Just because you deny something doesn't mean it doesn't exist...

I am learning many things about the Korean culture that I guess should not shock me. Over this past weekend and friend of mine and I went to a women's shelter in the city of Daegu to donate supplies. Now let me give you a little background on Daegu. Daegu is a city of about 3 million people, it also is the home of three United States military bases, Camp Walker being one of them. One thing that you find in cities this large is homelessness. The people in Korea (I guess I should not generalize), I will say the people of very conservative Andong like (most conservative places) like to think that their city, state, province or country is a utopia. No one is homeless, the divorce rate is minimal or nonexistant, the alcoholism is also at a minimum. The thing is just because you are in denial does not mean that it doesn't exist. The question that I got from a 100% of the Koreans about this shelter was it for foreigners. When I said no it was nothing but Koreans at this place. Every Korean was is shock and awe. These people could not believe that in their country there are homeless people. I thought to myself are these people serious? Are they in ignorant? Are they in denial? Now I don't usually use my blog to vent may anger or disappointment about any group of people. But come on, these people have to be kidding me! At first I attributed it to ignorance, because with at least ignorance people just don't know. Also with ignorance you can learn if you want too. But then I had my epiphany and I realized that these folks cannot attribute this to ignorance but to denial. I realized the people around here have a very codependent relationship to their social mores. They addicts suffering from denial. One of my coworkers told me that there where no gay people in Andong. No I almost peed my pants over that one. Now in this city of 165,000 people, there are no homosexuals? I don't know who these people are trying to fool but come on... They have this mentality of if I deny it maybe it will go away. My grandmother always said just because you say your ain't getting old doesn't mean you are ain't getting old. One thing the Koreans can learn from America is that we have this problem with denial. We said that AIDS and HIV was only a gay problem, we said that drugs was only a inner city problem that only effected the minority populations. But the sad reality of it all was that AIDS and HIV was an American problem because it effect every segment of our population as has the drug issue, because studies found that upwards of 65% of the drug epidemic was coming out of the suburbs which was mostly the populated with those who are more affluent. The reality of it all is that denial is more detrimental to a society than anything... Korea will go the way of most societies where they will be reactive instead of proactive. No matter where you live if anyone is in need we must do what we can to help and to imply that your society does not suffer from the ills of life is not ignorance but just down right stupidity!