From BTS to Jeju's sea divers: South Korea's cultural revival

**SPEAKER_2** (0:02)
This is a podcast by The Straits Times.

**Li Xueying** (0:11)
Hi, I'm Li Xueying, and welcome to Asian Insider. In this episode, I speak to The Straits Times South Korea correspondent, Wendy Teo. About why more in South Korea are wearing the traditional Hanbok attire, and what that all says about the government's efforts to preserve its culture.
Hi, Wendy, welcome to the show.

**Wendy Teo** (0:40)
Hi, Xueying, thanks for having me.

**Li Xueying** (0:42)
Okay, so Wendy, you have lived in South Korea for how many years now?

**Wendy Teo** (0:46)
I think coming to seven years in August.

**Li Xueying** (0:49)
Right, okay. And in all these seven years, just curious, as a Singaporean, do you own a Hanbok?

**Wendy Teo** (0:55)
Yes, I do have one. I think I bought it maybe a year ago, because I had to attend a friend's wedding.

**Li Xueying** (1:01)
Right.

**Wendy Teo** (1:02)
And then, you know, I didn't want the traditional kind of Hanbok, because it's very cumbersome. And I think laundering it is going to be a big issue. So I actually chose a more simple, more than one.

**Li Xueying** (1:14)
What does that mean? What does that look like?

**Wendy Teo** (1:17)
Actually, I thought it could function as a modern wear, like because, you know, the top, which is like, you have to tie it at the side. So I chose it so that I can wear it over a t-shirt, and it still looks more than like it has the Korean accent, but still more than enough. It's not the very frilly, not the colors, it's navy blue, and then the skirt. So basically, it's a top and a separate, that can be worn separately, and still not look too out of place in an office environment.

**Li Xueying** (1:52)
Is that common in South Korean nowadays, to see people wearing hanbok in its variations for just daily lives, going out and about, not just for special occasions like a wedding or some big dinner?

**Wendy Teo** (2:08)
Yeah. So I think as office wear, daily wear, the modern hanbok you can see, because the designs are really nice, it really looks like modern office wear, or modern casual wear with Korean accents. So I think the designs are really good. And the reason why I did the story is because I actually saw it coming up. Like in the past, you are suddenly like, there's this trend, there's this popularity. So you see, especially foreigners, you see more foreigners being very interested in these things. And a lot of the shops have gone online to cater to the international customers.

**Li Xueying** (2:45)
I see. And so these are like aspatrates, for instance, not just tourists, right? Aspatrates living in South Korea, who are sort of adopting a sort of local cultural tradition in the everyday lives.

**Wendy Teo** (2:58)
Yeah. I remember there was an ambassador, I can't remember which country, but it's a European country. Apparently she wears a modern hanbok, like a...
Yeah. So she wears it for all official events because she loves it so much. And she has a particular designer that she goes to who help her design something that has the Korean accent and goes very well. It still looks very formal.

**Li Xueying** (3:22)
Right. And I'm going to come to the question of why there is this sort of resurgence or this surge in interest among the foreigners in South Korea. But one question before that, is there, are there concerns about cultural appropriation when it comes to foreigners wearing the local cultural traditional attire?

**Wendy Teo** (3:41)
Based on what the interviews I've done, because you know there are palaces in Seoul that people always go to. It's part of the tourist itinerary. So it's a custom to wear, to dress up in a traditional hanboks and then you go to the palace. And if you wear a traditional hanbok or a modern hanbok, you get free entry. So this is the way, the government's way of promoting hanbok wear.
So I think because it's so common, that actually the Koreans are actually quite happy to see foreigners doing this. So for the modern hanbok, I feel like, because the designs are actually very classy and very modern, so in some ways I feel like it's catering to foreigners. So they're trying to stir up this interest in foreigners to wear the modern hanbok.

**Li Xueying** (4:31)
Okay. And what's the thinking behind that? In the last year, you were saying that it was only in the past one year or so, even though you've been in South Korea for seven years, that you've seen more foreigners wearing these attire on the streets of South Korea.