Chinese women who are entering South Korea seeking skilled plastic surgeons are undergoing such transformative procedures that they are struggling to get past airport security on their way home.The extensive surgeries, which can include reducing excess skin in the upper eyelid to make the eyes appear bigger and more ‘Western’, are transforming some Chinese women’s entire faces, rendering them almost unrecognizable.[contentblock id=1 img=adsense.png]
To combat the issue, some hospitals have resorted to handing out ‘plastic surgery certificates’ – which include the patient’s passport number, the name of the hospital they were treated at and the length of their visit to South Korea – to enable the women to re-enter China. China Daily reported that some women have been stopped at passport control because they were noted to have bigger eyes, higher noses and slimmer chins than in the photographs shown in their passports.
After careful checks had been carried out, the women were allowed into China but they were all advised to renew their passports immediately. ‘After they took off their huge hats and big sunglasses following our request, we saw them looking different, with bandages and stitches here and there,’ Shanghai Hongqiao Airport officer Chen Tao told China Daily. Plastic surgery is now such big business in South Korea that it is attracting thousands of clients daily from across the border in China.
And the mostly female clients return to China as ‘live adverts’ for the South Korean surgeons. Before and after photos, which feature women who have undergone sometimes numerous procedures, have been drawing attention since they were posted on Chinese news sites.
[contentblock id=3 img=adsense.png]
The photos, which list the type of procedures each woman has had – ranging from Botox to rhinoplasty to jaw contorting – are accompanied by candid captions detailing the features each woman disliked about herself.
For, example, Liu Yisong, 26, a dance teacher from Chengdu, said she disliked her eye shape, her flat nose, her round face shape and narrow forehead. So she underwent a double eyelid operation, V-line surgery, nose reconstruction surgery and had collagen injections as well as a skin rejuvenation treatment. Meanwhile, Wang Pingping, a 24-year-old tour guide, underwent surgery to change her pear-shaped face. She had a nose job and eye reconstruction surgery.
South Korea is rapidly becoming world’s plastic surgery leader, with more cosmetic procedures per head of population than any other nation, according to global figures released last year by the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons. One in every 77 people in South Korea now goes under the knife or needle in a bid to improve their looks.[contentblock id=2 img=adsense.png]
Shockingly, some 20 per cent of women aged 19 to 49 in the capital, Seoul, admit to undergoing cosmetic surgery. One of the most popular procedures involves reducing excess skin in the upper eyelid to make the eyes appear bigger and more ‘Western’.
It is believed that the rise of the country’s music industry is behind the boom, and many patients visit clinics with photos of celebrities, asking surgeons to emulate American noses or eyes. Some women for example also undergo Intense Pulsed Light treatment, a procedure which can, among other things, be employed to lighten the skin.
How Chinese Women are Flying to South Korea for… by womenzmag