Take off your shoes in Korea

In Korea, summers are extremely hot and winters are extremely cold. Therefore, houses were made of material that is less affected by temperture fluctuations. Furthermore, the ondol system which heats the floors has traditionally enticed Koreans to sit on the floor.

If you visit Korean royal palaces or traditional homes, you will notice that the furniture doesn’t have any legs. The ondol heating system is unique to Korea and has always ensured that Koreans could survive the long and cold winter months. In order to benfit from the ondol system, it was important to sit on the floor. Alternatively, in the hot summer months, it was cool and refreshing to sit on the floor.

If you go to a Korean restaurant, you will often be given a choice between sitting at a Western table or at a Korean table, which entails taking off your shoes. The advantage of the Korean sitting culture is that more people can be accommodated. Whether to sleep or sit, if everybody doesn’t have a set place, it is easier to squeeze one more person in. This is also possible because unlike Western culture, which considers personal space to be very important, for Koreans tend to stand or sit closer to each other when speaking. As a result, it is not unusual to see Koreans take off their shoes and sit in the lotus position even on Western style chairs or to put one leg up on the chair as if they were sitting on the floor.