Greatness

My co-teacher, the one who confided in me, she and I get along quite well. On the day that she confided in me and we really had a serious talk together, we went to lunch, as usual. While eating lunch, she told me "You are a great person... " I felt so touched and special, then she continued. "but you'd be a greater person if you lost weight." Yup. Because inner beauty and personality and strength all depend upon your outside appearance. It didn't really bother me, since I'm used to this kind of back-handed compliment here in Korea... but I just don't quite understand the mental process that occurs when they say something like this. Maybe the answer will be found in my learning Korean. Why do they always have to make an observation and include a physically disparaging comment as well? It's a mystery. Ah Korea... land of the back-handed compliment.