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An adoptee returns to her home town

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by Bella Frey on 17 December, 2018

in Busan | Personal accounts | Travel diaries

Bella Frey, who recently reviewed The Return – the closing film of LKFF 2018 – tells us about her own personal return earlier this year. A tale of the unexpected… My head is still swimming from my recent trip to Korea. It was in part planned to be a personal pilgrimage to re-visit places from […]

The BTS Love Yourself o2 concert – a fresh perspective

by Gargi Sengupta 30 October 2018

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LKL’s young contributor Gargi Sengupta, who reported from the Sheffield Korea Day earlier this year, provides her second report – from the biggest KPOP event in London ever! On the 10th of October I went with my father to watch the BTS concert at the London o2. Since I have been a HUGE fan of […]

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Affective becomings and musical transformations: BTS take London

by Colette Balmain 23 October 2018

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Dr Colette Balmain, or maybe a ghost writer, reports from the biggest KPOP event in the UK this year: Taking the Plunge This is the first concert review that I have written although I have been to many concerts, some of which I have good memories of and others which I wish I could press […]

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Some GDPR admin

by Philip Gowman 20 May 2018

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Sorry to add to all the noise relating to the implementation of the new data privacy rules which come into force on 25 May. Like countless other organisations we’ve waded through the 88 closely-packed pages of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of […]

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LKL at 12 years old

by Philip Gowman 2 March 2018

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Yesterday was LKL’s 12th birthday: we went online on 1 March 2006. I never thought I’d keep going for the full 12 year cycle of the zodiac and more. Thanks to you readers, and to those who help out by feeding me information and views. And of course thanks to those who have written articles […]

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Hopefully the last techie post for a while

by Philip Gowman 18 December 2017

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LKL’s look and feel hasn’t changed much since the summer of 2009, when we moved onto the current theme template, but believe me: during the second half of this year I spent a lot of time behind the scenes on the site, working on significant changes which aren’t immediately obvious. The changes have nothing to […]

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The boring stuff I’ve been working on during August

by Philip Gowman 27 August 2017

It’s August. The office isn’t as busy as usual. My brain isn’t being used as much as it normally is, and it needs to find an outlet. So it’s the month when, if there are things that need doing to the design or coding of the website, I turn my mind to it. The last […]

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Korean culture gets more mainstream (and what it means for LKL)

by Philip Gowman 31 July 2017

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A week or so ago Time Out, London’s leading event listings magazine, asked its readers to recommend their favourite Korean places in London and New Malden. I passed it on to the LKL Facebook Group without giving it much further thought, vaguely interested that the survey was in progress, interested also in the knowledgeable responses […]

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2017 travel diary – reminiscences

by Philip Gowman 21 May 2017

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Index Sat 29 April: Busan – Min Young-ki’s solo show Sun 30 April: Haman-gun – Gaya kingdom royal tombs Mon 1 May: Sancheong-gun – Hwangmaesan Royal Azalea festival Tue 2 May: Mungyeong-si – Tea bowl festival Wed 3 May: Buddha’s Birthday in Bongamsa | The Gyeongbokgung at night Thu 4 May: Jeonju Fri 5 May: […]

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Beth McKillop reports from the 2016 Culture Communication Forum in Seoul

by Beth McKillop 12 September 2016

Senior Research Fellow and former Deputy Director at the Victoria and Albert Museum Beth McKillop was the UK’s representative at Korea’s annual Culture Communication Forum hosted by the Corea Image Communication Institute. Since 1990 when I first visited Korea to collect ceramics, outfits and furniture for a planned Victoria and Albert Museum Korea gallery, I’ve […]

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Kang Ik-joong’s Floating Dreams installed on the Thames

by Philip Gowman 30 August 2016

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For one reason or another, today at the office I had my eyes glued to my PC screen most of the day. I didn’t have much time to enjoy the view from my window, from where I can see the Thames around the Greenwich peninsula. Which meant that I managed to miss one of the […]

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LKL at 10 years: a decade in statistics

by Philip Gowman 4 March 2016

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In the early years of this website, I was rather obsessed with readership statistics. It was gratifying to see the readership grow, and it was informative to see what it was they were visiting the site for. After a while, I found that nothing much was changing. And I realised that if I were to […]

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LKL at 10 years: what has changed?

by Philip Gowman 29 February 2016

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London Korean Links went online 10 years ago, on 1 March 2006. What has changed over that time, and how might things change over the next 10 years? For a start, there’s more of everything. More people following Korean culture in London, more events to follow. When London Korean Links started, it was a reasonable […]

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LKL at 10 years: the frequently asked questions

by Philip Gowman 28 February 2016

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LKL has been online for 10 years, and during that period I have been asked the same questions a number of times. Here are many of those questions, and the answers. Jeon Sung-min of the Euro Journal asked many of them back in 2008, and the answers haven’t changed much since then, but there are […]

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Roger Law’s Art and Seoul on Radio 4 this week

by Philip Gowman 22 December 2015

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A couple of months ago I spent an hour in a BBC studio with ceramic artist Roger Law (whom many UK readers will remember as one half of the Spitting Image team). The subject – Korea. Roger Law had already done a well-received quirky radio series on China and this was to be his Korean […]

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Caught on the plane: Twenty and Memories of the Sword

by Philip Gowman 13 December 2015

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I always look forward to long-haul flights as an opportunity to catch up on all the movies I should have been watching over the past year. And having just returned from an ultra-long-haul holiday, I can heartily recommend Singapore Airlines in-flight entertainment. My only complaint is that there was too much to watch: if the […]

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A lunchtime of ceramics and an evening of awesomeness

by Philip Gowman 5 November 2015

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I wish the lunch break had been longer at today’s Korean film conference at SOAS. I was planning on having a quick snack at Mr Mok’s Bibimbap Cafe in Museum Street, maybe say a brief hello to my friends at It’s All Greek a few doors away, and then look in at the British Museum’s […]

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