Shopofkorea guides
Korean Gifts for Your Pen Pal: Small Keepsakes That Fit in a Pouch
Official product names are shown in Korean. Product pages are in Korean; prices are in South Korean won (KRW).
When a parcel from a pen pal arrives first, the delight is quickly followed by a dilemma. What should you send back to make a proper reply? Something too grand will put the other person ill at ease, while something too slight may not convey enough feeling. And because the gift has to cross a border, anything large, heavy, or fragile is ruled out from the start.
A customer living in Daegu found themselves in exactly that position. This was someone who exchanged letters with several friends, and one of their foreign friends had sent a gift first. While looking for something to send in return, the customer searched using the phrase "Korea's 100 representative products." The search term itself reflects their thinking: since they were sending a reply gift from Korea, it had to be something distinctly Korean.
What the customer chose was a phone strap made of ebony wood with a lotus-flower pattern. They had already set aside two other items on their own: a small pouch and a metal bookmark. The plan was to place the bookmark and the phone strap together inside the pouch and send them as one package. After receiving the items, the customer noted that they looked exactly as they had on screen. When you are choosing a gift by photograph alone and sending it across the sea, that confirmation matters more than one might expect.
What is worth noticing in this scene is the size of the gifts. A few small things that fit inside a single pouch. A return gift between people connected by letters is usually just about right at this scale. If you picture the moment when the recipient takes the pouch out alongside the letter, a size that fits in the palm of the hand matches the warmth of a letter perfectly.
First Item in the Pouch: A Lotus Ebony Strap
The closest product to the 원연꽃 핸드폰고리 (lotus phone strap) the customer chose is the 흑단 작은열쇠고리-삼연꽃 (ebony small key ring – triple lotus). Against an ebony base, a three-lotus-flower motif is decorated with jagae (mother-of-pearl) inlaid using the sanggam technique, with each piece of partial jagae attached by hand, making it a handcrafted item. The longest side is approximately 9.7 cm, so it does not take up much room when placed in a pouch alongside other small accessories. It comes with a decorative knotted cord attached and is made in the Republic of Korea. It is not classified as a fragile item and can be shipped internationally, so sending it in a small parcel presents no difficulty.
Filling the Rest of the Space with a Bookmark and a Pen
The customer sourced a metal bookmark separately to include. For anyone who would like to put together a similar combination in one place, there is the 금장 책갈피-국보 10종세트 (gold-finish bookmark – national treasure set of 10). Ten bookmarks, each inspired by a Korean national treasure, are bundled together as one set. You could place one or two in this return gift and then tuck one into each subsequent letter, using them gradually over time. For someone who exchanges pen-pal letters with several friends, a set of ten different designs is inherently practical.
For people connected through letters, a pen is also a natural choice. The 예쁜 한국볼펜5종 (pretty Korean ballpoint pen set of 5) is a stationery set whose ballpoint pen designs incorporate Korean symbols such as hanbok, traditional patterns, hangeul, and roof tiles. The total weight is 60 g, so it adds very little to the weight of a parcel. If your friend ends up writing their next reply with that pen, the gift you sent will have come back to you as a letter.
There is no need to include all three. The pouch put together in Daegu contained nothing more than one strap and one bookmark. Matching the weight of the gift you received, or keeping it slightly lighter, also reduces the chance that your return gift becomes another burden in turn. Enough to fill a small pouch is plenty.
This account is based on an actual purchase; individuals and institutions have been anonymized and some details have been reconstructed.