Hello everyone!
Since a few people like my last post about top Korean news, I'm going to share
with you 5 news that made headlines for the months of January and February
2018. Hope you like it and come back for more next time.
1. Taeyang and Min HyoRin Tied
the Knot
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After
almost four years dating, Young Bae a.k.a. Taeyang and Eun Ran a.k.a. Min
HyoRin, got married at the begging of February. The couple came out to the
public on June of 2015, after already been together for almost a year and a
half. Both parties accepted the news of their relationship and said that they
never were cautious about it, they went on dates on the public but never were
photographed. Min HyoRin was Taeyang's love interest at the MV of the song
"1 AM", she was also the inspiration for the track "Eye, Nose,
Lips".
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On
December 18 of 2017 the couple announced that they decided to spend the rest of
their lives together, this through an Instagram post made by Taeyang. A few
hours later an official post from both agencies confirmed. The ceremony was
speculated to be on February, before his mandatory military service enlistment.
To the wedding were invited a great number of artists, from the Big Bang
members, to singers, actors, comedians, and a bunch of entertainment
personalities.
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The
wedding took place on February 3 of 2018 on a church with close acquaintance,
friends and family, follow by a reception at Paradise City in Incheon. The
officiant of the wedding was actor Ki Tae Young, husband of artist Eugene, who
Taeyang got close to on church and previously sang the congratulatory song on
the actor's wedding. For the congratulatory song, the R&B/ hip hop singer,
Zion T., gave the couple that gift. One of the things the media has been
talking about is that the couple did not wanted any monetary gifts from the
guest, like is the costume, they just wanted to share this moment with the
people close to them (even though some guest give it to them). The couple did
not went abroad for their honeymoon, because of their schedule.
2. PyeongChang Winter Olympics
2018
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All the rights of the images goes to their respected owners
The
XXII Olympic Winter Games were held on PyeongChang, Gangwon Providence, South
Korea from February 9 to 25 of 2018. The election of the host of the Winter
Olympics was decided on July of 2011, since then South Korea has been arranging
the area for the games, and is the third Asian city to host them. The events
were held in Pyeongchang, aside from ice events, which were held in the
neighboring city of Gangneung, also downhill, super-G, and combined were on the
neighboring county of Jeongseon. The focus of the 2018 Winter Olympics was the
Alpensia Resort in Daegwallyeong-Myeon, Pyeongchang, at this area was the
Olympic Stadium, Ski Jumping Stadium, Biathlon Center, Cross-Country Center,
Sliding Center, Olympic Village and Alpine Center. Aside from these venues, the Winter Olympic
had the stand-alone ones, which were Bongwang Phoenix Park in Bongpyeong-Myeon
at Pyeongchang, were the freestyle skiing and snowboard games were held, the
Jeongseon Alpine Center at Jeongseon, were alpine skiing, downhill, super-G and
combinde were held. The venues that were at the neighborhood city of Gangneung
were Hockey Center, Curling Center, Gangneung Oval, Ice Arena, and an additional
venue was located at the Catholic Kwandong University for the ice hockey
women's competition.
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There
are 15 sports at the Winter Olympics which featured 102 events, this would be a
total of 102 medals for the first time in the history of the Winter Olympics.
The games for the Winter Olympics are: alpine skiing, biathlon, bobsleigh,
cross-country skiing, curling, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hockey,
luge, Nordic combined, short track speed skating, skeleton, ski jumping,
snowboarding, and speed skating. For this games, six new sport were introduced
to the Olympics: men's and women's bog air snowboarding, mixed doubles curling,
men's and women's mass start speed skating, and mixed tem alpine skiing. A
total of 92 teams participated at Winter Olympics of 2018, with six nations
making their debut (Ecuador, Eritrea, Kosovo, Malaysia, Nigeria and Singapore).
One of the most meaningful moments of the Winter Olympics was the unification
of South and North Korea at the opening ceremony, marching under the Korean
Unification Flag, and a unified Korean team for women's ice hockey tournament
under the country code COR. Both countries also participated separately. The
rank for the medal table goes as follow (only the top 5 will be shown): Norway,
14 gold, 14 silver and 11 bronze, with a total of 39; Germany, 14 gold, 10
silver, 7 bronze, with a total of 31; Canada, 11 gold, 8 silver, 10 bronze,
with a total of 29; United States, 9 gold, 8 silver, 10 bronze, with a total of
23; Netherlands, 8 gold, 6 silver, 6 bronze, with a total of 20. For the host
country, they won 17 medals in total, 5 golds, 8 silver and 4 bronze, making it
to the seventh place.
