Two Sides of Family Servitude

"Queen of Tears" and "Because This is My First Life" explore gender expectations in ancestral rituals

Today is the last day of the year. For many Korean families, this means that tomorrow morning will include 떡국/tteokguk for breakfast. This delicious, hearty dish symbolizes good luck and wealth. It’s thought that the oval shape of the rice cake is similar to the 엽전/yeopjeon, a coin used in the Joseon Dynasty. (Personally, I don’t see it.)

People always ask me to share recipes. Unlike my mother, I’m not a good cook. I mean, I can cook, but I don’t enjoy it. But like my mother, I don’t use recipes (except for baking desserts). I use the same method as my mother: 손맛/son-mat, which literally translates to tasting by hand — you know, add a little bit of this or that to taste. However, I always tell people that if they want an easy-to-follow recipe for authentic Korean food, check out Maangchi's letter’s recipes here.

goawaywithjae

A post shared by @goawaywithjae

Tonight, many Korean families will be prepping for their 제사/jesa — or ancestral memorial — on New Year’s Day. Traditionally, it’s the oldest son’s family who holds the jesa to honor the deceased on the paternal side. And by oldest son’s family, I mean the son’s wife. Because she is the one who will be doing all (or the majority) of the hard labor.

My mother — the oldest son’s wife — did all the jesa cooking for decades, even after we moved to the United States. Every New Year’s Day, my mother would wake up around 4 a.m. and begin a five-hour marathon of cooking beef, fish, jeon, rice, japchae, soups, vegetables, and dozens of sides making up the banchan. This doesn’t include all the prep work of marinating, dicing, slicing, chopping she did in the days leading up to the jesa. Sometimes an aunt or two would arrive early on New Year’s Day to help a bit, but the burden was almost entirely on my mother.

Meanwhile, my father had the easier job of setting the dining room table with photos of my paternal grandparents and great-grandparents, as well as my eldest uncle, who had died as a teenager. All the food my mother prepared was set before the photos, along with goblets of wine. My parents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles and I would all bow in memory of our loved ones. My dad would then open the door, which was symbolic. It allowed our ancestors to enter our home and enjoy a meal before the rest of us. About half an hour later, we would all dig into the delicious food my mother had made.

Interestingly enough, many Korean Christians don’t participate in jesa, because they view bowing to ancestors as proselytizing to another God. One of the reasons why there is a fair number of Korean Catholics is because Pope Pius XII realized he could get more Koreans to convert to Catholicism if the church viewed jesa as a civil practice, rather than a religious ritual.

Note: 51% of South Koreans don’t adhere to any religion.

I am neither the son or the eldest in my family, but hosting the annual jesa is something that wouldn’t happen anymore if I didn’t do it. So I do it, partially to honor our family’s ancestors, but mostly to ease my mother’s mind. Some customs are still very much embedded in her heart.

So tonight, I cook. And tomorrow, I cook. And while it won’t be nearly the feast that my mother prepared for years and years and years, it will still be a nice day of spending time with family.

With all that said … for my final newsletter of 2024, I wanted to take a brief look at how jesas are presented in the K-dramas “Queen of Tears” and “Because This is My First Life.”

“Queen of Tears”

Hae-in’s parents hadn’t allowed her to include Hyun-woo in her will, because they didn’t think he was worthy of it. In fact, their overall disdain for the men who married into the Hong family is succinctly depicted during the preparations for jesa — a labor-intensive memorial for their ancestors. Traditionally, the women — the daughters-in-law specifically — are saddled with spending at least one full day (but probably more) cooking a feast for extended family and then cleaning up afterwards.

Korean mothers used to warn their daughters not to marry a man who was the oldest son in his family, because it’s the oldest son’s wife who is expected to prepare that family’s jesa. Way back in the day, marrying the oldest son had some benefits, since it was he who automatically got all of his parents’ assets after they died. That’s no longer the case.

But in an interesting twist on gender expectations here, it’s the male in-laws who married into the Hong family who are expected to do all the cooking. When Hae-in’s pampered younger brother, Soo-cheol, comes into the kitchen to give the men a pep talk, he doesn’t hear how contradictory he sounds telling them that men should do all this work … and yet he doesn’t help at all. This accentuates the pecking order: the in-laws aren’t real family members and should consider themselves lucky to be there in whatever capacity is demanded of them.

By contrast, Hyun-woo’s mother, Bong-ae, has no interest in subjugating her elder son’s wife. She tells her daughter-in-law that being a part of their family shouldn’t be a burden. She encourages the younger woman to visit her parents on holidays. It’s not because she wants to get rid of her DiL, but because she loves and respects her so much and knows that her own son isn’t a great catch. (She never has this conversation with Hae-in, because no mother-in-law would ask her prominent daughter-in-law to do any cooking or cleaning. And, also, Hyun-woo is quite the catch.)

These sub plots revolving around jesa feel very pointed, addressing serious issues that reflect on reality and why getting married isn’t the be-all end-all for women that some would have you believe.

The expectations of the daughter-in-law needing to do all the work prepping for a jesa is depicted very well in “Because This is My First Life,” which I will address briefly below.

“Because This is My First Life”

Their parents are unaware that their marriage is a business arrangement. At the first meeting between both sets of parents, Ji-ho’s mother can see that Se-hee’s parents believe Ji-ho is lucky to marry into their family. Worried that her daughter will be mistreated because she doesn’t come from a good (i.e. rich) family, she bitterly voices her concerns.

And when it comes time to hold the annual 제사 (ancestral memorial), her mother is proven correct. Se-hee has already said he won’t attend and tells Ji-Ho not to go. But guilted into it by his mom, she goes and is immediately put to work doing everything, while all her in-laws sit around and relax.

While there is no jesa story arc in “Fight for My Way,” gender/class dynamics are explored. One of the women in a long-term relationship is treated like a servant by her boyfriend’s family, because her mother is poor and is of a lower class than they are. When his mom calls her to come over alone, it’s so she can use the younger woman to do all the things they don’t want to do.

And even though that’s just laborious, additional work for her, she does it, because she believes it’s good practice for when she and her boyfriend get married.

After all, isn’t this what a good daughter-in-law is supposed to do?

This is my last newsletter of 2024. I wanted to thank all of you for your comments, suggestions, and — most importantly — words of encouragement and faith in my writing. I wish for you a safe and happy New Year’s Eve, followed by your best year possible in 2025.

---