Yul’s First Ever Haircut

It took us a few weeks to decide whether to have Yul’s haircut or not. There was a temptation to see how long it could get, but it’s summer and it was getting in his eyes, as well as it starting to look like a mullet. I am Australian, but it doesn’t mean that my kids should have mullets…

Letting it grow was more part of my Australian culture where it’s not unusual for a toddler’s hair to get quite long before their first haircut. Hair before a first haircut is likely to still have “baby curls” as well and once cut they don’t come back if a child’s hair is not naturally curly.

In Korea, mothers often shave their baby’s head while their baby is still very young. This is because of a belief that it will make the baby have thicker hair. Although it’s not exactly true, it does mean the hair grows more uniform after being shaved, which can improve appearance if a baby has very patchy hair. This cultural difference can sometimes cause arguments when a Korean mother in law insists on the baby head shaving, while the foreign daughter in law is horrified. My own mother in law had no problem either way so we had no pressure to shave Yul’s head.

Since we had not done the Korean head shaving thing, Yul had never a proper haircut before. To be honest, it did make me sad to think about the hair he has as a baby being cut off. Once I had reassured myself about the decision, Hugh started to have second thoughts! He then got sad about it as it seems like a big moment and he worried because Yul wouldn’t be able to do a little bun like him anymore.

My other worry was Yul ending up with a very bad haircut. I see a lot of bad kids haircuts all the time! Usually because the mother had tried to do it. I was also hesitant to take Yul to a hairdresser who may have not cut hair like Yul’s. Being a biracial kid, his hair is a bit different from the majority of kids here.

Luckily, our friend Han (a friend who has been on our channel before) has recently trained as a hairdresser! With two biracial children of his own, I knew he’d have the experience to deal with Yul’s hair. And he did an amazing job. I thought Yul had been particularly difficult but apparently he did well! It probably took almost an hour, but well worth it. Han was very patient but also managed a style that really suits Yul.

While we wanted to record this moment for ourselves and our own memories, I also wanted to show the time and effort that goes into a child’s haircut: if you want it to look good. Sometimes the skills of hairdressers are not appreciated, which is why so many kids end up with bad haircuts from parent attempts haha. Let’s value the skill and effort it takes to do a toddler’s hair. We were so happy with the result.

What a difference a haircut makes! Although I loved Yul’s long hair, he is now so handsome with his shorter hair and at first he seemed like a much older boy. Everyone in the neighborhood commented about how great he looks as well. I don’t think he realised how much he has changed, but at least he isn’t getting as hot and sweaty in the summer heat now.

Interviewing Alice about BIGBANG

Hugh interviews Alice about BIGBANG and she goes past YG Entertainment again and asks about BIGBANG again…

What a crazy day it’s been! This story about Alice walking into YG Entertainment has blown up in the Korean media and there have been so many stories about it. We have been completely shocked at how many articles there have been and how many people are talking about it.

Some of them (like YTN) got the story right but others also had misinformation such as ‘MyKoreanHusband channel is run by Sophie’, or that Sophie and I are sisters. Also many Korean commenters are calling Alice a “foreign girl”, which is not true. Alice is Korean. It’s a good time to educate people about different types of Koreans. That’s always one of our goals with our YouTube channel is to educate about multiculturalism. Sophie really wanted to make another video with Alice so that we still had control of the narrative.

Since Sophie and the kids, Alice and Gyo, visited again on Sunday and the way to our apartment passes YG Entertainment, Alice again wanted to ask about BIGBANG. The security guard already knew what she wanted to ask as it was the same one from before! But he was still smiling. Alice was a bit sadder this time.

We show some clips of Alice at the BIGBANG concert in Sydney and dancing around to BIGBANG when she was younger.  We got Hugh to interview her as she is more likely to answer his questions.

On another note: please don’t steal our videos. It’s been unfortunate that some people have taken some and then changed the story or deleted the real story. I do have an edited version of the original video that people can now use. It has embedded credits and our logo at the end. If you want to download this video and use it click here to download. You can use on other social media (but please don’t reupload on YouTube).

Luckily most of the attention has been very positive and it’s been great to see the response.

4 year old walks into YG Entertainment to ask if BIGBANG is there.

