Everyone in South Korea is about to become at least a year or two younger due to a new law.
As confusing as the headline might read to us Westerners, it seems that South Korea are opting to ditch the old 'Korean Age' system which measures a person's age.
So in western society, the internationally recognised method of measuring the age of a person starts from the day they are born.
If you're born on 31 December 2022, you'll be one-year-old on 31 December 2023.
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For South Korea, however, you are aged one on the actual day you are born.
So according to the 'Korean Age' system, if you're born a day before the new year, for example, you'll be aged one.
A day later, you'll be aged two, because it's the start of a new year.
Well it seems that President Yoon Suk Yeol has put forward the idea to abolish the 'Korean age system' and expects the new, standardised system to be implemented in the summer of 2023.
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"With the passage of the amendment today, all citizens of our country will become younger by one or two years starting next June," Mr Yoon’s office said in a statement.
Yoo Sang-bum of the ruling People Power Party explained to parliament that 'the revision is aimed at reducing unnecessary socio-economic costs, because legal and social disputes as well as confusion persist due to the different ways of calculating age'.
Lee Yong-ho, chief of Yoon's transition team's political, judicial, and administrative subcommittee said the change is being pursued for practical reasons, adding: "Due to the different calculations of legal and social age, we have experienced unnecessary social and economic costs from persistent confusion and disputes over calculating age when receiving social, welfare and other administrative services or signing or interpreting various contracts."
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Kim Eun-ju, professor at Law and Policy at Hansung University, told the BBC: "Globalisation has made Koreans more aware of the international age.
"This has an impact on young people as they feel that Koreans are being ridiculed for [these counting systems]."
Shin Ji-young, professor at the Department of Korean Language and Literature in Korea University, added: "To South Koreans, figuring out if someone is older than them or not is more important than finding out somebody's name in a social context.
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"It is essential in choosing how to address that person and the honorific or title which is required."
The new system is expected to come into force in June next year.
Anish Vij