Korean Anthropology - Curiosities, Part 1

My fondness for Korea comes from a well whose depths I haven't yet plumbed.  If it were bland and had no contradictions, no maddening habits, no little hypocrisies, I'd be itching to leave for my next adventure (which I am anyway, but I should stop contradicting myself).

For my slowly developing anthropology studies, I offer a few short but endearing snippets. 

Observations and Curiosities in Korea - Part 1

I recently visited an office of a government owned organisation. As I was whisked through the halls and large, featureless open plan areas, I noticed, hanging from the ceiling, small signs that indicated the functional group that sat at that location.  Oddly, the signs were written in both Korean (Hangul characters) and English.  This was odd but helpful as I struggle with my basic Hangul comprehension.  Why write the department names in English? No member of the public ever comes here, and even if there were, Korea is usually abysmal about having useful signs in English or even just using Roman characters.  But it made me happy, as now I could know that 'Finance' sat clustered around this clump of otherwise featureless desks, and 'Personnel' was a mere ten grey steps inward from that, and 'Customer Complaints' were appropriately barricaded in the corner. But that's not the curious bit. 

I then came across the 'Absurdity Reporting Department'.  I stopped to make sure my advancing dyslexia coupled with deteriorating eyesight wasn't acting up. It wasn't.  

I had previously written about feeling sorry for some of the women who work in these Korean mega-companies. Many have completely useless jobs (e.g. official greeters), or are employed in such numbers that they simply overwhelm the task at hand into submission (e.g. the wine section of the supermarkets will typically have up to a dozen staff who will follow you around the shelves, where you pick up one girl for every bottle of wine you buy and who coo and chirp incessantly in your ear (see later article on Outrageous Flirting) if you so much as touch a bottle ).  They are hired simply so that government economic statistics show near full employment for women. But there are very few women engineers or any other job where their brains will be utilised.

But what about these girls in the Absurdity Reporting? I can't imagine this is a dreary non-job. What are the job requirements when hiring?  (" I've read a lot of Kafka and Camus, I'm a big Monty Python fan, and Edward Lear is my favourite poet." )  Are there any dress code issues to match the job? (" Purple chicken costumes must be worn every second Tuesday"). 

I wonder what kind of volume they deal with.... thousands per year?  thousands per month?  Can they get medical assistance for perplexity overload?  What do they say to their husbands / boyfriends when asked how their day went?  (" I got 3 reports today of green aliens directing traffic at the bottom of a swimming pool.")

I wonder if I should report to the Absurdity Reporting Department that I saw an Absurdity Reporting Department?