The Hercule Poirot of Korea

by Dram_man on July 5, 2007

A no-surprise-to-most-of-us story the Dong-A talks about urban apartments being used as brothels partly due to the prostitution law. Fascinating though the scale and scope of the operation, and not to mention the fact despite the security, they were caught.

Now take this on the scale:

Police said that Hwang prepared uniforms for students, sailors, nurses, and flight attendants plus racing girl outfits. He ordered his prostitutes to wear them if customers wanted.

However, what clued police in?:

A police officer said, “When I first came there for the investigation, I did not think the sex trade was happening there because it looked exactly like an ordinary apartment. The only thing that caught my eye was a bunch of toothbrushes and towels, which later prompted me to suspect the place was an “office brothel.”

Raises the question, why weren’t the uniforms of students, sailors, nurses, flight attendants, and racing girls in the closet enough to tip of the police? It took toothbrushes and towels?

{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Grumpy July 5, 2007 at 11:33 am

I lived in a large Itaewon apartment complex a few years ago. In the apartment next door, two young Korean girls moved in with some new furniture. I didn’t think much of it, but on occasion I’d run into a “visitor” (and never the same one) in a business suit with his briefcase leaving in morning.

2 red sparrow July 5, 2007 at 11:44 am

I am surprised it took the Koreans this long to copy such a long-established business model from Hong Kong.

3 The_William_G July 5, 2007 at 12:47 pm

And here I thought those ladies on my floor just had a lot of friends…

4 SomeguyinKorea July 5, 2007 at 1:29 pm

“The only thing that caught my eye was a bunch of toothbrushes and towels, which later prompted me to suspect the place was an “office brothel.””

Wouldn’t it be better to use a UV lamp like on CSI to search for ‘DNA’ stains?

Most people have dozens of these small towels, I’ve got a whole drawer full of them. Thing is, it seems as if you can’t attend an event without receiving one or two of them. My mother-in-law has hundreds of them still new in the box, some of them dated as far back as the early 80′s.

As for the tooth brushes, time to throw out the ones that we use to scrub the toilet bowl. :)

5 Sonagi July 5, 2007 at 9:55 pm

Apartment brothels have been in existance for awhile. My first apartment was in the oldest and cheapest danji in Seocho-dong. Low rents and proximity to men with money next door in Sampoong Apts. made the ugly concrete lowrises a good place for prostitutes to ply their trade.

6 exkorling July 7, 2007 at 6:27 am

Nothing stops prostitution. When will lawmakers get this through their heads and stop wasting so much of the country’s tax money on it? Whether it be in the USA or the ROK, prostitution will find a way to morph itself around to survive. There’s just too much money to be made and too many horny men around to stop this. Why do you think it’s called the world’s oldest profession?

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