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David D. Lee

Choi Hyung-suk, 29, faintly remembers the first time he went on a blind date.
“It was 10 years ago when I was in college, and I remember walking to the restaurant where the date was with no nerves at all,” said the employee at an NGO in Seoul.
“I said ‘yes’ when a friend asked me to go on a date with one of her classmates, just the same as I would have if I was asked to dinner by a friend.”
Choi says he is not the only person in South Korea with an easy-going attitude towards blind dates, which are fairly commonplace on college campuses.
“It’s like Tinder except your friend is the app, telling you to swipe left or right,” he said, comparing the process of going on a blind date to the popular dating app that allows users to select a potential mate by swiping at other’s photos.

A 2019 survey by SK Careers Journal found that 70 per cent of college respondents in South Korea had gone on at least one blind date, with 37 per cent saying they had been on between two and five. Group blind dates between colleges are even a thing, with 10 or more students meeting up at a time.
Among Koreans in their 30s, the proportion of singles seeking love without looking first is higher still – 87 per cent of respondents to a 2013 survey conducted by D.noble, a matchmaking service geared towards clients looking for marriage partners, said they had been on at least one blind date while almost half said they had gone on two or more.
In neighbouring China, only 40 per cent of Zhenai users aged 25 or older had been on a blind date before, according to the online dating platform, which nonetheless estimated that 70 per cent of the country’s 240 million singles had been on a blind date at some point in their lives.
The US-based website DatingAdvice, meanwhile, which professes to be the “authority on all things dating”, says 43 per cent of Americans have been on a blind date.
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Blind dates are seen by some as a part of South Korea’s social fabric, providing a rite of passage, a gateway to relationships and possible future marriages. Yet even here, in recent years dating apps have begun to muscle in on the more traditional route of being recommended by a friend.
Noondate, which matches a user with one new person every day at noon, is one of the most popular – claiming to have been used by half the country’s singletons at one point or another.
“We estimate that there are about 8 million singles in the country, and our app has had 3.39 million users since it launched in 2010,” said a representative. “And membership numbers are increasing 30 to 50 per cent every year.”
College students can use Campusting, an app tailored towards their dating needs by taking into account factors such as age, class, major and location, while those looking for a more traditional matchmaking service can use marriage consultancy Duo Info Corporation, which has almost doubled its membership from fewer than 17,000 members in 2006 to more than 31,000 today.

Kim Sang-eun, a company spokeswoman, said the major reason people increasingly seek out the consultancy’s services is that finding a marriage partner is not as easy as it used to be.
“As the reasons and values a person holds in a marriage is becoming ever-so diversified, it’s becoming more difficult to find partners who view marriage the same way,” she said.
Kim’s company matches clients who express similar preferences for what they are looking for in a partner such as age, occupation and relationship style.
“Our members don’t just consider the other person’s occupation or house, they also look at the values the other person holds towards marriage,” she said. “Since our clients have decided that they want to get married, they are making sure by hiring us that they are in the driver’s seat when choosing their partners for life.”
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The stress of fast-paced modern lifestyles that have people rushing between work, school and home every day means they “don’t have a chance at romance”, the 27-year-old spokeswoman added.
This sentiment was echoed by 28-year-old software developer Jeon S.Y., who like Kim is based in Seoul and says he does not have enough time to meet new people.
Because “there are virtually no women” at the company where he works, Jeon decided to use an app called Somoim that helps its 2 million users organise into clubs and hold regular, often weekly, meet-ups.
There are clubs for tennis players, hiking enthusiasts and those that just want to meet up and have a drink. Jeon joined one for Japanese speakers.
“Most of the members in my Japanese-speaking club are there to meet people to date,” he said, adding that he has been on about 10 blind dates so far.
“My latest blind date last month was the only time that I felt good about the person sitting in front of me, as most times differences in personalities and values make it hard to go on second dates.”
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While Jeon holds out hope of finding someone special on a date, sometimes going out on consecutive weekends to do so, Choi, the 29-year-old NGO worker, has learnt to manage his expectations.
“Especially with dates that I find through apps, I tend to go to the dates with low expectations,” he said. “There’s a sense that these blind dates are not as serious as relationships formed through personal connections.”
A bigger problem for those looking for love in South Korea nowadays might simply be that there are fewer prospective partners to go around.
In 2017, the number of people aged 15-64 decreased for the first time in the country’s history, while those aged 65 and older came to account for more than 14 per cent of the population. And births are falling, too – hitting an all-time low of 357,771 in 2018.


