In Korea, parenting can come with some surprising twists—especially when it comes to safety. My first shock came when my ex-mother-in-law outright refused to use a car seat for my son. But that was only the beginning.
In 2006, after Grandma could no longer help with my son, I found myself on a desperate search for a nanny. As a single foreign mom with no family in Korea, I was in stress mode. I turned to an agency called Kangaroo, and though they were great at sending babysitters, the stories that unfolded were anything but ordinary.
The first time, I came back to an empty home. The nanny had taken my son to her own house. Why? Because I didn’t own a TV, and she didn’t want to miss her drama. Another nanny decided my son needed spiritual intervention and took him to church on a packed public bus where drivers think they’re on the Autobahn—with no food for the entire day. She calmly told me, “God will provide.”
Then, there was the university-aged sitter who hit my son because he refused to eat. I’ll never forget his heart-wrenching cry or the fact that he was curled up in a ball in the corner of the room when she left. I confronted her, and she said without an ounce of remorse, “I hit him because he wouldn’t eat.”
And it didn’t stop there. When my son was four, another nanny let him play outside on the street. You have to understand—this wasn’t the suburbs. And Korean drivers are notorious for speeding, and pedestrians? They don’t get the right of way. It was terrifying.
Later, after my daughter was born in 2008, I faced even more challenges. One sitter turned out to be a heavy drinker, while another elderly woman decided that rice and water was an acceptable diet for my infant daughter.
Some of you might be wondering why I didn’t call the police or get a new agency. But in Korea at that time, things like hitting children or even women were often considered private matters. And as for finding another agency? There simply weren’t any.
As a foreign mom, navigating childcare in Korea was a lesson in both patience and resilience. These experiences made me question not only cultural differences but also the broader approach to safety in Korean parenting.
