In the United States, many Major League Baseball games feature long periods of calm, punctuated by cheering when there’s action on the field or the stadium organ plays a catchy tune. But in South Korea, a baseball game is a sustained sensory overload. Each player has a fight song, and cheering squads — including drummers […]
Read MoreTag: Seoul (South Korea)
Ohtani Makes South Korean Fans Forget Rivalry With Japan
Shohei Ohtani is a soft-spoken, 6-foot-4 powerhouse. He is a unicorn: one of baseball’s best hitters and pitchers, the first to dominate both in nearly a century. He might one day be considered the greatest ever to play the game. He’s also from Japan, the former colonizer of South Korea. The nations’ relationship is still […]
Read MoreOhtani Makes South Korean Fans Forget Rivalry With Japan
Shohei Ohtani is a soft-spoken, 6-foot-4 powerhouse. He is a unicorn: one of baseball’s best hitters and pitchers, the first to dominate both in nearly a century. He might one day be considered the greatest ever to play the game. He’s also from Japan, the former colonizer of South Korea. The nations’ relationship is still […]
Read MoreWhy Women Outnumber Men in South Korea’s Sports Stadiums
Each time the South Korean men’s soccer team scored against Singapore during a recent 5-0 rout in a World Cup qualifier, the roar from the home crowd came largely from women, who held nearly two-thirds of the tickets to the match. In the Seoul stadium that November day, a billboard-size banner for the star striker […]
Read MoreSouth Korea’s Antitrust Enforcers Aimed at Big Tech. Then Came the Backlash.
The South Korean government unleashed a wave of panic across the internet industry: The country’s antitrust regulator said it would enact the toughest competition law outside Europe, curbing the influence of major technology companies. The Korea Fair Trade Commission, with the backing of President Yoon Suk Yeol, said in December that it planned to make […]
Read MoreSamsung’s Lee Jae-yong Acquitted in Stock, Accounting Fraud Case
A South Korean court on Monday acquitted Lee Jae-yong, Samsung’s top executive, on charges of stock price manipulation and accounting fraud, the latest twist in the billionaire’s legal troubles tied to a merger that helped him secure control of the nation’s largest company. Prosecutors had sought a prison sentence of five years and a fine […]
Read MoreThe Quiet Luxury of South Korea’s Postpartum Care Centers
Four mothers sat quietly in the nursing room around midnight, breastfeeding their newborn babies. As one mother nodded off, her eyelids heavy after giving birth less than two weeks earlier, a nurse came in and whisked her baby away. The exhausted new mom returned to her private room to sleep. Sleep is just one of […]
Read MoreFamily Split at LG, a South Korean Giant, Tests Corporate Succession
When Koo Bon-moo, chairman of South Korean conglomerate LG, died in 2018, there wasn’t much question, at least publicly, of who would next preside over the company. LG, a $10 billion corporate empire, is governed by the principle of male primogeniture. Succession was effectively settled 14 years earlier when Mr. Koo and his wife adopted […]
Read MoreHalloween Celebrations Subdued in Itaewon One-Year After Tragedy
Seoul marked a somber anniversary over the weekend, a year after nearly 160 people died in a crowd surge in Itaewon, a popular nightlife district in the city. Oct. 29, 2022, had started as a long-awaited Halloween celebration — the first in several years in South Korea that was free of pandemic restrictions. A mass […]
Read MoreSouth Korea’s Crowd Crush Disaster Prompts No Changes at the Top
From the beginning, with the grief still raw and anguished questions unanswered, the South Korean government distanced itself from the disaster that unfolded last year on a Halloween weekend in Seoul. Nearly 160 revelers were crushed to death in a narrow alleyway in the Itaewon neighborhood, after huge throngs had amassed with no police officers […]
Read MoreWhat South Korea’s Frequent Protests Say About Its Politics
A recent rally in Seoul carried the sound of a rock festival — high-amp speakers throbbing with the K-pop hit “Gangnam Style” — if not the look of one. The crowd of mostly elderly people waved South Korean and American flags to the song’s revised refrain: “Anti-communist style!” When speaker after speaker revved up the […]
Read MoreNorth Korea May Have Seen Little Benefit in Keeping Travis King
When Pvt. Travis T. King fled to North Korea in July, he looked like a potential propaganda bonanza for Kim Jong-un’s government. He was the first American soldier to cross from South Korea into the North since 1982. The North Korean state media claimed that Private King, who is Black, had complained of racial discrimination […]
Read MoreFor South Korea’s Senior Subway Riders, the Joy Is in the Journey
The subway rumbled toward its final stop north of Seoul. Along the way, hordes disembarked, with the determined, brisk gait of those with somewhere to be. Far from the city center, the thicket of high-rise buildings grew sparser, and the afternoon sun crept deeper into the train cars, riding on an elevated track at that […]
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