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Forget Tinder, in South Korea blind dates are best for romance

In South Korea, traditional blind dates are still giving apps like Tinder a run for their money. Photo: DPA

Choi Hyung-suk, 29, an NGO worker in Seoul. Photo: David Lee

SEO10:KOREA-WEDDING:SEOUL,7FEB99 - Some of the more than 25,000 couples from around the world pray during a mass wedding ceremony at the Unification Church Blessing '99 at the Chamsil Olympic Stadium in Seoul February 7. Presided over by the Reverend and Mrs. Sun Myung Moon, known to their congregation as "the true father and mother of all mankind," the mass wedding ceremony was broadcast by satellite and the internet to participants in 185 countries and is, according to church officials, the culmination of 360 million couples who have taken the vows at the centre of the ceremony. pb/Photo by Paul Barker REUTERS

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epa08177349 South Korean officials wearing Royal Guard uniforms with protection masks, perform the changing of the guard ceremony at Deoksugung Palace in Seoul, South Korea, 30 January 2020. The Royal Guard Changing Ceremony is a popular spectacle for tourists visiting Seoul. South Korea has so far reported four cases of the SARS-like coronavirus, which originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan and has so far killed over 160 people with nearly 6,000 infected, mostly in China. EPA-EFE/JEON HEON-KYUN

(FILES) This file picture taken on August 7, 2019 and shows Japan's lawmaker Shinjiro Koizumi(L) and television anchorwoman Christel Takigawa (R) speaking to the media at prime minister's office in Tokyo. - Japanese Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said January 15 he would take paternity leave, the first such declaration by a serving cabinet minister in a nation struggling with the world's lowest birthrates. (Photo by STR / JIJI PRESS / AFP) / Japan OUT / XGTY

A woman in traditional Korean hanbok dress wears a face mask as she visits at Gyeongbokgung palace in Seoul on January 30, 2020. - South Korea will send chartered planes to the Chinese city of Wuhan this week to return hundreds of its citizens to Korea, the foreign ministry said, amid concerns about the spread of the SARS-like virus. (Photo by Jung Yeon-je / AFP)

Imperial guards wear protective face masks during a reenactment of the Royal Guards Changing Ceremony in front of Deoksu Palace in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Jan. 30, 2020. The death toll rose to 170 in the new virus outbreak in China on Thursday as foreign evacuees from the worst-hit region begin returning home under close observation and world health officials expressed "great concern" that the disease is starting to spread between people outside of China. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

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EXO's Chen has broken countless hearts with his announcement that he plans to marry his girlfriend. Photo: Instagram

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Don’t Worry Village: welcome to South Korea’s retreat for stressed millennials

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A group of Don't Worry Village residents. Photo: Don't Worry Village

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‘Tinder tourists’: Indonesian sex workers turn to online dating apps for safety and to set their own rules

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R16BXX Silhouette of trees and a man walking while looking at his mobile phone, against a beach sunset .

BJ529H Young happy asian couple enjoying their time outdoors

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Many in South Korea see blind dates as part of the social fabric: a rite of passage as well as a gateway to relationships and possible future marriages
Yet even here, in recent years dating apps have begun to muscle in on the traditional route of being recommended by a friend



Many in South Korea see blind dates as part of the social fabric: a rite of passage as well as a gateway to relationships and possible future marriages.


Forget Tinder, in South Korea blind dates are best for romance

Many in South Korea see blind dates as part of the social fabric: a rite of passage as well as a gateway to relationships and possible future marriages Yet even here, in recent years dating apps have begun to muscle in on the traditional route of being recommended by a friend

Many in South Korea see blind dates as part of the social fabric: a rite of passage as well as a gateway to relationships and possible future marriages

Yet even here, in recent years dating apps have begun to muscle in on the traditional route of being recommended by a friend