An ajumma is a certain type of Korean woman. She is probably over 65 years old. Also, she is tiny! Ajummas are like 4’6” and weigh something like 75 lbs. They are also quite fond of dying their very short hair shoeshine black and perming it into super tight curls. On top of this, ajummas don’t care about conventional fashion. An ajumma will wear plaid, fuchsia parachute pants with a gold, silver and red flowered sparkly sweater and dare you to say something.
During the summer, ajummas take on a whole new level of ajumma-ness. In the summer, they go into Suntan Avoidance Mode. In Korean culture, pasty white skin is highly valued and ajummas believe this more than anyone else. They will go out in the middle of an August afternoon completely covered from head to toe. They will wear long sleeved shirts, long pants, closed shoes, and gloves. On top of it, they will wear the biggest sun visor that you have ever seen. Those things seriously look like welding helmets. It’s insane.
What I like most about ajummas are their attitudes. Ajummas run this country. No one dares to cross them. They will do the most socially inappropriate things and no one says a word. I’ve been yelled at, elbowed, body checked, and made to move by random ajummas all over Korea. Why? Because that’s what ajummas do. They do what they want and you can’t say a word because they are old ladies and this country has great respect for their elders. Plus, an ajumma will give you this crazy evil eye look that kinda makes you want to cry and apologize for even thinking that she had no right to elbow you in the kidney like that. That’s just how they are.
I’ve come to the conclusion that my own grandmother, Nanny, was really a white ajumma. Nanny was aggressive, loud, sarcastic, and made random people cry all the time. She would have fit right in with the Korean ajummas.
Like any bully, ajummas travel in gangs. I think they do this in case someone tries to stand up to them. They always have backup in case the young try to revolt against being pushed around the subway.
Technically, in Korean, ajumma means something to the effective of “a married woman or a woman old enough to be married.” So, that currently makes me an ajumma. The slang meaning of ajumma is quite different. The slang meaning is the one that I am using here.
Younger Korean women tend to be the absolute opposite of ajummas. They are kind, polite, and very fashionable. Plus, they are of normal heights. I’m not sure exactly when a Korean woman becomes an ajumma. Is it a gradual process or, on your 65th birthday, do you just morph into a hardcore ajumma? I’ll have to investigate so that I too can become an ajumma.
All in all, I have a lot of work ahead of me. But, if I can become ruder, more aggressive, and figure out how to somehow shrink nine inches, I too will one day be an ajumma.
These ajummas are rocking their big visors.----------
This is a fine example of the Ajumma Perm.----------
This woman is not quite an ajumma. She doesn't have the hair. Plus, she isn't wearing any odd prints. She does, however, have the visor and her jacket has strange bedazzling on the sleeves. I think she might be 64 years old and, therefore, not a full ajumma.----------
These women are hardcore ajummas. I actually took this picture shortly after they pushed me. I was just about to step onto the escalator when I was shoved aside by the first ajumma. They all then jumped onto the escalator. I took a picture of them from the back but, I wasn't brave enough to take a picture of their faces. I really didn't want to add "Beat Down by Ajummas" to my list of experiences in Korea.----------
Ahahaha...hilarious!! I totally understand that...in Asian countries, they don't mess w/ their elders. I'm sorry you are getting pushed around by them though, but better by grandmas than by gang bangers eh?
ReplyDeleteThey're also some of the most hardcore fitness people in Korea.
ReplyDeleteDuDe!!!! Can I join you? We can make a deal to all meet up when we are 65 and form our own ajumma gang. We will be known as the "AJUMMA-nators!" We will be feared and respected! =)
ReplyDeletePriscilla, we can so create an ajumma gang! Like I said, they don't travel alone so, we def. have to be ajummas together.
ReplyDeleteWe lived in Korea 1965-1985, and it was the same then. The ajummas were the "aunties" who raised everyone's children. The ajumma's over 60, having completed the five cycles of the Asian calendar of 12 years, had arrived. No one could control them anymore; they were finally their own women. Their interesting ways in those years, at least outside the big cities, were the choices to smoke, and to go to the beach with their ajumma friends and bury each other (nude) in the sand, up to their necks. Sometimes in the hottest weather they'd go topless in public. It was fascinating to us, because we knew that in those days, up to that 60th birthday, they had been totally under the thumb of father, husband or son. Now they came into their own. And boy, could they be terrors as mothers-in-law, though I must admit, I've heard of some very loving, caring mothers-in-law as well.
ReplyDeleteLoved your blog!
ReplyDelete