CULTURE
COURTESY KOREAN TRADITIONAL MUSIC ASSOCIATION
Traditional Korean dance will be part of the entertainment at Saturday's Korean Festival at Kapiolani Park. Organizers want the community to know more about the Korean culture than just its food.
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All things Korean
It's not all kim chee and kalbi. Saturday's Korean Festival in Kapiolani Park, the fifth annual, will be marked with the garlic-scented flavors of Korean cuisine, but it's also a showcase for Korean art and culture. Thus, the theme: "See, Taste, Listen Korea!"
Korean Festival
» Place: Kapiolani Park
» Time: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday
» Admission: Free; scrip sold for food, products and some activities
» Parking: Free at Kapiolani Community College, with shuttle service 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
» Call: 792-9321 or e-mail kfestival@hkccweb.org
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Pretty much covers all the bases.
On the side of taste, look for food booths, cooking demonstrations and a kim chee-eating contest. On the side of see and listen -- Korean music, dance, cultural displays and family activities. On the side of shopping (OK, not part of the official theme, but part of every ethnic festival) will be Korean-made and local products.
Case in point when it comes to cultural activities would be the dance troupe Chum-sa-Rang, the Hawaii school of the Traditional Korean Dance Institute. The school is headed by Chae Hee Lee, who won the Jang-Heung national Korean traditional music and dance competition in Korea this year.
Lee, studying with Yie Jo Lim, has been named one of Korea's Significant Intangible Cultural Assets and director of the Traditional Korean Dance Institute in Korea. She founded the Hawaii branch in 2000, and the group has maintained a busy schedule of public appearances on stages from care homes to the Hawaii Theatre ever since.
"Our mission is to break the mold of the stereotypical view about Korean traditional dance as something that belongs only in a museum," Chum-sa-Rang states in its biography. "We want to contribute to this multi-cultural community, and we strive to increase the awareness of our unique cultural heritage in order to preserve our tradition."
Rex Kim, president of the Hawaii Korean Chamber of Commerce, says the event's audience keeps growing -- more than 120,000 last year -- with proceeds going toward trade and tourism missions, scholarships, financial seminars for senior citizens and immigrants and other community projects.