The K-pop boy band Seventeen performs at the Pyramid stage on day three of Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm near Pilton, Somerset, Britain, June 28. Glastonbury Festival ran from June 26 to 30. EPA-Yonhap
Post-pandemic, people are bent on traveling including to Korea. Whether they are coming mainly because of the Korean wave, or hallyu, is always heavily scrutinized and debated.
British magazine Monocle in its late 2023 issue ranked South Korea sixth in its "soft power survey," powered mainly by its cultural exports. It noted how the Korean Netflix drama "Glory" prompted an anti-bullying campaign in Southeast Asia, while demand for Korean-language courses and accessibility to bibimbap is high. Still in the top 10, sixth is a slide down from the previous years, something the policymakers hope to turn around. The burgeoning entertainment industry is ever finding the next source of growth while the members of the super-popular K-pop group BTS, except Jin, are still serving in the military.
For hallyu fans, it's about more opportunities to be in the land, enjoy their favorite groups, deepen their knowledge of the Korean language and work either short-term or long-term.
"It is nice to be back in Korea overall. There is so much good food, and I can buy casual ‘hanbok' (traditional Korean attire),” said Sydney Smith, 24, from the United States. After working a year at a Korean middle school, she is doing an eight-week internship with a Korean conglomerate. She got interested in K-pop early through a friend.
For her, consuming Korean content has always been a pastime, while the pandemic era provided more time for her to study Korean. She said she was already heavily consuming Korean content even before the pandemic. Smith got inducted into K-pop through SHINee and Girls' Generation, and is now a fan of NewJeans, who sold out tickets at their first concert and fan meeting in Japan, held June 26 and 27 at Tokyo Dome.
The members of K-pop girl band NewJeans perform at their first concert in Japan and fan meeting held at Tokyo Dome on June 27. Yonhap
Cass Zheng, 26, has been listening to K-pop since she was 12 years old. She decided to learn Korean so that she did not have to wait for English subtitles and translations for K-pop, drama and variety shows to pop up. From Singapore, she finds Korean food becoming a staple with people going out for Korean food frequently. There is Hong Kong Banjeom, a restaurant franchise run by Korean celebrity chef Paik Jong-won, in her neighborhood. For her, the Korean wave is part of her "lifestyle," with a possibility for international fans like herself to find work in the Korean entertainment industry.
Ashley Onuigbo, 22, is a relative newcomer to the Korean wave, having just gotten to know and like K-pop around the time of the pandemic.
"When I saw BLACKPINK at Coachella in 2019, it was flashy, different," she said. In 2021, Onuigbo came to Korea to attend a vocal academy but returned home because of COVID-19. The senior at Carnegie Mellon University is currently at the same corporate internship and hopes to continue to audition in Korea after she graduates.
Hallyu fans, from left, Sydney Smith from the United States, Ashley Onuigbo also from the U.S., and Cass Zheng from Singapore share their views on hallyu as consumers and possible future industry workers. Korea Times photo by Kim Ji-soo
The three stopped by The Korea Times office in Seoul last Saturday to talk about their interest and passion in Korean content. Having been exposed to various aspects of the Korean wave such as K-pop, K-dramas, K-beauty, K-food and others, they are finding that respective pockets of hallyu are appealing to different audiences under an overarching interest in Korean content.
Customers try out a range of fragrances at Olive Young in the Hongdae neighborhood in Mapo District, Seoul, in this April 2024 file photo. Courtesy of Olive Young
On a similar note, global sales of Korean instant noodles are soaring. A recent surprise surge in exports of Korean instant noodles has exceeded $100 million in both April and May, buoying up share prices of Korean food conglomerates such as Samyang, CJ CheilJedang and Ottogi.
Buldak Ramen by Samyang and other Korean instant noodle products line the shelves at a supermarket in Seoul in this May 19 file photo. According to export-import sales figures of the Korea Customs Service, monthly instant noodle exports exceeded the $100 million mark for the first time in April, posting a 46. 8 percent increase over the same period of the previous year. Yonhap
The question however of whether K-pop will decline or peak always hovers.
"Korea, despite its contemporary centuries of stagnation, has been an open-minded nation. With its desire for 'recognition' and knowledge that culture reigns in the digital economy of the 21st century, Korea's positive energy will be expressed further through hallyu, " said Shim Doo-bo, professor of media communication at Sungshin Women's University in Seoul.
Shim, who is also author of the recent book "What is Hallyu All About," forecasts that the widening range of hallyu fans in terms of age groups will bring about its expansion. As for the incoming foreign visitors, both short and long-term, their presence is expected to drive the direction of hallyu toward more openness and wider economic benefits as well.
"By global standards, Korea is still a 'closed society.' The criticism that Korean popular culture remains limited in ethnic or sexual representation illustrates that. With the domestic market small, key for Korean firms is to advance to the global market. And an influx of foreign talent can facilitate that," he said.
The three fans attested that there has always been speculation regarding when hallyu might stop being popular.
"I guess in regard to K-pop, there is the question when BTS and BLACKPINK become inactive, who will fill the void globally," Smith said. The 13-member act Seventeen of HYBE Entertainment took the main stage at Glastonbury Festival just recently, becoming the first K-pop idol group to do so.
"In terms of K-pop, it could peak. It's oversaturated already. In terms of Korean culture, there are still parts of Korean content that the general public can enjoy. It could hit a high and there would be a plateau," Onuigbo said.
The interest in cultural content has meant that demand to learn the Korean language has increased in tandem. In a January column for Seoul Economic Daily, Lee Hae-young, chief of the King Sejong Institute Foundation, noted that online students at King Sejong Institute Foundation increased by 44 percent to 88,000 in 2023.
As Korean content's global popularity continues, these three fans said that they have not really seen the traditional Korean sentiment of “han” or regret. “When I think of han, I think of Kim So-wol's poem ‘Azalea,'" said Smith. Onuigbo added that she noticed the social commentary aspects — people driven by greed and for money — in the popular Korean film “Parasite” and Netflix drama “Squid Game.” Zheng said she finds such Korean sentiment in Tablo's song “Hood.”
For the three, they found that Korean singers or stars were more responsive to trendy presentations through short form, or more use of English lyrics that appeal to them. As international fans, they think they can stress the importance of producing perhaps eco-friendly albums or explaining cultural appropriation and foreign management styles.
As for the future of hallyu, they believe it will be sticking around.
Smith, who has been studying Korean for nearly seven years, said it would be a dream come true “if I could speak like a native (Korean speaker).”
Onuigbo, who wants to work and live in South Korea as an entertainer, saw globally popular Afrobeats being incorporated in such K-pop songs as Le Sserafim's “Smart.”
For Zheng, she hopes that she can be part of an international cooperation of K-pop and, for example, Singaporean pop in the future.
"Our international input could affect change. For instance, a Japanese friend of mine from a language program is now manager of JYP's all-Japanese-member group NiziU," Zheng said. "I think her input as a manager could bring about changes."