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The
PyeongChang Winter Olympics 2018 has been emphasizing on the children and
peace. Since the opening ceremony, children have been a key part of the event,
and at the closing ceremony 12-year-old
Yang Tae-hwan made a great impression with the electric-guitar
presentation, aside from 11-year-old boy, Oh Yeon-joon, who had won the South
Korean version of The Voice, who performed the Olympic anthem. Children also
accompanied Jang SaIk for South Korea's national anthem. The artistic
performance at the closing ceremony was on the hands of KPOP with singer CL and
boy band EXO, as well the audience could see the interactions between the
Korean history and the current Korean culture. As for the International Olympic
Committee (IOC), they thanked the athletes for their "spirit and fair
play" and Thomas Bach, the president of the IOC, made the remarks before
the closing ceremony that on this Winter Olympics, "We have seen here how
sport can make the world a better place."
3. Yonghwa (CNBlue) under
investigation and enlistment
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On
January of 2018 there was rumors of an idol cheating his way to Graduate School
at Kyunhee University, South Korea, for the Applied Arts Doctorate Program.
This idol was giving admission without completing all the requirements, and
even got top marks, despite not showing up for the mandatory interview. The
agency FNC Entertainment goes as follow: "Yonghwa was recommended multiple
times by the school and applied to Kyunhee University's Applied Arts Graduate
Doctorate Program in January of 2017 during the additional accepted round.
Popular celebrities such as idols have their schedules planned by the label
since they are busy due to concerts and other things, and celebrities more
according to that schedule. Similarly the label took care of Yonghwa's
application including filling out his forms, submitting them, and contacting
the school. Both the label and Yonghwa believed that he was undergoing the
normal application process until the situation became problematic. Yonghwa
believed that the individual interview was the regular process, and attended
the interview as the label scheduled." During the Statement the label also
mentioned that Yonghwa was denied admission for the master program on fall of
2016, but a professor from the program said that they needed more students and
there was no competition, that is why he applied for the followed year. Both,
the label and Yonghwa, though there was no breaking the school's laws during
the process, for which they felt sorry and he was going to take a break from
school.
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After
all this controversy, Yonghwa enlisted for his mandatory service on March 5 of
2018, right after his last fan meeting in Hong Kong. On March was announced
that the label and professors of the University were charged for obstruction of
business. A common though on the internet is that he intentionally was delaying
his mandatory service with this graduate program process. For now, Yonghwa is
going to be serving until December of 2019.
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4. South Korea Hospital Fire
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On
January 26 it was reported a fire on a small hospital without sprinkler system,
killing 37 people. Sejong Hospital is situated at the city of Miryang, which
has an elderly center with 94 patients, the ones that were successfully
evacuated. The hospital had a total of six floors, from which the first and
second floors had the most amount of victims. The officials stated that the
fire started on the emergency room. 34 of the dead's were women, and 26 were in
their eighties or older, and there was a total of 140 injured victims. This
event is the country's deadliest blaze in about a decade. Before this accident,
a fire on December of 2017 was the deadliest, a building located in central
South Korea was caught on fire killing 29 people.
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5. An Olympian Visits South
Korea's Dog Farm
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We
know that different cultures have different diets, and some cultures eat things
that you would never imagine could be eaten. When a United States' freestyle
skier (Gus Kenworthy) went to the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics this past
February, he went to the dog farm near of the venues. But this dog farm is not
one that raise dogs to later find a good home for them, this dog farm is to
maintain the dogs to later sale as cooking meat. For western culture this can
be outrageous, but it is a practice of centuries at oriental cultures.
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All the rights of the images goes to their respected owners
Dog
trade in South Korea generated around $2 billion yearly, this according to the
International Aid for Korean Animals (IAKA). The athlete made the point that he
did not wanted to impose with his ideals, but the way the dogs were living in
small spaces and the malnourished evident to his eyes, was "completely
inhumane". He decided to adopt one of the dogs there, and hopes to raise
awareness about the topic. It was reported on a census carried by Korea's
Statistics Information Services, that there is over 100,000 farms holding
892,820 dogs, which makes millions of dogs slaughtered yearly. The practice of
dog eating is neither legal nor illegal in South Korea, from which the Korean
Association for Animal Protection demanded the prohibition of it.
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This
story has many people supporting the shutting down of dogs farms around South
Korea. A CNN reporter said on an article that her dog was a rescue dog from one
of those "farms", rescued two years ago. Other athletes also had made
their voices heard upon this issue, even the President of South Korea, Moon
Jae-In, has adopted a shelter rescued from a meat farm and adopted one of the
dogs there. But further action hasn't been done by the government there. The
Humane Society has been doing a great task, by shutting down 10 dog farms which
rescued more than 1,200 dogs, and they are also working to make the practice
illegal by signing petitions around the Asian country.
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