Lesson 2: The feelings of a foreign land from "giving up the tray for the bowl"
The number of 383/5000 Nghe An workers who went to Korea under the EPS program but have not returned home (according to data from the Department of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs) is just the "tip of the iceberg". The actual number of Nghe An workers in particular and Vietnamese workers in general who have escaped to Korea outside the EPS program and the number of workers who have not yet returned home but have escaped to work outside the contract is very large. There are many reasons given by workers to explain their behavior, and there are also many regretful lessons from those who have escaped...
According to Mr. NVM (also known as M “bald”), from Thai Hoa town, a former garment worker who worked in Korea 10 years ago, now considered a “boss” of Korean labor export brokerage in Ho Chi Minh City, he has successfully brought many Nghe An people to work in Korea, including families with up to 7 people going together. To go to Korea “quickly and conveniently”, many people fall for the “brokers”, so the cost has increased to 150 million VND to over 200 million VND, which is about 7,500 - 10,000 USD (while the actual cost according to the EPS program is 630 USD, plus a deposit of 500 USD that will be recovered later). Thus, the burden of “having to quickly recover capital” has been placed on the workers’ shoulders right from the moment they arrive.
Nghe An workers at a garment factory in Seoul. (Photo by email from Korea).
According to the assessment of "boss" M., many workers must stay at all costs because of their great desire to change their lives. When a person goes to Korea, the whole family puts all their efforts and wealth into it, so they cannot accept that after 3 to 5 years, when their skills are proficient, their salary starts to increase, they "get used to the smell of kimchi" and Korean dishes, they have to return home to... work or start their career again. Besides, most workers do not know much information in the country, labor and employment policies have not reached the people, so they do not know how to "get rich and effectively promote the capital they have saved" when they return.
Many people think that if they have to return, they will lose their chance to go to Korea. As for those workers who "escaped right after arriving" or those who ran away before their contracts ended, it was because their relatives and fellow countrymen persuaded them to leave to work outside because the salary outside was higher, and they could choose any job they wanted. They often "blame" that the contract work was not suitable, but in fact, they thought that they would earn money faster because the difference was about 500-600 USD per month. "I think that, combined with the image of the countryside still having many difficulties, and the nature of Nghe people being very... reckless, they are willing to stay and escape at all costs. And so the story of "leaving the bowl for the plate" is not strange for Vietnamese workers in Korea" - Mr. M. shared.
He also explained why Vietnamese people have the opportunity to stay: Korea is an industrially developed country, in great need of labor. Using "imported" labor is both cheaper and more efficient than domestic labor, so for many years, Korea has had quite open policies for recruiting foreign labor, in which Vietnamese labor is highly appreciated for its intelligence, quickness and... hard work and endurance. Vietnamese workers, especially Nghe An workers, can work more than ten hours a day, work on holidays and accept to do toxic and heavy work: from producing car and motorbike tires to producing bathtubs, toilets, or carpentry and seafaring.
There are jobs that never involve native workers, such as mold casting, which requires working in hot and polluted environments. It can be said that in Korea, there is no shortage of jobs, while the wages paid to workers are quite high (around 1,000 USD per month). Without Vietnamese people, many businesses would have to close down because they would not be able to find workers. For example, Mr. M. said that a wire manufacturing corporation had to struggle when the police hunted down Vietnamese workers who had illegally stayed behind to work at the corporation, because this job can only be done effectively by Vietnamese people because it requires workers to be quick, able to endure the heat, and work 16-18 hours a day.
Vietnamese workers who stay behind are skilled and know the language, so they are very popular with Korean business owners. Moreover, if they use runaway workers, the employer does not have to pay insurance and taxes, so costs will be reduced, and they can work any hours. Thus, Vietnamese workers who stay behind have the secret "assistance" of Korean business owners. Mr. M. also named many friends and acquaintances who are staying behind in Korea and are very "respected" such as Nguyen Quoc Hung from Nghia Dan who has been in Korea for 13 years, Tran Van Huu from Yen Thanh, Vo Van Luan from Dien Chau (who came to Korea on a commercial basis) who have stayed behind for 3 years very leisurely, because they are favored by their employers due to their good skills. Besides, there are also many names and situations mentioned with sadness when they have to hide or have accidents while working outside of their contracts...
Vo Sy H. (from Nghi Lien, Vinh City, cousin of the guy who “plucked chicken feathers” in part 1 of this article) is one of them. H. had an accident while working outside of his contract, falling from the roof to the ground in his 4th year of working in Korea. After a long time of treatment, H. is now bedridden. Without a wife or children, and carrying within himself a great inferiority complex of being a “trash” who has ruined his family, H. refuses to contact or tell anyone about his story...
The story also led me to learn about the case of Mr. Nguyen Van Minh, 33 years old, from Cua Lo, who went to Korea just 5 years ago. When I called, I met Huyen (Minh's wife, who also went to Korea with her husband more than a year ago as a tourist). Huyen sadly said: "Mr. Minh was hospitalized for 6 months after a work accident. Now I am working very hard to support my husband while he is recovering from his injuries."
It is known that Minh came to Korea under the EPS program, working in the seafood industry, with a monthly salary of 500-700 USD. After the 3-year period expired, Minh decided to stay and work as a freelance worker at different factories in the Busan Industrial Park. Minh calculated that if he worked hard, he would earn about 2,000 USD per month, spend 500 USD on rent, and spend about the same amount on food, then he would save nearly 1,000 USD. As for Huyen, at first she stayed at home, cooked for her husband, then found more work in nearby factories, and earned a few hundred USD more each month. Unexpectedly, Minh had a work accident at the beginning of this year. So Huyen was both worried about avoiding police raids and working extra to earn money to take care of her husband in the hospital. “The 6 months Minh was in the hospital were 6 months I didn’t eat or wear clothes. The hospital bill in Vietnamese currency was over 100 million VND, not to mention travel and food, while the employer only helped with about 500 USD, which is only about ten million VND. But that’s still very lucky, many Nghe An people here who work outside of their contracts have had accidents and broken their spines and necks, had to return home, became disabled and received nothing but a few small amounts of support from humanitarian policies” - Huyen confided.
She also added: “In Busan, there are so many illegal Vietnamese workers, countless. Some people have been lying down without a job for months. I have a job, but I work 13, 14 hours a day.” When asked about Huyen, what should I do to get home? Huyen sighed: “I don’t know what to do now. I’ll just have to wait a while for my husband to be able to walk again. I don’t expect much right now, I miss home and my children a lot... but I don’t know what I’ll do when I get home?”
This year is also the 12th year that Nguyen Van Cuong (from Thach Ha, Ha Tinh) has stayed in Korea. In 2000, after going bankrupt due to business and trading, he decided to go to work abroad and ran away without fulfilling his contract after working for 1 year. He confided: "That was the most wrong decision of my life". The hardships and difficulties combined with the risks he saw made him regret many times. He worked very hard to stay, worked and saved a fair amount of capital. Now, he rents a fairly large house in Teku to take care of many Nghe people who have escaped and have not been able to find jobs.
Mr. Cuong said: “Looking at them, I think of my own mistakes, but I don’t know what to advise, and even if I do, it’s too late. I also want to return home, many skilled workers who have escaped and stayed behind now also want to return home to invest and do business, but they are worried about having to research the market. Moreover, I heard that it is very difficult to borrow capital in Vietnam, but here, if you want to open a factory or a company, it is very easy in terms of policy. I guarantee that if our policies are more “open”, we will welcome many skilled workers to work in our homeland”...
Thuy Vinh