Lee Min-ho wins top award for boosting Korea’s brand

Actor Lee Min-ho was awarded the grand prize at the 2017 National Brand Awards held at the National Assembly Hall in Seoul on Wednesday.　 Actor Lee Min-ho receives the grand prize at the 2017 National Brand Awards held in Seoul on Wednesday. (Yonhap)“I traveled around the globe so many times over the past few years. I was so touched to see people (overseas) trying to write or speak Korean to me,” he said at the acceptance speech. “I will further try to contribute to Korea’s brand image.”　The Nat

Feb. 22, 2017

LTI Korea's Kim Seong-kon receives honorary doctorate from SUNY

Kim Seong-kon, president of the Literary Translation Institute of Korea, will be receiving an honorary doctorate in humane letters from the State University of New York.　The degree will be conferred in a ceremony on May 19 at the University of Buffalo.Each year, on the recommendation of campus presidents, faculties and a statewide committee on honorary degrees, SUNY confers a select number of honorary degrees upon individuals of “extraordinary merit and achievement in their fields,” according to

Feb. 15, 2017

Ban to garner PCI Award in LA

Ban Ki-moon will receive the 2017 Individual Building Bridges Award from Pacific Century Institute on Feb. 23, according to PCI News.  Ban served from 2007 to 2016 as the UN secretary-general. He was responsible for several major reforms on peacekeeping, UN employment practices and climate change. The UN faced serious challenges in promoting international gender equality, along with inadequate funding during Ban’s two terms. Under Ban’s initiative in July 2010, the UN General Assembly created UN

Feb. 12, 2017

Entertainment agency stocks plummet as China reacts to THAAD deployment

The value in stock assets held by Korea’s entertainment industry leaders has plummeted in the wake of the Chinese government’s response to the anticipated US anti-missile system deployment here.Lee Soo-man, the founder of S.M. Entertainment and its former president, saw his S.M. Entertainment stocks sitting at a total 103.77 billion won ($91.3 million) as of market closing on Friday, according to Chaebul.com. This represents a 44.3 percent drop from the 186.2 billion won he recorded a year earli

Feb. 6, 2017

Bolivia opens ‘Evo museum’ dedicated to indigenous president

LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) -- School notebooks, a boy’s sandals and T-shirts given to him by famous soccer players are among the objects displayed at a $7 million museum inaugurated by Bolivian President Evo Morales.It’s in his native village of Orinoca, high in the country’s altiplano, and is called the Museum of the Democratic and Cultural Revolution. But Bolivia’s political opposition has dubbed it the “Evo Museum” and is questioning its cost and ostentatiousness standing near humble homes in a rur

Feb. 5, 2017

Lee Dong-gun splits with T-ara’s Jiyeon

Lee Dong-gun’s agency said Thursday that the actor recently ended his romantic relationship with Jiyeon of K-pop group T-ara. According to Lee’s agency FNC Entertainment, the celebrity couple broke up due to their busy schedules. The company did not say exactly when the two decided to go their separate ways. Lee Dong-gun (FNC Entertainment) Jiyeon (MBK Entertainment)They reportedly met in 2015 during the filming of “Encounter,” and the relationship was publicized after photos of them dating were

Feb. 2, 2017

Korea Times president to head foreign language newspaper group

The Foreign Language Newspapers Association of Korea on Monday named Lee Chang-sup, president-publisher of Korea Times, as its president.The nonprofit organization was launched in 2015 to promote the cooperation and development of Korea-based foreign-language newspapers. The Korea Herald, Korea Times, Korea Joongang Daily and Chinese edition of the Aju Business Daily are members of the group. Lee Chang-supIts activities include inking an agreement with the state-run Korean Culture and Informatio

Jan. 23, 2017

Repaired and ready: Venue where young Dylan played reopens

SARATOGA SPRINGS, New York (AP) -- Bob Dylan would surely still recognize the low-ceilinged room in Caffe Lena where he played a couple of gigs almost 60 years ago. But just about everything else about a venue that bills itself as the nation’s oldest continuously operating coffeehouse has undergone some major upgrades as part of a $2 million renovation project bankrolled in part by folk music performers themselves. Dylan performed twice there early in his career, when the young singer born in Mi

Jan. 16, 2017

[Eye Interview] Salvation Army volunteer recounts lifetime of service on the streets

A regular sight during the Korean holiday season: Salvation Army volunteers stand next to their signature red kettles and ring handbells to raise donations.One such volunteer, Lee Sung-deok, 83, who has taken to the streets every winter starting 1954, rang his last bell this year, retiring after decades of charity work.Over 62 years, Lee witnessed the ups and downs of Korean history in the flurry of the streets, he told The Korea Herald in an interview at the Salvation Army’s Korean headquarters

Dec. 30, 2016

Actors Gong Hyo-jin, Cho Jung-seok, Cho Jin-woong win top star award

Actors Gong Hyo-jin, Cho Jung-seok and Cho Jin-woong were crowned Korea‘s “top stars” Thursday at an award ceremony celebrating influential figures from various segments. The 2016 The Night of Stars-Korea Top Star Awards held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in central Seoul also honored film directors Na Hong-jin and Yeon Sang-ho for their hit films “The Wailing” and “Train to Busan,” respectively.Actor Cho Jung-seok attends the 2016 The Night of Stars-Korea Top Star Awards at Grand Hyatt Seoul on Thur

