BY BECKI DEGEEST
Email
“ahn n-yawh-ng ha seh yo” means hello in Korean. Learning Korean was just one of the many fun things that event-goers took away from Korea Night last Saturday.
Put on by the Korea Club, Korea Night furnished variety for all who attended with one objective in mind: to educate about Korea while having a bit of fun.
“The purpose of the event is to show the people things about Korea, like the pop-culture, traditional culture and expose a country they might not be familiar with,” said Conor Lee, president of Korea Club. “I think we had a good turnout, for being that time of the year and being cold out. So I’m really happy with it. The food was good, performances were good and the booths were all good.”
Opening their doors at 7 p.m., club members encouraged people to check out all the booths. This year’s booths included Korean games, calligraphy, k-pop, tae kwon do, Korean food and recipes, Korean post cards and Korean superstitions. Each booth offered a variety of information and gave viewers a “little chunk” of Korea to take with them.
“I really loved learning about the superstitions at the booths,” Telia Rattliff-Cross, MSUM senior said, “Learning all about Korea was great.”
The night took off when the performances began. The first performance was given by Lee and club member, Jenny Wiebesick. It was an acoustic rendition of a popular song in Korean, titled “Don’t Cry” by Park Bom. Following the acoustic “aweing” song was a demonstration given by the TaeKwonDo Club.
Other exciting events included a k-pop dance done by the group calling themselves, “AV8TRX.” Following that was the Korean Club fashion show, where students wore traditional clothing from Korea.
Lighting up the show with excitement and action was the variety show – dance competition. Anyone who attended was allowed and encouraged to sign up to do a “dance off” type competition. Competitors were split up into teams of three, each team individually taking the stage. Next the teams watched 15 seconds of a k-pop video and were told to mimic the dance routine the next time it was played back. Whichever team did the best representation of the video won. This was the event that definitely got the most laughs.
“I absolutely loved the performances,” Rattliff-Cross said. “They interacted well with the audience and danced well together.”
Ending the night in tradition, the Korean Club members took the stage to sing the most popular Korean folk tune, “Arirang.”
All students are invited to come to meetings put on by Korea Club. They meet on a weekly basis and are always open to new members.
“I really think that you should come if you want to learn about Korea or interact with Koreans,” Lee said about the club. “You get a different experience and learn more about a different culture.”