Vietnamese brides’ struggles after divorcing South Korean husbands

"At that point, all I had left was South Korean citizenship," recalls the 42-year-old from Tay Ninh in southern Vietnam. Her hopes of building a better life were in a shambles.

Growing up in a poor family, Oanh had hoped that marrying a foreigner would provide a better life. Through a matchmaker she married a man 12 years her senior, a factory worker in Hwaseong city in South Korea’s Gyeonggi Province. They tied the knot in 2009 when she was 27 and they had just known each other for a month.

But life in South Korea became increasingly difficult, especially after their two children were born. Her husband was short-tempered, domineering and lazy. The burden of caring for their children and managing the finances fell entirely on Oanh, who worked at an electronics assembly plant, earning three million won (US$2,237) per month and working 12 hours a day.

The strain of managing the finances and family responsibilities led to frequent arguments between the couple. On many occasions, her husband vented his anger on their children, forcing neighbors to step in. In the winter of 2017 a concerned neighbor told Oanh, "If you can’t live like this, leave."

Oanh filed for divorce and moved out with her children, renting a small apartment a few dozen kilometers away for 600,000 won. Both children were in primary school and needed to be taken to school every morning, and she had no one to rely on.

Her ex-husband provided no financial support, while the government offered a 300,000 won monthly subsidy for childcare. Oanh explains that hiring a helper in South Korea was an unaffordable luxury especially for an immigrant. With no other choice, she took up temporary work, juggling childcare with assembling products at home late into the night.

She lost five kilograms in just a few weeks, nearly exhausting herself. Her income was only enough to cover rent, food and school fees for her children. When her children fell ill, she had to borrow money to make ends meet. Four years ago Oanh got her mother to come over from Vietnam to help.

But her mother did not speak Korean or drive, and so could only assist with household work. Besides, every three months she had to return to Vietnam for her visa, adding to Oanh’s expenses. "I was lonely, ashamed and deeply sad, but I could not return to Vietnam," she admits.

Her children had grown accustomed to life in South Korea, could not speak Vietnamese, and would struggle to integrate into a new environment.

Moreover, she knew the farmland in her hometown of Hoa Thanh District, Tay Ninh, would not provide enough economic opportunities to support and raise her children.

She was thus forced to stay in South Korea despite the overwhelming hardship. Her situation is hardly unique among Vietnamese brides in that country.

According to the latest report from South Korea’s Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, Vietnamese women accounted for the highest percentage (33.5%) of intercultural marriages in South Korea as of 2023, followed by Chinese (18%) and Thai (14%). The number of divorces between such couples is also on the rise, with 6,000 reported in 2023 alone. A majority of Vietnamese women divorcing their South Korean husbands face financial hardships, with 82.4% bearing the sole responsibility of raising their children.

One contributing factor is that South Korean men who marry foreign wives typically earn less than three million won, below the 3.29 million won average for those married to South Korean women. However, around 80% of Vietnamese women choose to remain in South Korea after their divorce to ensure their children can continue studying or find employment.

Hoang Thi Ha, head of a support group for Vietnamese women in Incheon city, says the difficulties these women face after divorce have increased significantly. Through her work assisting Vietnamese women with divorce proceedings, she finds that their biggest challenges are finding housing, securing legal counsel for child custody, inadequate money, and lack of childcare support.

Most of these women work in assembly plant, assembling car parts or cosmetic containers, earning two to three million won a month while working up to eight hours of overtime, often not enough to cover living costs, rents and childcare.

The government provides monthly assistance of 200,000-300,000 won for single-parent households with young children and incomes of less than two million won. This too is insufficient to cover expenses, especially with the recent inflation, Ha says.

Huyen on the streets of Incheon, South Korea, August 2024. Photo provided by Huyen

Two years ago, holding her divorce papers, Bich Huyen, then 35, found herself at a crossroads: reconcile with her husband or raise her child alone. "I couldn’t let my child suffer, witnessing constant arguments between us," she says. She admits that the marriage broke down because she did not get to know him well enough before marrying. Growing up in Hanoi, she lost her father at a young age, which left her family in difficult financial straits.

Huyen, who was an accountant, chose to marry a foreigner after two months of exchanging messages and a single meeting with her future husband, a South Korean man 12 years her senior, in the hope of changing her life. Their marriage was marked by constant arguments, and she grew tired of her husband’s laziness. After the divorce she rented a 300,000-won apartment near her ex-husband’s place so that her daughter could stay close to him and have someone to look after her while she worked overtime on weekends.

Her job at a cosmetics company paid her around two million won, and the government provided an additional one million for child support and free tuitions for her daughter. Her ex-husband did not contribute financially. A lawyer advised her that she could file a lawsuit to have her ex-husband’s salary garnished, with the money transferred directly to her account, but she decided not to."A broken marriage was enough; I did not want to prolong the conflict," she explains.

Le Hong Hien of the Hanoi Bar Association, who has provided legal support remotely to many Vietnamese women divorcing their South Korean husbands, says often the reason for divorce is disillusionment. Many of them marry through matchmakers and have little time to get to know their future husbands, he points out. Vietnamese brides often live in rural areas, face cultural differences, have husbands with low incomes, or are required to care for elderly in-laws, all of which lead to conflict, he points out further.

Some women file for divorce after just a few months of marriage, making post-divorce life particularly challenging, he says. They need to contact their family in Vietnam to obtain necessary documents, often lack information about their husbands and are not in possession of their marriage certificate, he says. "Divorcing a fellow Vietnamese is complicated enough, but doing so in South Korea is even more difficult, involving numerous procedures and time. Many in-laws refuse to provide information or assistance."

He advises Vietnamese women to avoid these challenges by taking the time to understand South Korean culture, lifestyle and, most importantly, their future husbands. They should also learn how to contact the local Vietnamese embassy and community groups for timely help and support, he adds.

*Names in the article have been changed.