all in Korean. One positive experience we made was at the corner where Songdo, one of Incheon's cities, was promoted. We got a special treatment from the lady who showed us around in English. When dinner time approached, we looked for a place to eat - and found there was a food court, but soon discovered they only had one counter - guess what - of course Korean food. Not that we would object to Korean food at all, but it was the only choice at a GLOBAL fair! And it looked so terrible we decided to drive home for dinner. We weren't surprised anymore that we could hardly see any foreigners around. At Incheon "Global" Fair, 99.9% of the visitors were Korean.
