Kingston’s annual Korea Harvest Festival went live online for the first time ever due to the Covid-19 restrictions in place on Saturday September 26.
The festival was first started five years ago in 2016 to promote South and North Korean culture and encourage meaningful cultural exchange.
“I know that there are so many good things about British culture but I also know that there are many good aspects of Korea that not many British people know about,” Justina Jang, the Festival Director and trustee of Korean British Cultural Exchange, said.
“I thought that maybe if we bring some Korean culture here then maybe we can put the good things from Korea and the good things from Britain and make something really nice.”
The festival took to YouTube and Instagram to showcase a variety of events from making one of Korea’s favourite rice cake dishes Songpyeon, to traditional dance performance Ganggangsullae, to a live Kpop dance workshop and more.
The organisers of the festival also launched a Kimchi Recipe book with the help of illustrator Diya Mitra, who drew the illustrations for the book and festival.
Participant Phoebe Hung said: “For me personally the food events were my favourite. I learned about Songpyeon, which I would really like to try, and Kimchi, which I want to make myself.”
As the festival had to be done online, there were many sudden changes to the initial plan the team had in place and Jang said finding the money, time and volunteers proved to be a struggle.
However, Mitra said the advantages of having it online was being able to see it from the comfort of one’s home without the need to travel.
“Additionally, it makes it easily accessible as it was streamed on YouTube which is a very popular platform which many people use,” said Sophia Tang, host and volunteer for the festival. “As everything is pre-recorded and edited, it meant there was less to manage in comparison to a real-time event.”
There were many sponsors for the festival this year, with the Kingston Council being the main sponsor over the past five years and once again this year. Jang said they could not have done it without the Council’s initiative.
They were also given funding from the Korean Foundation, CLF Holdings and one particularly big sponsor the National Lottery.
“Very kindly, CLF Holdings allowed us to use music for free and also supplied electricity for us,” Jang said. “They’ve been supporting us by directly providing us with the space and electricity for the Festival.”
The Kingston Korea Festival continues on October 31 and November 1 with the modified annual Kpop competition now a virtual workshop, followed by the Kim Jang Festival on November 22.
Jang said there would also be an opportunity for aspiring singers and dancers to feature in a music video that one of the dancers is planning to put together.
“When we actually do this, if someone wants to do an audition online then she [one of the dancers] can arrange that and she can send companies like JYP the tapes,” Jang said.
By Abby K Lake