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South Korea’s female freedivers: TV has made stars of the haenyeo but what is their real story? | South Korea

R.Below is an episode in Netflix’s drama when life gives you life where a woman dives into the sea and restores a hunting from the sea ear (Sea Snails), which she says will feed her family. woman HaEENYEO. Haenyeo, or “Sea Women”, was registered in the seventeenth and unique of its kind on Jeju Island in South KoreaWhere they hunt sustainable, and dive again and again on one breath for shellfish and seaweed.

However, the scene, which is located in the 1960s, will simply not happen today, says Myeonghyo Go, who lives in the IHO-Dong Village on Jeju. “Seaweeds here disappear, and seaweed is the food for the Apalon. Because we do not have seaweed, we have no sea ear,” she says.

Haenyeo is unique on Jeju Island, South Korea. Photo: Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images

Myeonghyo is not just a heino, it is a citizen and an environment. In her forties, she represents the new generation of traditional divers in Korea and her mission is to change the way the world sees by the world.

Haeyeo is one of the most famous cultural exports in the country, as UNESCO officially graduated their work in the representative list of The unfinished cultural heritage of humanity Because of their focus on sustainability. However, their future is at a crossroads. Most of them are now more than 70 years old, so the national government and the Jeju authorities are keen to advance a new generation.

When the boycott government (Jeju is a self -government boy She described how to represent Haeyeo “The personality of the island and the spirit of people,” however, myeonghyo feels that the resulting magic with Haenyeo was not always useful for the future of women.

Myeonghyo goes with her mother, Chunsuk Son, which was also Henio. Photo: Domino Albert

“I feel uncomfortable when stories are shared about Haenyeo,” she says. “they [those who are telling the stories] Take everything that is really important and shows only certain aspects of our lives. “

“There is a famous Haenyeo choir, and if there is an official event, they are often invited to singing nice songs. But the tradition of Haenyeo in singing together started when things became tiring and difficult [during work]. So our songs are not happy, in themselves, and what you see is not really authentic. “

The peak with Haenyeo has peak in the past few years as part of Frencies on Korean cultureI started from the ascending of K-POP. In 2022, another K drama, blouseand The life of the sea was followed, and last year a documentary film, The last women of the seaAdvertising for Apple TV was born. This month, the British Broadcasting Corporation will show the first program in Korea (in cooperation with Broadcaster JTBC), Deep diving Korea. The Korean model and the song follow the actress Ji Hugh tried to become Henio.

Myeonghyo wants to use Haenyeo’s popularity to create a school to educate people about environmental science in the ocean and create a team of citizen scientists.

“When I feel that we are [the haenyeo] “It is used, it is used to make me feel intense lonely, then I started to change my opinion and think, can I use this interest to tell the true story instead? For me, this is a story that relies on a long tradition in protecting the weak, whether in our society or in the natural world.”

A video of an abstract female gathering oysters from the sea floor
Haenyeo diving for a variety of marine life including mollusks and seaweed. They use a tool like a weed shovel to separate fishing from the rocks and put what they find in a network connected to a float device. Credit: Ko Myungyo

She says that haenyeo have a tradition called Halmioni BadaAnd that translates into the vicinity of the grandmother. It is an area dedicated to shallow water, where the oldest Haenyeo goes and hunts. “So we have this way to care for the elderly and weakness,” she says. “Then we have group diving days once or twice a month, where all we divide equally between all Henio, regardless of age or experience.”

Haeyeo also works with the ocean when they hunt, so that they do not dive during the seasonal multiplication season, for example, but harvesting seaweed instead. They also avoid hunting the fabric if it is smaller than 7 cm to give species a chance to multiply before harvesting them.

“We are alive in collecting and selling seafood, but we also protect them,” she says. “We explain how humans and nature can coexist.”

A Haenyeo on Jeju Island in 1954. Photo: World History Archives/Global Photo Group/Getty Images

Myeonghyo volunteers with Citizen Science Center in the ocean BaranIt is a relatively new local non -governmental organization that employs citizen science to document changes in the seas surrounding Jeju and uses information to pressure the government to improve maritime protection.

She needed to teach her to diving with Scuba equipment to document the ocean plants, and when she did it she says that she noticed the large solid coral reef that appears alongside traditional soft coral reefs in Jeju. It is usually found in tropical waters and only began to appear in these numbers in the past five years when the water temperature has increased around the southern side of Jeju significantly, Reaching a new record last year, According to data from the National Institute of Fisheries Science. The same area also witnessed a sharp decrease in seaweed, the spread of jellyfish and green algae, and the melting of soft coral reefs.

Sangon Yun, a consultant in Baran, whose mother was from Henio, says the older generation is not always keen to raise their votes about the environment. “However, the ocean changes quickly and is the first to witness these changes, and so when we go and talk to them on the basis of one to one, they start opening their hearts more. I hope that the younger generation will lead to this change in what Haenyeo represents.”

Before you can start the rest of the world, myeonghyo faces a challenge to tackle home – her mother.

Chunsuk Son, ninety -year -old, has become at the age of 17, in the footsteps of her mother, but she does not see why her daughter should do the same.

The squid is hanging until it dries along the Jeju Olle corridor on Jeju Island. Photo: Dave Stambolis/Allama

“When I taught her, I wanted to have a suitable job like joining the civil service,” she says. “We are older women. We do not want our daughters to be Haenyeoand But Myeonghyo still says she wants to be one to protect the ocean and help make the place where we live a better place. I know it has a different goal [as a haenyeo] And a different direction. In any case, do not listen to me. “

Additional reports before Eunhae Grace Young

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