Life on the North Korean Border in China: A Tour of Yanji in the Korean Autonomous Prefecture
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 24 ก.ย. 2024
- Hey there guys! I can't believe it, but in just a week, I am going to be leaving China and moving to South Korea to start my graduate school education. On the way, I will be stopping by Japan to see a childhood friend of mine get married and hang out with some friends from college, and will be going back to Taiwan for a short bit! But before I go, I want to show you the place where I have been living for the past 7 months. It's been a bumpy ride (as you will know if you have watched my other videos!) but I really do love this city despite the difficulties I have had living here. I hope you all enjoy this video tribute to my second home, Yanji!
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I really enjoyed your video. Thanks for giving us a glimpse into this far away yet fascinating part of China. I love the fact that people get together and dance in open spaces! Looking to seeing more of your videos.
You're very sweet! Thank you
Hey Sarah, I am 조선족..! Greetings from London 😁 So glad to see my hometown and thank you for making this great video so that many people can know about yanji and chaoxianzu. Good luck on your adventure..!! BTW your pronunciation is on point 👍🏻👍🏻
Thank you!!!! I loved Yanbian and hope to return someday!
Are you planning to move back to your hometown in the future? 😊
I feel like going to that area just so I can randomly dance 😂😂😂
My lovely home town, went to high school there, and that college front gate at 4:53, used to pass by every single day.
Loved this video. I am reading a book with a few scenes set in Yanji, so I wanted to learn a little more about the area and I came across your video. Thanks!
What book?? I'm so curious!
I love the style of this video Sarah! Thanks for taking us around and showing us all of these things! Great job!
Thanks so much!
You’re very welcome hun!😁😊❤️
3:05 im sorry, i laughed when that song came on 😂😂😂
10년전에 연길 잠깐 살았는데 다시보니 감회가 새롭네요 :)
I'm living in Yanji for three years. One of the coolest place in northern china
Agreed!
I had this question for Sarah and would also like to hear her response but I just read your comment and you be able to answer this question since you lived there for 3 years ?
Do you think someone who speaks fluent Korean would be able to interact with a lot of people in conversation in yanji or would they be better off speaking fluent mandarin?
Yanbian Korea in a brand new Korea. Yanbian Korea is very similar to North Korea.
those lamb skewers are so good.
You look great! And the video was great, too! Hilarious watching the old men watch you recording, like what is that chick doing. Lol. Keep posting videos!
Very cooll city
I love you sharing videos like this; it reminds me of why I'm working so hard on this Fulbright scholarship. If I get it and you're still in Korea next year and you want a new friend, it'd be cool to meet up sometime! Till then, keep doing what you love.
Yes definitely!
Is there anything else you want to know about Yanji? Let me know in the comments section below!
SarahsSeoulSearch 맥사라 孟欣怡 there are professors from English speaking countries or few of them are Gyopos ! Like have u talked to foreign expats while u are there ? also nice to chat with them !
@@adamjosephyoungdokim7667 I haven't spent a lot of time with other foreigners because I am not affiliated with the university officially :( I have run into some people accidentally though and they have been nice!
You're living my dream!
Thank you so much!
한국어 중국어가 통하는 지역 연변延边 현재 코로나19 확진자 없는곳이 연변에 있는 연길이예요.
I just came to know that Yanji is also the region in China where many North Korean escapees are hiding.
If they are caught they face execution back in North Korea.
It kinda shocks me while many people make fun over there while thousands of others are fearing for their life out there all day.
Someday I gotta go there and check out Yanji ! Also make sure that I buy 연변개고기라면 ! Or else I’d have friends to ship it to me here in Canada 呵呵
lolol I still haven't gotten around to trying it! maybe in my last week here? haha
연변에도 개고기 라면 금지됬습니다.
Wow, this video was really well-made. Did you hire someone to help you? The only bad thing was a few of the sped-up walking transitions that were still a bit long, but on the whole it had a professionally-made vibe.
My friend helped me film and edit! But everything was filmed on my phone actually :D I want to do more videos in this style in the future now that I know I can!
Are there some young people in Yanji and where can you find them
thanks for the tour :)
Is there really places to eat dog meat in Yanji? I am going next week and out of pure curiosity would like to try. I have been to 18 provinces in China in this trip and have never seen it before
There were a ton when I made this video. I’m not sure if that’s changed but I think you should be able to find at least one
The square dancing looks like a great activity for elderly.
