72 to China. The majority of North Koreans who left their country after the famines went to China to seek help from their relatives there. In most cases, North Korean refugee women crossed the state borders to obtain food or to raise seed capital for trading activities. Because North Korean and Chinese villages situated along the border are like neighbouring villages separated by rivers, North Korean refugee women did not worry much about crossing the borders. North Koreans living in areas close to China and the Tumen River secretly went into Chinese farm villages, equipped with goods to obtain food, and returned with food stock in exchange for their goods. Yi Myeongsun (2009, 1-3) also crossed the river at night together with her son and went to a Chinese rural village thinking, “My mum’s house is next to the Tumen River. Even if we die, let’s at least get some rice in China to eat.” Although they didn’t know us, when we went there they treated us so well. Because I was so pitiful, because we were so miserable, the next time the whole family came out. The family. Yes, they put gloves on our hands and gave us clothes, and then after three days we went back again, went back again, then, the next time when we went they told us to bring a yarn spinning machine, you know, there is this yarn spinning machine. Went to the market and bought it for 10Won, for 10Won &orth Korean money, went to China, [got] cigarettes called ‘Dart’ for them, 10 cigarettes, at that time one cigarette was 40Won. 10 cigarettes, that made already 4,000Won… I received probably 6 of those packs. That means they made 24,000 Won. So you become a totally rich person. (Yi Myeongsun, 2009, 1-3) Subsequently to the famines, movements both ways between North Korea and the three north-eastern regions of China became frequent, facilitated by historical relations and upheld through exchanges of goods which made use of the geographical advantage; however, a new element was introduced to this nexus when the number of North Korean refugees increased. People who regularly went in and out of China began to take North Korean women to unmarried Chinese villagers and to receive money in return. Once Chinese cities started to develop and service enterprises began to thrive after the market economy was introduced in China, Chinese village women migrated to the cities. In this process, even married women moved to the cities to support their family’s economy, and there was a drastic rise in the number of women living away from their families. Naturally, this led to a rising number of male widowers, unmarried men, or men who had not been able to get married until late in the villages. This way a gender imbalance among marriage-aged people emerged in the Chinese countryside,