I would like to thank my Professors at Hannam University to help me find the

’
t speak 
Korean or English so people can
’
t really communicate with her unless 
they speak Uzbek language which makes it obvious that we need 
workers from Uzbekistan or someone who can speak Korean to take 
care of Korean customers. Many people from my country lack the 
skill of speaking Korean language like other immigrants in the 
beginning but I still prefer hiring them because that can ease their 
hardships of being at a foreign land in the beginning. Our food is also 
Halal so finding Uzbek staff makes us more credible in our customer
’
s 
eyes especially Muslims. Our community is our strength because the 
location of our restaurant is a bit of walk from public transportation 
which means our community customers will keep visiting us if they 
will find their co-ethnic community members serving them their 
ethnic cuisine
”
. (Case 5) 
In contrary to that some respondents opposed the idea of hiring co-ethnic 
employees and they also denied any emotional support from their co-ethnic 
community: 

---

49 

“
I never expected to get any emotional support from my fellow 
Indians because I had situations in which they demotivated me to 
overcome my business challenges. I also don
’
t like to hire Indians 
because they get too comfortable and forget to respect their 
professional boundaries. They also lack human capital like language 
proficiency in English or Korean, which makes it more difficult to 
think of hiring them. I also noticed sometimes jealousy or competitive 
attitude in an aggressive way among my community which makes it 
obvious to me that if my business is slowing down I cannot turn to 
other community members for emotional support.
”
(Case 1) 

“
I think co-ethnic community members exaggerate the situations and 
lower the morale which makes me feel pushed away. They also say 
things out of jealousy that sometimes demotivates me. In order to get 
more customers, they lower down the prices to an extent that I feel 
like losing customers to them. I also don
’
t like to hire my community 
members for service jobs because they refuse to learn the polite 
etiquettes which are a gist of succeeding in this competitive food 
market. I like to hire Koreans because they are professional and 
always try to help find replacements in case they leave the job.
”
(Case 3) 

“
There was nobody for myself but just me and when it comes to 
hiring labor, I prefer to hire Koreans because of their work attitude. I 
never even tried to reach out to my community because I never felt a 
need to mingle around my community.
”
(Case 4) 
4.7 Startup Capital
 
Proposition No 3: The higher the degree of access to startup 
capital, the better the survival of the business of the necessity 
immigrant entrepreneur. 

---

50 
Result: Proposition 3 is not confirmed as a survival factor for necessity 
immigrant entrepreneurs. Among the participants for this research, none of 
them had access to startup capital by government. All of them confirmed that 
they saved money by themselves or they took informal loans from family and 
friends. When asked them to share few insights about the process of raising 
startup capital, 2 of them admitted that they sold their properties back in 
their home countries to invest in their business here in South Korea. Among 
all the participants 2 of them had more startup capital than other but it didn
’
t 
have any impact over their business performance. Due to the rising 
competition in immigrant food business, they confirmed that excess capital 
wouldn
’
t have any impact on the success of their businesses. 
4.7.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of Startup Capital as a 
survival factor: 
All of the participants denied of having access to any formal financial support 
and their statements are as follows: 

“
I wish there was such thing as for immigrants to start small 
businesses in Korea but unfortunately government ask long credit 
history and a lot of documentation which makes it harder to even 
imagine getting a loan or startup fund. I saved money for my 
restaurant by working many years on a regular job back in my home 
country