In the dim light of a basement, a loads flawlessly brushed boys kneel in rows, calling out their names.
Muscle, with shiny boy-band hairstyles, they cram side-by-side right into the slim space, waiting for us to make our selection. Outside in the hallway, even more of their colleagues are showing up for an additional evening at work. It is 2am, and also we are their very first consumers.
Concealed beneath the pavements of Seoul's ritziest postcode, Gangnam, the males at Bar 123 belong to an expanding market, which outgrew the long customs of Japanese geisha as well as Korea's kisaeng houses yet with one essential difference - the customers right here are all ladies.
Called "host bars", these all-night alcohol consumption areas use female clients the chance to select and pay for male friends, sometimes at a price of thousands of extra pounds an evening.
Among the women I satisfy at Bar 123 is Minkyoung, a waitressing manager for a first-class resort. Once or twice a month, she states she comes to host bars.
The allure of host bars can be refined. Right here, she states, she has even more interest from her male friends, even more option and also, most importantly, more control.
ADVERTISEMENT
" In routine bars the men that consume alcohol with me have just one objective - to have a casual sex. I don't want that, so that's why I come below, I desire to have fun," she says.
Hosts are worked with by bars similar to this one to supply companionship as well as entertainment. Formally that means pouring drinks for their customers, dancing and also speaking with them, as well as singing karaoke.
Host bar in Seoul
Sex is not officially on deal in a lot of host bars. That would be unlawful however also Minkyoung seems satisfied to tease and also touch with her host, and the guys here estimate that around half the clients desire to pay for sex, either on or off the premises.
James has actually been functioning at Bar 123 for a number of years. In Korean society, he says, there is a great deal of pride as well as discussing a price for sex is never done clearly. Rather, he tells me, it is all to the host's own analysis.
" The guys here are pros - we understand what we're doing," he claims.
" After chatting to a girl for a hr we essentially recognize just how much money she makes and also what she provides for a living. We've currently evaluated her personality and also what she wants to offer."
James as well as other hosts say their customers consist of a few of South Korea's elite, as well as that the cash and also perks available boggle the mind. One client James fulfilled, throughout his first week in the task, asked him to authorize himself over to her for 2 years.
" She said 'allow's make a contract. I've obtained this paper and also I've numbered it 1-5. Whatever you list alongside those numbers, I'll get you.'".
James says at the time he took it as a joke yet since discovered the exact same lady invested 60,000 ($ 97,000) on another host.
" If it happened now, Iwould certainly do it - Iwould certainly be assuming straight.".
Ironically maybe, host bars outgrew among Korea's most entrenched and also, some say, misogynist company traditions - the room beauty parlor. These are private alcohol consumption spaces where teams of males select, as well as are offered by, attractive women people hosting.
It was the people hosting' requirement to allow off steam after work, states expert host Kim Dong-hee, that created the initial demand for host bars, with all-male personnel.
" What these hostesses want is to [make us] do the exact same thing they needed to carry out in their own office. These women are required to do points they don't intend to do for cash.
" I think a lot of them are in pain, as well as a great deal feel lonely. Put simply, they intend to purchase our time and our bodies.".
Hostesses still make up a huge percent of the consumers at host bars right here, yet at Bar 123, for instance, as much as 40% of the consumers on a provided evening are currently from various other profession.
The factors for that expanding allure are linked up in South Korea's rapid financial surge. Within 50 years, the nation changed from post-war destruction to OECD participant.
According to Jasper Kim, head of the Asia-Pacific Global Research Group in Seoul, something important was shed along the means.
" I believe that with all this rapid development comes quick adjustment, and also Koreans simply do not recognize exactly how to deal with it. Increasingly, industrialism is surpassing basic societal standards that you would certainly expect a couple of decades earlier.".
Jasper Kim says South Korea's infamously lengthy working hrs have left several Korean women really feeling lonesome, while the nation's technological advancement has actually left many individuals really feeling separated.
" The human component of Korean culture that existed before merely does not exist today. Individuals are concentrated on modern technology, individuals are concentrated on their tasks, they aren't focused on human relationships anymore.
" In several means, Korean society today sort of reminds me of 1960s culture in the US, where it's on the edge of some kind of social change.".
The grandpa of Seoul's host bar scene, Kim Dong-hee, agrees that a number of the ladies who pertain to host bars are not spending for sex but for companionship, which is why he opened up a brand-new chain of freshly-marketed electrical outlets targeted at the mainstream market - called Red Model Bars.
Red Model Bar hosts.
Photo subtitle,.
Hosts at Red Model Bars can not touch clients.
" Men wish to have aesthetic pleasure as well as wish to feel points, they're responsive. Females like to chat and to pay attention. And also that's why I considered opening up a bar such as this - a sort of dialogue bar.".
Red Model Bars are various to conventional host bars in one essential respect - there is a no-touching rule. Hosts sit on one side of the table, consumers on the other, and also no physical contact is enabled, and certainly no sex.
Probably therefore there is a lack of furtiveness among individuals that work or consume here - the lights are reduced, the decor mostly dark red and also the room is split right into very discreet cubicles, but it is an open-plan room and consumers and also hosts are divided in each cubicle by a huge table.
This new service version depends completely on females paying the matching of hundreds or also hundreds of dollars to speak with attractive boys over a beverage. Still, it seems to be functioning - three brand-new branches result from open this year.
Resting at a table at one end of the bar was one of their regular customers, a florist called Kim Nayu. She tells me she comes right here on a daily basis to meet her much-loved host and discuss issues she is contending work.
The cost for this slice of male interest is $487-650 ( 300-400) a day.
" Talking to friends would be less costly" she confesses, "but they do not pay attention as much. They're busy, and also in a hurry to speak about themselves. Right here, people will certainly pay focus to me and they'll pay attention to me.".
" I spend a great deal of money yet it deserves it for what I get mentally. People pay to head to see a psycho therapist or psychoanalyst, so it's comparable but less stressful.".
Nayu's preferred host Sung-il claims it can be difficult to keep his individual as well as specialist life separate.
" Honestly Iwould certainly be existing if I say I haven't been tempted to take points further with some clients, because we're human, we're males, but there are regulations.".
Among his consumers yapped to her hubby concerning him and when the 3 of them met, Sung-il and also the husband ended up being close buddies.
" No one conceals - the workers do not hide that they function here, and clients can be open as well.".
This openness is posturing a brand-new kind of challenge to South Korean culture, different from the in some cases seedy abyss of traditional host bars as well as their hinterland of male hooking.
By supplying women a "reputable" way to test traditional gender functions and also bend their economic power, these new bars ask questions of Korean culture that are ending up being harder to neglect.
Hear the complete record on BBC Radio 4's Crossing Continents. You can listen using the Radio 4 internet site or by means of the Crossing Continents podcast.
The appeal of host bars can be subtle. Here, she says, she has more attention from her male buddies, even more selection and also, crucially, more control.
James has been functioning at Bar 123 for a pair of years. Instead, he informs me, it is all down to the host's own analysis.
As well as that's why I believed of opening up a bar like this - a kind of discussion bar.".