It is! I feel like China can be quite a nice place to be a retiree in terms of social life, things to do, etc.
@@sarahsseoulsearch Asian elderly just can't sit tight and do nothing it seems.
Did you go near the North Korean Border?
Many Koreans are high-quality people!!
The North Korean books seem really interesting! What are they about? How easy is it for you to read them (ie how distinct is the DPRK language from Korean in the south)? What other influences of North Korea have you seen in the university?
They have stuff on just about everything. Biographies of the Kims, cabinet notes, newspapers, film magazines, farming handbooks etc. The language is intelligible with some training (some are completely different words such as 핸드폰 -> 손전화; 한국어 -> 조선말; 아이스크림 -> 얼음과자 등, some are just different spellings of the same words like 이해하다 -> 리해하다; 세계역사 -> 세계력사; 여성 -> 녀성 등). Yanbian Korean is heavily influenced by the North Korean lexicon, spelling and pronunciation since they have had the most mutual contact over the long term. South Korean is definitely the language of prestige now though; young people can switch between local Korean and South Korean pretty effortlessly because SK dramas and media are so pervasive here and speaking the language of the land where there is money is good for advancement opportunities. There are also tons of Mandarin (센터 -> 중심, 미용실 -> 미발)and Japanese loan words (화장실 -> 벤소깐, 팬티 -> 빤쯔) here that are not used in South or North Korea as well as some pure Korean words (꼬치 -> 뀀). Yanbian Korean is so creative and expressive, I really love it. Unfortunately its dying as South Korean and Mandarin are taking over :( I feel so fortunate to have been here at this point in time; Yanji is such a special place and it is changing fast.
@@sarahsseoulsearch
Thanks for replying! Wow, those books are quite a resource then. That's a really fascinating syncretic culture.
@十선비 haha thanks!! I really like 연변말 actually I think its such a creative language
Definitely ♡
Hello Sarah. I learn the Korean language. Do you think it is possible to spend time in Yanji if I speak Korean, but not Chinese?
yes you can definitely get around
Sooo beautiful ❤️🌹
nice👍, not a lot of videos on this topic/area
Thank you for making this video, I have a question ?
Do you think someone who speaks fluent Korean would be able to interact with a lot of people in conversation in yanji or would they be better off speaking fluent mandarin?
Mandarin would be better because they could speak to 100% of people there (Most Korean speakers also speak Mandarin) but Korean would get you pretty far with about 40% of the population.
Strange that they call themselves Chaoxianzu, which translates to Joseon people instead of Han Guo Ren (Korean people).
'zu' means ethnicity, and 'ren' means people. so like Han Guo Ren is Korean People as you said, and Chao Xian Zu would be Ethnic Korean (old term Korea, 조선). and there are 56 ethnic ity in china, so...
@@두마리메뚜기 Yeah sorry, it's difficult for me to translate Chinese to English, as English is not my first native language.
Guo means country. Thats basically saying they're South Koreans 💀
Not sure if anyone commented before, but I believe Yanji should be 연길, not literally 옌지 (I noticed that you spell it that way in your thumbnail).
In Yanbian Korean, it's spelled 연길, and in Mandarin, it's called Yanji. However in the KOrean used in most of the world it is called 옌지, hence why I spelled it that way in the thumbnail, since the video is for people who are not from Yanji.
Hi, i would like to ask you a question. I was told that Yanbian Koreans aka Joseonjok aka Chosonjok is a sensitive topic among the South Koreans. Do you have a clue? Many thanks!
Hi, I would say that yes, it is a sensitive topic. Chosonjok face a lot of discrimination in South Korea and they are often portrayed in the media as criminals, or used as scapegoats during elections (people will say that Chosonjok disguised as Koreans went to the polls and voted, which is to my knowledge not possible because they don't have Korean citizenship cards. There may have been a few instances though I haven't seen reports on it, but I highly highly doubt it would be enough to change the results of an election).
In South Korea they are rejected as Koreans and subjugated to do the work that South Koreans don't want to do (construction, kitchen work, factory work, housemaids, etc) but if they call themselves Chinese (which they are - their passport is from mainland China) or use the money they earned to invest in real estate, education etc. in China (kind of like how hundreds of thousands if not millions of Koreans did in Germany, the United States, etc. after the Korean War ahem ahem) people get all up in arms about how they have somehow betrayed their Korean identity. It's to the point that well-meaning people I have talked to about this think that the word Chosonjok (which is literally just a transliteration of a Chinese word that means "a person of Korean ethnicity") is a slur because they are so seldom talked about in a positive way.
