I wrote all this based on my own experience. I talk to lots of Koreans about 정, but I only wrote down two of the discussions. They formed a lot of the source material:

INTERVIEW #1

K: 정 is a warm heart. It's, different from love though. Married couples don't stay together because of love, they stay together because of 정. It would hurt too much for them to separate. They have tamed each other. A wife will say, "I may not always love you, but I can never leave you now because of 정. It comes after ten-- even sometimes after only one year."

At: 정 has a lot more social functions, right?

K: Yes. When you go to the market, and you bargain, that's to create 정. I love talking to the ajummas in little markets streets. They don't try to take your money. Sometimes they will try to give you free things. If they give you something, you will like it, and it will make them feel good because you like it. That's why with rude, pushy ajummas, young men cannot hate them, because ajummas love to give things to young people to make them happy, so young men only see a nice old woman who would love to give them something nice.

At: I've heard you can have 정 with someone you hate.

K: Yes. You can have 정 with somebody you hate. So maybe it's not only "warm heart." If you share a common experience with someone, even if you hate them, you have a part in their life, and they have a part in yours, so there's 정.

INTERVIEW #2

Ch: 정 is what married couples have. Or any people, really. But it's not the same as love.

At: How does 정 apply to people you don't like?

Ch: You have 정 even with people you hate. The reason you hate someone in the first place is that you have so much 정 with them. If you had no 정, you would not be able to hate them. You wouldn't care at all what they had done, nor would you have any expectations. But if you have a relationship with a person where you can expect kindness but instead they are mean, that's when you hate them. It really means you like them. That's how 정 is different from love.

At: I've heard 정 explains why ajummas can get away with being very rude and pushy.

Ch: Especially older people like to make 정 with younger people and make them happy, maybe by giving them things. That's the 정 economy -- feeling good by making other people feel good.

At: Love has been massively exploited in the West to sell things. Has 정 been similarly co-opted?

Ch: They advertise Chocopie as 정. "Give Chocopie, and you are giving 정."