On the wrong side of Ehwa Women’s University, you can find cheap stores filled with unpackaged junk, old men fighting in front of the convenience store, and North Americans picking through the trash. This is where you find Sun Tattoos, one of Korea’s underground tattoo shops. I can’t give you more specific directions because it might get the owner, TK, arrested.

Tattoos are a touchy subject here. “They’re an insult to God!” blusters one editor to me. More importantly, they clash with Confucian belief, which is still strong in Korea. Most Koreans believe that our bodies are gifts from ancestors, so it is our duty to preserve our bodies. It’s not surprising then the reactions that most Koreans have to tattoos. Expose your tattoos here, and you may never experience the infamous Korean hospitality. In Europe in the past, tattoos were used to mark all kinds of criminals, slaves, and undesireables. Korea has not moved as far beyond such practices. Consequently, getting a tattoo in Korea is harder than getting a nice cold beer in Salt Lake City.

Moon So-Yee, a Korean living in London, was shocked to observe that “Seven out of ten people wear a tattoo like shirt or hat. I am totally shocked and I ask myself, they are all gangster? In Korea, someone has tattoo, he must be in criminal because of tattoo.”

The practice, possibly adopted from Japanese yakuza, is a rite of loyalty. Once you’re marked by a gang tattoo, you may never fully leave, at least in theory. I recall a taxi driver one night who covered his tattoo with an armband. He was released from his gang after he had done his time in prison. I never got to see his tattoo, other than the odd bits not covered by the armband. Although the practice is seemingly still continued, it doesn’t account for all tattoos.

Binool, a tattooist based in Hongik University area, claims that most of his customers are regular people, mostly in their 20s. “There are many artists like musicians, dancers, actors, and painters among my customers,” he says, “but also university students and office workers and even housewives.”

Not quite the stereotypical set of contemporary undesireables most Koreans would lead you to believe—the “Japanese, gangsters, and foreigners.” Most of the visible tattoos you’d find in Korea would be on foreigners. A Korean would most likely get a tattoo in an area easily hidden under clothes—the shoulder, the back, or the thigh.

Speaking of hidden, it takes hours to find the unmarked entrance to Sun Tattoo. It’s hidden down a narrow basement stairway in an unmarked alley. Outside a group of kids are tapping around a soccer ball, unaware of the secret laboratory underneath their feet. We’re assured by everyone that we’re not breaking any laws, but it somehow feels like we are.

Tattooing is technically legal in Korea, but tattooists are often arrested, fined, and usually convicted. Binool knows a tattoo artist currently waiting trial. He was charged with illegally practicing medicine without a licence. This practice became standard practice in 1992, when a judge convicted one tattooist on this charge, having nothing else to throw at him. That case has made it far easier to convict any other tattooist in subsequent cases; even though some judges understand there is nothing wrong with tattoos, they are afraid to go against the landmark 1992 verdict.

These verdicts obviously upset Binool. “It might be a drastic example, but the law says it’s even against the law if you just apply medication on your son’s knee at home when he falls.” Although no one has ever been brought to court for this, it is illegal to practice any form of medicine on another person in Korea.

“I was in prison for ten days,” says Gun-won, a Korean tattooist, in an article in local bilingual zine DDD. “They took me in, but they couldn’t find any evidence. They took all my customers’ phone numbers and called, but they couldn’t find anybody to incriminate me. So they regarded me as an illegal medical doctor and charged me with that, because the needle goes through the skin.” Gun-won is last known to be awaiting trial.

Though tattooing is officially legal in Korea, everything about it is illegal, including equipment and there is no licensing body. Standards for hygiene are set by agreement between artists. “Since there is not any institution giving lessons to become a tattoo artist in this country,” says Binool, “I travelled all around the country to meet as many tattoo artists as possible.” Unfortunately, there is no guarantee you’re getting a quality tattoo, unless you know the artist.

“Don’t get tattooed in Hongdae,” warns Drew, an American who’s lived in Korea for most of his life. He confides in me his most embarrassing tattoo, which resembles a man yanking on a bull’s privates. The circle around the tattoo is uneven. He got it in the back of a piercing shop. “I told the artist I had to catch a train in two hours, which may have been my mistake.”

Another concern is hygiene. “The room [for Sun Tattoo] kinda puts people off,” says Paul, a half-Korean punk who plays guitar in a band called Suck Stuff, “but I don’t see why, because the room’s not going into your arm.”

An alternative to a tattoo parlor is one of the many cosmetic surgery clinics on nearly every street in Korea. These places are operated by certified doctors. Jay’s barracks buddy Spanky recently got a tattoo at one such place. “Look for a green cross,” he says. “If it’s a surgical or medical clinic, go for it. It’s expensive, but it’s worth it—you won’t get chlamydia or Hepatitis A.”

“Hepatitis B,” corrected Jay.

“Whatever,” retorted Spanky.

