SKKU held ‘The 3rd Central & Eastern Europe Sungkyun Korean Writing Contest’ at the Korean Culture Center located in Vienna, Austria on Oct 25th, where 40 students from 16 countries in the region participated. While the students came from different nationalities, they all showed passion and love towards the Korean language.
The subject of the contest was “sharing”. Prof. Jae Ho SUNG from SKKU School of Law led the panelists and encouraged the students by saying that “sharing is the value that should always be underlined and excised in our daily lives. You can go beyond the idea of sharing tangible things, and reflect experiences and thoughts on various meanings of sharing.”
The gold prize went to Kilerresku Alexandra from Babes-Bolyai University. Alexandra first learned Korean after falling in love with Korean dramas during her high school years, and wants to become a Korean language professor in Romania. In her writing, she linked sharing with caring as “it seems that we tend to disregard the importance of caring for others, as more people want to live independently and think only about themselves. However, one can understand how others feel only when they share tasks with others.” The silver and bronze prizes went to Bulgarian and Turkish students, respectively.
“The subject seemed easy at first, but still tricky,” said panelist Young Gu HAN. “It was very encouraging to see that foreigners understand not only Korean language, but also Korean sentiment.”
The contest wrapped up with various events and training sessions on the Joseon Dynasty culture and classics held by the Institute for the Translation of Korean Classics. CEO Gwang Joon PARK of Seoyoung Engineering also visited the venue to give words of encouragement to students. Prof. Seok Kyu LEE, vice-president of International Relations at SKKU expressed that “We will make more effort to expand this event with full responsibility as citizen diplomats promoting the excellence of Korean language and culture”.
List
