The Korean Cultural Festival, held by the Cambodia-Korea Cooperation Centre (CKCC) to showcase the culture of the Korean people, attracted students from different universities and other youth who love this culture.
To share Korean culture with the public, especially students of the Korean language, the festival was meticulously designed and featured many interesting activities and performances including traditional dancing, K-pop, Kimchi cooking classes, make-up tutorials and a lantern show. Also, food stands were set up.
Speaking last week, Oum Ravy, vice rector of Royal University of Phnom Penh, talked about the importance of Cambodian-Korean relations. The vice rector said, “This festival shares the culture of Korea, in order to create a bond between the nations while providing new experiences and in-depth knowledge of Korean culture to Cambodians. Globalisation links people together for the purpose of exchanging culture, extending knowledge, and cooperation, helping us to explore and understand.”
A programme development manager at CKCC, Eng Sonita, said the event was organised with the Embassy of Korea, which initiated a food festival. In combination with the CKCC cultural festival, these two concepts will spark interest in Korean culture here, Ms Sonita said.
“It will be the biggest and most unique cultural event of the year,” Ms Sonita added. She encouraged youth to participate, saying it would benefit them to directly experience and get accustomed to another culture amid the current trend toward globalisation, and that there was much they could learn. She also advised Cambodian youth to foster their critical thinking skills, rather than engaging in premature judgement and criticism.
Mr Van Thakknin, 20, a student of the Korean language at CKCC, said he is fond of the Korean culture. “I once participated in a similar festival and all the performers were Korean. But I’m thrilled that the Cambodian performers did such a good job of understanding another culture.”
Men Linda, 21, a first-year student pursuing a bachelor’s degree in the Department of Korean at the Institute of Foreign Languages, was interested in the Khmer chounpor dancing and a taekwondo demonstration. She was curious to see this cultural event and discover more, citing the reasons of getting healthy life and learning self-protection. Ms Linda said she would register for a taekwondo course.
“Joining the Korean Cultural Festival doesn’t mean we are obsessed with this civilisation; but we need to learn other cultures because we live in a diverse world and in the era of ASEAN integration.” She recommend it to other youth.