It's not everyone that thinks like this, but it's definitely a fair amount. It makes me sad because I know a lot of really kind Chosonjok people and I enjoyed living in Yanji for the most part. Also, their food is absolutely bomb (think South Korean food without all the sugar - it's delightful). China has a lot of problems and not every Chosonjok person is an angel or anything, but the same can be said about South Korea. There are no perfect people or countries on this planet.
I think it comes down to this idea that there is only one "correct" way to be Korean in South Korea, and you can't really be "Korean" + anything else at the same time. I believe this is a vestige of the Korean War, when South Korea had to defend its "Koreanness" against North Koreans, who were portrayed as "the wrong type of Korean". There is a concept called "danil minjok" that was taught in Korean schools until very recently that propagated the idea that the Korean race is all one people descended from a common bloodline, and that because of this their culture, way of life, thinking etc. is the same. You don't have to leave South Korea to see that this isn't true - ask anyone about the rivalry between Honam (Southwest) and Yeongnam (Southeast) and chances are they will have strong opinions. But anyway this kind of thinking is not very open to cultural or other differences (or hyphenated identities - in the US it's totally accepted to be both Korean and American, or Italian-American, etc), especially when those differences occur within the "bloodline" supposedly shared between South Koreans and members of the Korean diaspora.
There are other groups of ethnic Koreans such as Zainichi in Japan, Gyopos from North America, Koryo Saram from former Soviet republics etc. that also face a unique set of struggles in South Korea. However, I still think that the Chosonjok are the most widely disliked, possibly because Korea feels threatened by China (and there are legitimate reasons for that, though it doesn't excuse discrimination against Chinese people who had nothing to do with their government's policies) and those feelings are being passed off onto Chinese people more generally. Despite this, they are also by far the most numerous, comprising nearly a third of all foreign residents in the country.
@@sarahsseoulsearch thank you so much for this explanation!! I am a Joseonjok living in America, and having previously lived in South Korea when I was really young, I found this so helpful!
@@Hoonie-gd5je I am really glad you found it helpful! I love Chosonjok culture and met so many wonderful people in Yanji ♡
Well i wouldn't generalized 50 million south Koreans some look down and some don't it's basically like every country.
Heck even some Hong Kong Chinese look down on mainland.
Its not everybody, but it is a huge proportion of people I've met. I know several people who thought the word chosonjok was a swear word because its nearly always used in a negative context :/ I've had people here in South Korea argue with me about how terrible yanbian is when they've never even been their and their only exposure to that region is south korean media created to make yanbian look bad -,- even when I told them I lived there and did research there they tried to tell me my own experience was incorrect. Its extremely frustrating
I'm a korean chinese minority that knows nothing about this place, and learned it from an american girl☠️ i need to go there in the future.
Is it safe to backpack in Yanbian? Any snatch theft case?
I never had anything like that happen but its always good to travel light and keep track of your things :)
연변은 세계에서 제일 안전한곳 한지역입니다.
nice video
연실시 X 연길시 O
This comment might get here a bit too late, but there's something interesting about the integration of Han and ethnic minority cultures.
Kinda feels interesting when there's Mandarin posted alongside Uyghur, Tibetan, or Korean, for example.
It definitely is really interesting! Chinese bilingual education and signage policy is very fascinating to me :)
@@sarahsseoulsearch Preservation of ethnic culture on one, formal integration into mainstream on the other
Hi Sarah, thanks for these updates. I was just wondering, what proportion of the people at Yanji and Yanbian more broadly would be ethnic Korean? Would it be fair to say that the young ethnic Koreans are less likely to know Korean proficiently? Is the Korean spoken there quite different in accent and vocabulary to the Korean you know? Thanks
The current proportion is probably about 1/3. It used to be double that but a lot of Chaoxianzu have emigrated to Korea, Japan, and other areas of China. Young people still speak Korean pretty well on average but this might be the last generation that does because so many Korean schools are closing as a result of the emigration :/ and the Korean is super different. Closer to North Korean than South Korean but more influence than either of those from Japanese (this area was part of Imperial Japans puppet state Manchuoko during ww2) and Mandarin. It's super interesting but has also been really hard to learn lol. I can understand it if I try but I am terrible at speaking it >
@@sarahsseoulsearch Thanks so much for your answers. It is absolutely fascinating to learn about this from watching your videos, and from your responses.
