Korean Wave hits Taiwan

If you watch or are forced to watch Taiwanese television and especially Channel 41 in Taichung, you will already know that Korean soap operas are very popular now. I just finished watching the season finale of Stairway to Heaven. (Spoiler: The actual Led Zeppelin song is never played in the series.) The scene where they dress up the blind heroine in a wedding dress and take her to her own 5 star wedding without telling her was very touching. I also liked the character who was the heroine's stepmother's ex-husband. His flamboyance would have fit in well in a Taiwanese night market.

I also was forced to endure several episodes of Lovers in Paris. The best part of this show was the dopey lead female's facial expressions and all the shots of whitey walking around in Paris while the characters speak Korean and hand Euro bills to each other. (Spoiler: in a sop to Korean nationalism, some Eurotrash attempts to harass the heroine and is knocked down by one of the Korean male leads. The one who is slight of build and wears spectacles. Now, while this is sort of a fantasy for me too, I know in real life women go to Paris for the explicit reason of being harassed by overly romantic Frenchmen.)

The other one I recall was about an imperial cooking school for Korean girls set in olden times. Google reveals it's name as Jang Geum. I never knew cooking was so cutthroat ruthless - you need to be devious to cook at the imperial level.

Not only that, you can find more and more Korean restaurants in Taichung, especially faux Korean food, i.e. a Taiwanese entrepreneur who has never had Korean food slaps a Korean flag or symbol on the sign and adds Kimchee to his normal dishes. (In fact, from careful study of Stairway to Heaven, I would imagine Korean food consists of steaks and red wine.)

Meanwhile the Taipei Times reports that Korean books are all the rage in the nation.

So, I was not surprised to find The Marmot's Hole posting about another Korean export gaining popularity in Taiwan, this time with Taiwanese men.

So I ask, how long before we can hear the sweet sounds of feminine Korean voices while idling our evenings at PJ's?