Dec. 30, 2016

Carrie Fisher’s books become -ellers after her death

NEW YORK (AP) -- There’s been a run on Carrie Fisher’s books since the “Star Wars” actress and humorist died Tuesday.Fisher’s book, “The Princess Diarist,” was on top of Amazon’s list of best-selling books on Wednesday, just ahead of “Zero Sugar Diet.”“Wishful Drinking” and “Postcards From the Edge” were also in Amazon’s top 10, with “Shockaholic” ranked No. 57.Five of the top 10 books on Amazon’s “Movers and Shakers” list, which measures titles that show the greatest upward movement in sales ov

Dec. 30, 2016

Statue to honor ‘Korean Schindler’

Hyun Bong-Hak, the late doctor and civic activist who saved thousands of civilians during the Korean War, was commemorated Monday with a statue in front of the Severance Building in central Seoul.Hyun has been dubbed “Korean Schindler” -- after German industrialist Oskar Schindler who saved over 1,000 Jewish lives during the Holocaust -- here for persuading US military officials during the war to evacuate some 104,000 refugees from battlefields in Heungnam, North Korea. Lee Gyeong-pil (left) and

Dec. 20, 2016

Jet-setting Hungarian actress Zsa Zsa Gabor dies at age 99

Zsa Zsa Gabor, the jet-setting Hungarian actress and socialite who helped invent a new kind of fame out of multiple marriages, conspicuous wealth and jaded wisdom about the glamorous life, died Sunday at her home, her husband said. She was 99.The middle and most famous of the sisters Gabor died of a heart attack at her Los Angeles home, Frederic von Anhalt said. Gabor had been hospitalized repeatedly since she broke her right hip in July 2010 after a fall at her home. She already had to use a wh

Dec. 19, 2016

Patti Smith explains Dylan lyric flub in candid essay

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Patti Smith says that when she stumbled over the lyrics of a Bob Dylan song during the Nobel Prize ceremony last week, it was because she was overwhelmed with nerves by the enormity of the experience, not because she forgot the words to “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.”Smith writes in an essay published Wednesday by the New Yorker that after loving the song since she was a teenager and rehearsing it incessantly in the months and days leading up to the ceremony, its lyrics “were n

Dec. 15, 2016

Turning the DMZ into vibrant tourism zone

Hong Seung-pyo, CEO of the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization, has high hopes of revamping the bleak demilitarized zone into a tourism destination. This year, Hong established an ecological tourism zone and held concerts, exhibitions and educational programs by the inter-Korean border. One of the province’s tourism success stories is at Camp Greaves, the US Army base set up at the DMZ following the Korean Armistice Agreement of 1953 and closed down in 1997. It was reopened for tourists in 2013, and w

Dec. 12, 2016

Netflix spokesperson says Prince discussed reality show

NEW YORK (AP) – Here’s something else we lost with the death of Prince: A Netflix reality series centered on his Paisley Park home in Minnesota.A Netflix spokesperson told the Associated Press on Saturday that the online entertainment company had been in “discussions” with Prince about a series, but that the project did not “come to fruition” before his death in April. Photographer Maya Washington, a friend of the performer known for such hits as “Purple Rain” and “1999,” told GQ recently that h

Dec. 11, 2016

Rockefeller family promotes cultural exchange through art

The name Rockefeller resonates with wealth. In 2016, the oil-rich Rockefeller family ranked 23rd on the Forbes list of America’s richest families with a net worth of $11 billion.What is much less known about the Rockefeller’s is their philanthropic mission to pursue a cultural exchange between Asian and American artists. Wendy O’Neill, a fifth-generation Rockefeller, expressed her wishes to increase philanthropic support for Korean artists at a press briefing held in Namsan Art Center in Seoul,

Nov. 15, 2016

Yoo Duk-hyung receives Rockefeller Award

Yoo Duk-hyung, president of the Seoul Institute of the Arts, has won the John D. Rockefeller III Award for his significant contribution to international understanding of the Asian arts, the college said Sunday. Yoo, the first Korean to receive the award since its founding in 1986, was recognized for his efforts to transform a small theater school into the country’s most prestigious arts academy.  President of Seoul Institute of the Arts Yoo Duk-hyungThe award ceremony is to be held Monday at the

Nov. 13, 2016

[Eye Interview] Rinpoche sheds light on happiness in turbulent times

Frustration is now running deep in South Korea, with the scandal involving President Park Geun-hye and her longtime confidante Choi Soon-sil. Furthermore, uncertainties about the country’s diplomacy and economy are also rising after Republican Donald Trump’s upset win in the US presidential election. The unexpected developments at home and abroad are fueling public anxiety and discontent.However, for Tibetan monk Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, the biggest source of worry is less about the turbulent su

Nov. 11, 2016