It’s rare to find a cosmetic surgeon who would do a real tattoo. The doctor Spanky visited was probably used to doing more standard plastic surgeries. All kinds of cosmetic surgeries are popular in Korea, from spot removal to the famous eye surgery, to “permanent makeup.” Cosmetic surgeons are accredited to administer tattoos, although they’re not used to anything more than eyebrow tattoos or other natural-looking makeup tattoos. And they are not peers of underground tattoo artists: “It’s literally makeup, not a tattoo,” sneers Binool. “No, I would never think of it as a kind of tattoo.”

Sun Tattoos turns out to be adequately stocked with hygienic equipment. The owner of the shop, TK, shows up at 6:00 to let us in. While we thumb through his library of Japanese tattoo magazines for Jay’s design, TK sets to sterilising his equipment. TK has his portfolio on display over all of Korea’s punk scene. He’s the official tattooist of Skunxs.com, the Korean punk online store.

Tattoos are popular in the Korean punk scene. As a result, most of them can’t get decent jobs, relying on labour work to pay the bills. When they go to public saunas, everyone glares at them. So why do they get tattoos?

“Because other people did it,” says one punk.

“I was curious,” says another.

“I just thought it would look cool,” adds a third.

Pretty disappointing reasons, especially considering the hardships they face from having tattoos. So why do they keep getting inked? The Korean punks say it gives them a feeling of achievement, and makes them feel special. Their number one gripe about getting tattoos continues to be the pain itself.

“Rather than a particular motive,” Binool says, “tattoo has just been a natural way for me to live my life, just like going to school, going to the army, getting married and starting a family.”

Motivation must be questioned for why Koreans would get tattoos. Especially considering the employment situation, and the risk of bullying in the army. In the past, anyone slightly different would easily be targeted by bullies, and tattooed soldiers got it worse. However, stricter rules have cracked down on bullying.

Every Korean male must serve two years in the army before turning 30. Until recently, the Korean army refused to accept recruits who had tattoos over two-thirds of their bodies. They can’t flee to Canada, so Koreans choose to get stabbed a million times with a tiny needle.

“There used to be many people who took adventage of that law before,” says Binool, “but nowdays you cannot get an exemption from the army by having tattoos anymore.”

According to a 2003 article on CBS News, about 170 men had been arrested over the years for trying to dodge the draft by getting tattoos, a crime punishable with up to three years’ imprisonment. The young men were shown in the national media, disgraced, handcuffed, heads lowered, and shirts removed to reveal tattoos of dragons, fish, birds, and roses.

“When I give people tattoos, it is beyond my care what they’re gonna do with their tattoos,” says Binool. “All I care is just put all my spirit into the tattoos and give the best tattoos as I can.”

One sad story involves a 25-year-old police recruit who failed his physical examination because of some leg tattoos he’d received ten years ago. That case got a demand from the National Human Rights Commission of Korea to revise their entrance policies, but tattoos and government jobs do not mix.

Naturally, removal and cover-ups are a profitable business. Binool admits that many of his customers want cover-ups, not tattoos. “They got many kinds of tattoos just because of curiosity when they were young and ruthless,” he says. “That gives them a lot of handicaps in their lives: they cannot go to public saunas, swimming pools, gyms—they’re even afraid to socialize.”

Binool tells of one family man who came in for a cover-up tattoo. He had never been naked in front of his young son because he was ashamed of an old tattoo. “He cried for happiness to have gotten a cover-up tattoo,” recalls Binool. “When I watch these people going back home after I give them cover-up tattoos, when they starting being proud of themselves again, I feel proud of what I do. I believe what I do can change their lives. That’s what they get tattoos for. It is for a change in life.”

Surprisingly, piercing is becoming popular in Korea. Piercing shops are scattered throughout Seoul, particularly around Ehwa University, where you can find groups female students purveying the merchandise. “The biggest difference is trace. The biggest charm of a tattoo is that it leaves a trace and doesn’t get erased, but at the same time it’s the biggest weakness. Piercing doesn’t leave a trace. If you just wanna look cool in your youth, then piercing is the best.

“Getting a tattoo is having a friend to keep until you die. You shouldn’t without thinking deep choose your friend who will live for the rest of your life on your body and die with you.”

Jay is not ready to get a tattoo yet. He has an idea, but getting it to look right is much harder. He makes an appointment to come back next week.

“Thanks for coming,” says TK. “Don’t draw any attention to this place as you’re leaving.”

“Pablo Picasso, Vincent van Gogh, they’re all great artists,” says Binool. “How many canvases did they have to tear and throw out until they finished one piece of art? Probably a lot. Tattoo is art on a human body. Even if you don’t like what you have done, can you tear it? Can you erase it and start all over again? It requires extremely high concentration and a professional mind. Tattoo artists are greater artists than Picasso or van Gogh, I believe.”

Reprinted from Theme Magazine.