@선비 there's no such thing as ethnic north or south Koreans. The Koreans are one ethnicity
@lucky _ are you dumb?
There's only one ethnic Korean which is KOREAN there is no north or south.
i was so stupid not going there in 2019 like you did
Do they have a " floor culture"?
조선족(朝鲜族chaoxianzu)=korean Chinese朝鲜民族줄여서 朝鲜族(조선족) 민족으로 따지면 조선족은 조선민족이고 조선민족은 북한식 발음이라서 한국에서 말하는 한민족 고려인 하고는 같은 말이고 같은 민족이 맞아요.
Nice eyes 👀
How are the crime rates in yanji. I heard it’s pretty dangerous there
연변에서 한국어를 배웠나요?
연변은 조선족학교가있습니다. 조선인들이 다닐수있는 학교구요. 한국에서 말하는 한국어 저희는 조선어라고합니다. 조선글은 한국어라기보단 저희 조선민족이 공용으로 사용하는 언어이기도합니다.
As a chinese. I would never ever be able to eat dog meat
1:54 Oppa Gangnam Style!
Les peuple blancs d asie
Dog meat soup 🍜 😳
4:59 대학교? But it says 대학 in the behind? Are you smuggling peninsular terminology😾😾😾
They use 대학 in Yanbian Korean as a literal translation of 延边大学
@@sarahsseoulsearch but you said 대학교 4:59
I probably just misspoke ^^; some people call it 연변대학교 too
so you ate dog already
I didn't eat it but there is nothing wrong with other people eating it.
exact
What do I taste like?
You are obviously racist buddy.
Did you say dog meat soup..? 🤮🤮
We eat much more strange, unnatural and unhealthy things in the US 🤷 Unless you're a vegan who doesn't eat pork or calimari (pigs and octopus are both smarter than dogs) or any other kind of animal, you are being hypocritical when you criticize what other people eat.
In the US, dogs are pets while cows are raised for meat and milk. In India, where many Hindus believe that cows are sacred animals, this would be unthinkable, but no one is smacking your hamburger out of your hand while you eat it in your home country. Muslims are forbidden from eating pork, but no one is stopping you from eating bacon in the morning with your breakfast. Why do so many people feel like they can shame Asian people for eating dog meat when they have historically been raised to be eaten just like cows, chickens, pigs, and other animals are in the West?
Many people in the world have not been so lucky as to have cheap and readily-available meat available to them whenever they want it - just a few decades ago, many people in the region where this video was filmed were constantly on the verge of starvation and couldn't have any meat at all for most of the year. How can I judge them for what they chose to eat to stay alive when I have never had to make that decision before in my life? Why can't the people who live there pass down their culinary heritage in the exact same way my ancestors did? Why is it so much worse for someone to eat dog meat soup than hot dogs or beef stroganoff? Heck, why is it more "normal" for someone to drink bottles of carbonated corn syrup and silicone, feed their child cups of Jello made from the collagen extracted from pig bones, or drink a Starbucks pink drink colored with ground up beetles?
The conditions of the farms are often not great, and I would love to see that problem be addressed. However, we have to keep in mind that the same can be said for factory farms in the United States and several other countries, where pigs and cows often live their entire lives in miserable, filthy stalls too small for them to even turn around in while machines pump their milk and stab them with needles to make them produce more milk or meat. It's horrible, but everyone who eats the animal products that comes out of those farms is complicit, including myself.
For the record, I have never eaten dog meat - I admit that my culture and my own affection for my pets has made that pyschologically difficult for me. Plus, there are so many other great things to eat in China that I would rather choose those options in most circumstances. However, I don't think I can or should impose my culture's norms to police what people in a completely different country choose to eat.
Why you complaining lol i bet you eat fish , meat , chicken etc which is also animal food.
@sarahsseoulsearch thank you 😭😭 Its so nice seeing someone not being so judgemental
The North Korean books seem really interesting! What are they about? How easy is it for you to read them (ie how distinct is the DPRK language from Korean in the south)? What other influences of North Korea have you seen in the university?
I heard that the southern variants have borrowings from American English
@@thisiskevin1000 not really because they have more Chinese loans than English.
And north Korean language isn't different from south Koreans
They can understand eachother but it's just that the tone of them is different.