In South Korea there are parents voluntary in cells. There is a word that explains it: “Hikikomori”

Jin Young-Hae is a fictional name. Your story is not. Last year this South Korean mother explained to the BBC Under the condition of the anonymity what has led him to – in a totally voluntary way – a blue monkey and spend hours and more hours held in a tiny, austere cell, not much greater than a closet and in which he did not have a company, mobile, or portable spent hours. Alone, with your thoughts. The only link with the outside from his peculiar prison was the small hole open at the door through which he was given food.

Sounds strange, but there is a word that explains it: Hikikomori.

Objective: to isolate yourself from the world. The choice of Mrs. Jin may seem extravagant, but she is not the only one who has made a similar decision in South Korea. BBC has spoken with other inmates and voluntary inmates. In addition to demanding anonymity, they all share two fundamental characteristics. The first, who are parents of young people who are between adolescence and thirty.

The second, which have decided to participate in a special program that keeps them held during a brief period in isolation cells. And this last word can be understood in its most literal sense. Jin and the rest of the participants are housed in tiny habitats to which they cannot take or mobile phones.

But … why? To understand. Jin or Park Han-Sil, another pseudonyms used by BBC to tell a real case, are mothers of South Korean youth who share another peculiarity: they have been isolated from the world. Jin is the mother of a 24 -year -old who lives withdrawn in his room, neglecting his cleaning and food. Park has a little older, 26 years old, who has already decided to cut all communication with society. Now he barely leaves his room and refuses to take the medication that doctors have scheduled.

When voluntary, ladies Jin or Park try to better understand their offspring, put themselves into their skin in an extreme way and especially look for tools to communicate better with them. “I’ve been wondering what I did wrong … it’s painful,” Jin admits50 years. Now, and after passing through the cell, he claims to have “some clarity.” Park also recognizes that isolation has helped him understand the feelings of his offspring. “I have realized that it is important to accept his life without forcing him to fit into a specific mold.”

“Confinement experience”. Neither Park nor Jin decided to be a good day in their homes, improvised. His have been planned experiences and the isolation have been done in the Happiness Factory rooms, where the inmates They arrive to experiment in their flesh the “confinement”.

For this they can dress a uniform, leave their phones and laptops and be held in bare wall cells, without company. The BBC clarifies That since April there are other parents who have been participating in a 13 -week special education program funded by organizations such as Fundación for the Youth of Korea or the Blue Whale Recovery Center.

The program has a clear, and complicated objective: show these fathers and mothers how to communicate better with their children. To this end, it includes a peculiar experience, a three -day period during which participants spend time in rooms in the province of Gangwon that replicate an isolation cell.

The keyword: Hikikomori. Jin and Park are mothers of Hikikomoria term coined in Japan already decades ago and that identifies young people who at a certain time of their lives decide to be disturbed almost completely, cutting contact with the world that opens beyond their homes or rooms.

The phenomenon is not new, but serious. At least according to the estimates that the authorities handle. Not long ago, the Ministry of Health and Welfare of South Korea conducted a survey between 15,000 young people between 19 and 34 years old and discovered that More than 5% They lived in isolation. If these figures move to the country as a whole, they would show that in South Korea there are hundreds of thousands of people in a similar situation: just over half a million (540,000).

Understanding isolation. The program confesses Park, allows the parents of these young people to better understand the reason for seclusion. To her, for example, reading notes written by others Hikikomori He helped him understand his own son’s silences. The South Korean government also has studies that help become a clear idea of ​​the phenomenon of isolation among young people without going through an experience like Hapiness Factory.

A study by the South Korean Ministry of Health reflects that 24.1% of young people between 19 and 34 years old who deconciate from the world do so by difficulties in finding work, 23.5% due to problems to relate and 24.8% due to family or health issues. Of backdrop is The competitive society Surcoreana, where from a very young age parents take their children to academies to end up accessing the most prestigious universities in the country. South Korea also stands out for its Work Days marathon.

Concern beyond home. The one of Hikikomori It is a phenomenon serious enough to generate concern beyond families. In 2023 the government came to launch A campaign To encourage solitary young people to leave home and “reintegrate into society”, for which he did not hesitate to offer 450 euros designed for young people up to 24 years. Then there was talk that in the country there would be hundreds of thousands of people living in isolation.

The advantages of a pause. The mothers and fathers of Hikikomori They are not the only ones in South Korea who seek voluntary isolation. In the country there are those who decide to confine themselves on their own choice, paying even hundreds of euros in exchange for the experience, simply to take a respite from their busy routines.

The CBC chain told in 2018, which The case said From Suk-Won Kang, a Seoul’s 57-year-old engineer who paid $ 578 to spend seven days in Prison Inside Me, a center of Hongcheon. During his peculiar holidays Kang dressed uniform and stayed in a five -square -meter cell in solitude. I wasn’t at all alone. The installation housed another 13 similar guests.

In Xataka | South Korea already states that girls begin the school before. The reason: overcome the birth rate

Images | GRANT DURR (UNSPLASH) and Daniel Bernard (UNSPLASH)

*An earlier version of this article was published in July 2024