Foreign arts fill the heart of Seoul

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Foreign arts fill the heart of Seoul

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Hanoi, Vietnam parade after their performance at Seoul City Hall Plaza in Saturday’s Seoul Friendship Fair.

The heart of Seoul, from City Hall Plaza to neighboring Cheonggye Stream to the streets of Mugyo-dong, was filled with international flavor s last Saturday when the annual global cultural fair was held on an unprecedented scale.
Around 50,000 Koreans and foreigners attended the 13th Seoul Friendship Fair.
It featured performances by troupes from 11 cities across the globe, the city government said.
Only about 25,000 people came out last year and nine foreign troupes participated. The fair was part of the week-long annual Hi Seoul Festival. It has been held since 1996.
The audience and performers seemed to enjoy Saturday’s event to the fullest.
“I love this event because I can befriend people from all over the world,” said Omer Inci, part of Motif, a 12-member troupe from Istanbul, Turkey, after performing at City Hall Plaza and parading with fellow performers.
Invited to Seoul for the first time, the Istanbul team performed six kinds of traditional folk dances that represent seven different Turkish regions.
“Korean people liked our performances. I want to come to Korea again, hopefully next year,” Inci, 24, said.
Tao Xinfeng from China played the erhu, a traditional two-stringed Chinese fiddle, when his Shanghai team presented a variety of performing arts, including music, dance, martial arts and circus tricks.
When asked which troupe performed the best, Tao said with a confident smile, “We did.”
Zhao Qi, who played a flute, said he was grateful for being able to get a glimpse of an international gathering in Seoul before the upcoming Beijing Olympics.
“The Beijing Olympics is an important event and I hope it can bring the world together,” Zhao said.
As part of the fair, the embassies of 58 countries held a flea market in the neighborhood where traditional goods and foods were sold.
Under the yellow and green Brazilian national flag, the tent of South America’s largest country attracted many locals.
Brazil is popular because it has many attractions to show to the world other than football, said Juliano Paiva Junho, 31, a volunteer at the tent.
“Here we sell coffee and crystals that are also common in Brazil,” said Junho, who has been studying linguistics at Seoul National University since August 2006.
“Brazil has beautiful nature and different kinds of beauty everywhere,” he said.
He named the pastel, a Brazilian pastry, as the best attraction of the day from his country.
Kim Jae-haeon, a deputy director at the Seoul city government, was in charge of the event.
He said the fair met its goals of providing locals with knowledge of the world and giving expatriates in Korea a chance to enjoy other cultures.
“We hope this also helped raise Seoul’s image as an international city where foreigners don’t feel estranged from the local population, but can feel at home everywhere,” Kim said.


By Moon Gwang-lip Staff Reporter [joe@joongang.co.kr]
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