Eh, Koreans have a pretty high rate of smoking (this site claims >40% of adult men), so you’re probably just getting sampling bias if most you know don’t smoke. My SO’s friends are all anti-smoking for religious reasons, but when we visited Korea, a lot of people smoked. A lot of people in Asia smoke, it’s nuts.
But yeah, Koreans tend to stick with other Koreans. My in-laws are quite racist against non-Koreans (I get a pass), and while the younger generations are better about it, they still tend to stick with other Koreans. I had a lot of international friends growing up (Vietnamese, Japanese, Taiwanese, etc), but none of them were Korean, despite having a pretty big Korean population where I grew up. I had a good working relationship with one in college when I was dating my SO (he was super good at StarCraft, that’s not just a meme), and I helped him edit his essays.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure N. Korea bans religion, kind of like the USSR, because the leader is supposed to replace God.
South Korea is something like 50% non-religious, and the rest is split between Buddhist and Christian (a bit more Christian than Buddhist). But at least from my experience, Koreans tend to see religion as more of a social club than actual belief, and in the US, they tend to be business networking places instead of places to actually worship. So even a Christian Korean probably wouldn’t be super upfront about it.
Eh, Koreans have a pretty high rate of smoking (this site claims >40% of adult men), so you’re probably just getting sampling bias if most you know don’t smoke. My SO’s friends are all anti-smoking for religious reasons, but when we visited Korea, a lot of people smoked. A lot of people in Asia smoke, it’s nuts.
But yeah, Koreans tend to stick with other Koreans. My in-laws are quite racist against non-Koreans (I get a pass), and while the younger generations are better about it, they still tend to stick with other Koreans. I had a lot of international friends growing up (Vietnamese, Japanese, Taiwanese, etc), but none of them were Korean, despite having a pretty big Korean population where I grew up. I had a good working relationship with one in college when I was dating my SO (he was super good at StarCraft, that’s not just a meme), and I helped him edit his essays.
I will say most koreans I have known are religious (and christian curiously) and come to think of it I don’t recall this guy ever mentioning religion.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure N. Korea bans religion, kind of like the USSR, because the leader is supposed to replace God.
South Korea is something like 50% non-religious, and the rest is split between Buddhist and Christian (a bit more Christian than Buddhist). But at least from my experience, Koreans tend to see religion as more of a social club than actual belief, and in the US, they tend to be business networking places instead of places to actually worship. So even a Christian Korean probably wouldn’t be super upfront about it.