Grueling office life being satirized

By Baek Byung-yeul

A poster for KBS drama “The Queen of Office” Courtesy of KBS

It is strange that the country never really had its version of ``The Office,’’ the British-inspired American sitcom that was a hilarious satire on the modern workplace. After all, weren’t Koreans the most depressed and overworked corporate citizens on the planet?

But it now appears that the anonymous workers behind the cubicles have finally acquired a voice through pop culture.

The new KBS television drama, ``The Queen of Office,’’ based on the Japanese comic book ``Haken no Hinkaku’’ and revolving around the story of a non-regular employee working her way up in the supermarket kingdom, is the most successful show of the year so far. The broadcaster is reporting viewer ratings of around 15 percent, a better audience record than any other drama in the same timeslot.

Meanwhile, the Internet cartoon ``Misaeng,’’ also about precarious workers but this time set in a cut-throat trading company, has become immensely popular to the point where a film or television adaptation seems inevitable.

In Queen, the protagonist Miss Kim, played by movie bombshell Kim Hye-soo, is portrayed as a non-regular employee with superb abilities, work ethic and a no nonsense attitude.

Kim gets to office at 9 a.m., and leaves at 6 p.m., unwilling to spend a microsecond more. She holds more than 120 skill certifications in all sorts of fields, executes work with perfection, and speaks a bunch of languages including Russian.

Kim’s confidence about her ability, and also the frustration from her contract situation, allows her to be protective about her private life and blatantly reject after-work drinking sessions and other oppressive traditions of the macho corporate culture.

She provides a sense of catharsis to the average television viewer, who knows they will probably never manage to be like her in real life.

``Although I am not a non-regular worker, I have seen numerous cases that they are treated as puppets in my company, too. The drama seems to portray this culture with authenticity,” said Park Jong-ho, 31-year-old office worker and drama fan.

``I was fed up with other television dramas that used office life just as a setup for a cliched ending where the man kisses the woman and we’re done. But Queen breaks this tradition and I can’t wait to see it every Monday evening.’’

While Yoon Tae-ho is firmly established as one of the country’s leading cartoonists, none of his work has been as popular as Misaeng, which is published on Daum (www.daum.net) on Tuesdays and Fridays. So far, the cartoon has garnered more than 8 million readers and its paperback version is selling well in bookstores too.

The protagonist is Jang Geu-rae, a man who tries to adjust to life as an office worker after failing as a professional baduk player. Yoon convincingly connects the cut-throat trading industry culture with the game of baduk, known as ``go’’ in Japan, and his painstaking research of the realities at trading companies allow him to provide a vivid description of life as a corporate underling.

Koreans, who on average work 300 hours more a year than the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development average, are celebrating cultural content representing their corporate culture.