In my personal opinion, one of the best parts of living in a multicultural city that welcomes with open arms immigrants from all over the world is the chance one gets at experiencing an incredibly broad variety of different cultures, as almost every immigrant tends to take some parts of their homeland—be it something tangible, like traditional celebrations or national foods, or something more elusive and obscure, like ways of thinking and unspoken culture codes—into their new home.

Meeting people and getting to know things about their countries and cultures through conversations and interactions with them has always been a source of great joy for me, especially when it comes to matters that have no direct equivalent in my own native language, home country, or society I grew up in. Learning about something entirely new, something so alien that it might at first be difficult to pinpoint and grasp, is all the more fascinating, eye-opening, and rewarding. Such was my experience of learning about nunchi, one of the key concepts of Korean society, from D., a born-and-raised Korean who first came to Germany in his mid-twenties some 5 years ago.

In our initial conversations, D. himself struggled to explain exactly what nunchi is, since this extremely broad, rather abstract, and at times self-contradicting concept was something that he himself simply grew up with without ever having to really define or question it. As I have come to understand (and I by no means claim to have a full grasp on this incredibly delicate matter, as my contact with this part of Korean culture was rather superficial), nunchi describes a special ability to know, to a certain extent, the thoughts, feelings, wishes, and needs of people in a given group. Nunchi is akin to a finely attuned sensor that allows one to detect the tiniest cues, such as tone of the voice, a movement of the eyes, or a slight tension of the back, as well as to interpret them in order to gain insight into the person’s current state of mind and act accordingly. “It’s a skill to know what other people want in advance so that you do it first in order to satisfy their need. It is proactive; it always should lead to behaviour”, explained D.

At first, it was difficult for me to understand the difference between nunchi and politeness or etiquette, which seemed the closest similar concepts in many Western cultures. However, D. stressed that, although nunchi and good manners might overlap, they are nevertheless not the same: “Nunchi is not fixed instructions; it’s a skill. It depends on the context. Filling up [a person’s] glass is good manners, but noticing that a person is now not in the mood for drinking is nunchi”. This flexibility is perhaps one of the most important features of this concept: having quick nunchi means always being attuned to the other versus simply following a set of preordained rules. In a way, nunchi leads one to truly pay attention to other people, exercise one’s perceptive skills to understand their inner state, and use creative thinking to make sure that their needs are met and the group’s harmony is maintained.

Looking at nunchi from this point of view, one might be tempted to see it as some kind of superpower that allows people to read each other’s minds and, moreover, that is used for the greater good—for making sure that everyone in a given group, be it a small circle of friends at a party or two dozen company employees at a work meeting, is feeling fairly satisfied and comfortable within the social situation they are currently in. In a way, such a description is not entirely wrong: although nunchi is, of course, not a supernatural force but a learnt social skill introduced to children from the moment they are born, it does serve a good purpose in many ways.

Firstly, it does help to live in harmony with others—in a society where everyone is concerned with making sure that the people around them are comfortable and satisfied, the general level of comfort and satisfaction might actually be taken up a notch. Secondly, it helps to navigate challenging social situations and avoid embarrassment (second-hand included), resentment, or conflict, which naturally leads to the third positive effect of it—it helps achieve one’s goals by getting in the good books of superiors, which in a highly hierarchical society like that of South Korea is an essential skill. And finally, nunchi enhances transferable skills such as awareness, attentiveness, quick-wittedness, and a high level of emotional intelligence. As D. pointed out, nunchi’s focus is traditionally on the harmony and happiness of the other rather than on the gain of self, but it does not mean that one cannot exercise their quick nunchi to achieve their personal goals.

Naturally, upon hearing all that, I had to ask D. whether he found it difficult to adapt to life in a society that has no nunchi at all: it must’ve been devastating to move from South Korea to Germany and suddenly find himself surrounded by people who are largely unable not only to show the same amount of care, attentiveness, and consideration that he was used to, but also to pick up on what seemed to him like absolutely obvious cues. How lonely one must feel when, having left one’s family, friends, and one’s entire life behind, one also has to face such drastic differences in interpersonal communication, penetrating every facet of every social interaction! But, contrary to my expectation, D. replied that this change, however shocking, felt like a rather positive shift: “Actually, many find it a relief. In a society with no nunchi you don’t have to use your own, which can feel liberating”. Nunchi, as he proceeded to explain, can be both a blessing and a curse: as much as it contributes to the harmonious living of the members of a given society, it can also feel like a heavy social burden.

One part of this is the strong feeling of restriction that nunchi places on people: one cannot be direct, honest, and blunt, as such behaviour is seen as impolite, and instead has to resort to the unspoken language of hints and cues to be picked up on by somebody else’s nunchi. For example, D. explained, a Korean is much more likely to shrug his shoulders and say, “Oh, it’s getting a bit chilly here, isn’t it?” instead of simply asking his counterpart to close the window. By doing so, he would simultaneously demonstrate his own nunchi – being considerate of the other person’s wishes by not putting them in a position where they would have to either be polite and close the window even if they themselves are feeling hot or openly refuse to do so and therefore act rudely—and allow the other person to demonstrate their nunchi by discovering the real meaning of his words behind her indirect communication.

In addition to that, as Seth Robertson points out in his article “Korean Nunchi and Well-Being,” women and young people in general are forced to use their nunchi more often than men and the elderly, as in the highly hierarchical Korean society, the social mishaps of the latter group are treated with significantly higher generosity and acceptance than those of the former. Consequently, those with slow nunchi often struggle with integrating into various social groups, building friendships and relationships, and even ascending their career paths, being driven away from communities for the sole reason of not being able to “read the room” effectively. All that contributes to the overall feeling of pressure that nunchi can impose onto members of a society where practicing it becomes not only a norm but a necessity.

All in all, it is surely impossible to determine whether nunchi is a positive or a negative trait of Korean society. D. himself, for instance, believes that it benefits the incredibly high work performance of Koreans—on the one hand. On the other, it often takes a devastating toll on people’s mental health, taking the focus away from one’s own happiness and comfort and emphasising instead the wishes and opinions of others. But one thing is certain: there is definitely a lesson to be learnt from the Korean art of nunchi. Perhaps if we as a society could adopt the same caring, attentive attitude and the same striving for harmony that lies at the heart of nunchi, the world could become a slightly better—kinder—place for us all.