Most people will know Sophie and Han’s daughter Alice from several of our videos. The other week Sophie, Alice and baby Gyo were visiting us and the walk from the bus stop goes past YG Entertainment. Alice likes Bigbang and has even been to a Bigbang concert before so she knows the YG building as “Bigbang’s house”. As we were walking back from the shops and passing YG, Alice was asking about Bigbang. We told her that as it’s a Sunday they won’t be there (which is usually true). Since she is so confident she decided to walk right into the YG driveway and ask the security guard if they were there. The security guard was very nice to her but told her they aren’t there. Usually fans are stopped before getting that far but they let her in and the security guard had a smile on his face. Alice speaks more Korean than English so the whole exchange was in Korean.

I posted this video on Instagram and it got a great response so decided to post it on YouTube too. So many people relate to Alice wanting to see Bigbang. Even some Kpop news sites picked up the story.

Thank you to everyone for all the positive comments across social media. Her mother’s Instagram is here.

Here is a photo of Alice earlier in the day:

How much do you wish that you had the confidence of a 4 year old? haha

We’ve had a lot of stuff on lately and haven’t been able to do a ‘Seoul Life’ video but here is a new one finally! As you can see we’ve been busy being 니콜라 이모 and 휴삼촌 (Aunt Nichola and Uncle Hugh).

Hyunwoo (from Talk to Me in Korean) and his family also visited in the afternoon.

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In this video we get hanboks at a special event, we see friends and first snow of the season! Hugh had a lot more to say about the Dokkaebi drama but the camera battery ran out and we had to start that bit again and then he forgot to say what he wanted to. But we’ll talk about it again later!

It was very exciting for YouTubers to get proper hanboks (traditional Korean clothes) like this and to be acknowledged for promoting Korea to an international audience. Hugh was been quite passionate about having a good YouTube community in Korea and has been doing a lot of behind the scenes work to get stuff happening.

We went to the Han river with a bunch of our friends. Han and Sophie and Alice have moved back to Korea! It’s awesome to be able to see them regularly. (Sophie’s blog about raising a bilingual child is here).

We also went with with Hyunwoo and his wife Mikyung and their son Joon. Also our friend Megan Bowen (on YouTube Chonunmigooksaram) came as well. We all live in a similar area in Seoul, so it’s great to be able to spend time together like this. It was a public holiday so there were so many people in the parks at the river, but it was a lot of fun. It’s so nice to see Joon and Alice playing together!

We ask questions to Australian/Korean married couples! How did you meet? What aspects of your partner’s culture have you adopted? Best and worst things about international/intercultural relationships? Advice or other couples?

Big thank you to everyone who helped us make this video!

Check out Rachel and Nick’s YouTube channel, The Drunken Bear here.

Check out Sophie’s blog on raising a bilingual child here.

There is a reason why we don’t do these videos regularly: they sure are a pain to edit! But we had been wanting to do something like this for a long time. This video is just Australian/Korean couples, but we may in the future do another video with a bigger mix of people. We wanted to focus on the culture rather than race aspects, as too often people focus on race and what people look like. But culture is what we should be talking about. How do you navigate and international and intercultural marriage? It’s an ongoing exploration and discussion.

(A video with Korean subs will be coming).

Another quick video in our Australian summer series! You may be wondering how this group of people actually came together. Some of us grew up in the same areas, or went to the same schools, and then only later in life have reconnected because we’ve all married into Korean families. Other people we’ve met through the blog or through Korean classes. Australia is becoming more and more multicultural and as the Korean population grows, the more common multicultural families with Australians and Koreans are becoming. It’s great being friends with other couples and families in similar situations, and with some of us living in Korea and some of us living in Australia, it’s rare that all of us can come together like this.

We didn’t plan to do much for New Year’s Eve but we ended up at a cool apartment and then close to the fireworks! We were really lucky.

It’s rare for all of us to be together. Han and Sophie (and Alice) live in Australia, but Daniel and Chloe and us live in Korea. Daniel and Han are both sometimes in our Ask Korean Guys videos with Hugh. While the three wives (me, Sophie and Chloe) are all close friends. It was great to all be together.

Make sure you watch to the end to see the BIGBANG dancing and singing!