The Korean title of When Life Gives You Tangerines is a tad bit different from its English one. Actually, it’s a whole lot different. In Korean, after someone’s finished work, they say “you’ve worked hard” or “you’ve done well” at the end of the day. The show is set on the beautiful Jeju Island. The tiny island situated away from the mainland has its own dialect, its own speciality foods, slang etc. In Jeju, they say “Pokssak Sokatsooda” at the end of the day. The Korean title signifies the feeling that children feel towards their parents. Throughout the show, we see Geum-Myeong and Eun-Myeong fight with their parents, yell at them, and tell them they’ve not done enough, but at the end of the show, Geum-Myeong says her thanks to her parents through a sweet little letter, which ends with these exact words: “Pokssak Sokatsooda,” or “thank you for working hard.”
The show is very obviously a tribute to family and to parents who spend their whole lives worrying about their children, always wanting to give them their all. But, even when their kids aren’t able to express it all too well, they do feel only love and no resentment towards the people who care the most in the world. But then, why is the English title so different? Jeju Island is known for its tangerine fields. If you are an avid K-drama watcher, you might’ve heard of tangerine peel tea or just about how famous Jeju tangerines are. I just saw it in the latest episode of “Buried Hearts,” too. So, you can imagine the title comes from these famous tangerines, but is that all?
The show teaches us many lessons; it’s about endurance and hope through the hardest of times. It is about how one’s priorities change as time goes by because sometimes you don’t get what you want, but you can still find happiness. It’s about true love that lasts forever and never abandons you. It reminds you that no matter how flawed the relationship between mother and daughter is, it is always the strongest bond still. And most importantly, it’s about moving on, and learning to keep going even when you lose the dearest of people. We’ve all heard the phrase “When life gives you lemons.” The show uses this phrase and makes it its own by switching the lemons with tangerines, which are sometimes sweet and sometimes sour. The show uses the word tangerines specifically because of its connection with Jeju, but within the 4 volumes, we see them make an appearance in many different parts. Mainly during the happy moments.
Sure, sometimes the tangerines may be sour, but you can still make sweet treats from them, turn them into tea or marmalade. The tangerine is a versatile and humble fruit, it’s just like Ae-Sun, hard on the outside and pulpy on the inside. Once you peel the skin, you’re left with a sweet fruit. In the show, Ae-Sun faces many challenges since childhood. When she’s growing up, she wonders if she was born to nurse people. I just can’t imagine what would compel a teenager to feel this way, but her circumstances do push her in that direction. She first has to raise her step-siblings, then she has to raise her husband’s sister, and before you know it, she’s got 3 children of her own. But what I really adore about Ae-Sun is how she never gives up on her dreams. Despite having been a mother basically her whole life, Ae-Sun finds her voice, and she finds meaning in every little thing around her. What I found interesting is that, later, at the end of the show, when Ae-Sun goes to the nursing home to teach poetry, she’s turned her “sourness” around. In the sense that, she might’ve been born to nurse people, but that nursing is rewarding to her. When she tells Geum-Myeong how going to the nursing home makes her happy, Geum-Myeong is peeling tangerines for her. It’s a full circle moment for Ae-Sun, who finally gets to be called teacher, given the respect and love that she deserves (not to say that Gwan-Sik didn’t give her all of that while he was around). I really quite loved this detail, because when life gave her tangerines, she made the most of it.
The Korean show isn’t just a slice-of-life drama about a family. It is nuanced in the way it presents the two generations of the family in a world that changed so drastically. But, somehow, we see it seamlessly through Ae-Sun and Gwan-Sik’s lives. From making sure that her daughter doesn’t become a Haenyeo to pushing her to do everything that she was always told she couldn’t do, Ae-Sun really did the best she could for her daughter Geum-Myeong. Gwan-Sik fought his own battles, too. He always put Ae-Sun first, when he wanted to marry her (though she was an orphan), when he turned to the other table and fed his daughter his own food, because Ae-Sun wasn’t getting enough. It’s the little details in which this family blurred the lines and pushed forward, making that sweet marmalade for them. At the end of When Life Gives You Tangerines, Ae-Sun talks about aging and how she thought it went from spring to summer to autumn to winter, but at age 70, she realizes that spring never leaves; there are always days of spring. Interestingly, tangerines grow in the winter season, bringing perfect freshness to the cold, snowy landscape. The spring days, if you will.
