ABSTRACT
There was hardly a country – perhaps besides the colonial homeland (naichi), Japan – that was more important for colonial-era Korea than China. Chinese residents in Korea were the second largest group of resident non-Koreans after the Japanese, their economic prominence far exceeding their numerical strength. In 1930, before the start of the Japanese invasion of north-eastern China (Manchuria), 67,794 Chinese citizens lived in Korea, almost one-eighth of the number of Korea-based Japanese residents (Yang and Wang 2006, 206–207). In some professions, resident Chinese were almost as prominent as resident Japanese. The Japanese Government General counted in 1930, for example, 37,601 Japanese in wholesale and retail trade operations in Korea – and 18,264 Chinese, that is, almost a half of the total number of Korea-residing Japanese traders and sales clerks. In customer service professions, including restaurants and barbershops, 18,188 Japanese were counted, compared to 6,550 Chinese – the latter comprising almost one-third of the former (Chōsen Sōtokufu 1934, 258–263, cited in Yi 2012a, 32). Indeed, Chinese salesmen, restaurant owners or workers were perhaps the only foreigners – besides the Japanese – whom an average colonial-period Korean was likely to personally meet in their lifetime.
