Stylish Handbags

- Any reviews on Korean-made PU handbags?
Lately I have seen a lot of korean sellers on ebay selling really trendy looking handbags that are PU = polyurethane. Apparently PU is a higher grade synthetic than PVC. In any case, I like the look of some of them and they are a great price. Any ideas or experiences whether on or off ebay about these kinds of purses / handbags. This is one of them I am talking about: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Korean-style-Lady-PU-leather-handbag-shoulder-bag-New-/110728597677?_trksid=p5197.m7&_trkparms=algo%3DLVI%26itu%3DUCI%26otn%3D5%26po%3DLVI%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D3176171746211132480

A I actually just bought a Korean-style PU leather handbag! I'm pretty satisfied with it; the quality's not too bad, and it's very trendy and cute. When I received my handbag, it was actually slightly different, but it was so slight that I didn't even notice until I stared at the pictures on eBay for a couple minutes. I really like it, though!

- Are many Korean men metrosexual?
When I first came here, I noticed many Korean young men wore colorful shirts(like pink, purple), tight jeans and purses(men's handbag or whatever) with well-designed hair style. Some of them were using oil-absorbing sheets in public!! So I'd thought Korea(at least Seoul) was a gay friendly place with a bunch of gay guys. However, many of them were actually straight men with a strong concern for their appearance. Later I found Koreans are quite homophobic. They think homosexual does not exist in Korea. From a western point of view, Korean "straight" men seem to care about their appearance too much and sometimes they are way too fashionable. How do you explain this? Is this just a cultural thing? (Well, I recently notice that Korean women are obsessed with their appearance as well.)

A This an amusing question that I just had to address. I'm Korean, but grew up in America. So I guess I have a unique outlook on this topic. It's understandable that Korean men can be viewed as metrosexual. They enjoy wearing brand name clothing almost as much as their female counterpart. I hear plastic surgery is becoming popular even with men. Appearance is valued greatly. This though, is much more common with the younger generation than the old. But Korean men are far from feminine, even from Western point of view. If American notion of masculinity involves drinking beer while sitting on a couch watching sports on TV, burping and farting with friends who take pride in bench pressing 300 pounds, then nothing else can be said in the matter. Because most Korean men aren't that. Korean masculinity can be equated to duty and honor. Even Western history place value on chivalry, a phenomenon first glorified in 16th century European novels. Koreans and other Asian cultures have been promoting these values during thousands of years of our history. Today, even in a modern world, these involve a man doing whatever he can to make a living in an increasingly competitive market that is Korea, while doing their best to do it with integrity. Wives and mothers do their best to raise their children, as their mothers have learned from their mothers. Children too, study endlessly well past midnight with hopes that they may enter a university. All so that they can shed the recent memory of war that ravaged our land and embrace affluence and modern globalism that is reality today. So Korean men like to show off. Like all men do. While Western men may feel more masculine because they spend hours in a gym but act like they don't care about their appearance by wearing the $15 T-shirt they bought at a Vegas strip club, Korean men feel more masculine by wearing expensive brands and being fashionable as a status symbol. After all, real men can wear pink. It's because we're secure about ourselves. What about Western men? Why can't they wear pink? It's just a color. I guess, even with all their brawns and "masculinity," they're still insecure. How manly...