A growing number of South Korean women are training to be morticians, a field from which they had long been excluded, amid changing views on gender roles and a rising preference for women's bodies to be handled by women.
With recent deaths of female celebrities and prominent figures, as well as growing scrutiny of sex crimes against women, gender sensitivity is changing the way families of the deceased bid farewell to their grandmothers, mothers and daughters.
"I felt uncomfortable when my classmates of a different sex touched my body, even when I was fully dressed," said Park Se-jung, 19, who is in her second year of funeral directing studies. "I sure wouldn't want them to touch, wash and dress my naked body even if I were dead. I am determined I should be the one bidding those women a proper farewell."