If you are a Kpop-blogger you probably are already familiar with tour2korea.com! Apart form all the goodies they have there, they also have entertainment news section which you would be surprise how much people obtain their blog news from them! Anyways, probably they noticed the interest in the media and made a TV commercial called ‘Korea, Sparkling’ featuring Singer Rain. This news is kinda old (2 weeks old to be precise) but I have been praying to God for some other blogs to cover it, since with our moving process making a cap was such a pain for me. But seems like it had to be on my neck finally~ as busy as we are lately I managed to make only one cap. Mianeh Da!
How do I spend my time on visiting Korea?
Korea Tourism Organization Set to Attract More Tourists
The Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) has set a lofty goal of attracting 7 million foreigners to visit Korea this year. Last year, foreign tourists to Korea reached 6.15 million. Kim Jong-min, CEO of the Korea Tourism Organization, said that although the tourism industry grew significantly, there is still room for growth when compared to other industries. Also KTO will work hard to narrow the gap between the increasing number of Koreans traveling to other countries, and foreign tourists visiting Korea. While there were 11.6 million Koreans who went abroad last year, up 15 percent from year ago, the number of tourists coming to Korea has risen only two percent. As a first step, the KTO is planning to focus on attracting tourists from Japan and China. For example, the organization is working with Seoul Metropolitan Government to add Japanese and Chinese to road signs in the city. A TV commercial called ‘Korea, Sparkling,’ featuring Rain, the most popular singer in Korea, will be aired in other countries to reach wider range of potential tourists around the world.
Rain´s Korea Sparkling has arrived over our national TV sponsoring My 18 yrs Old Bride at 7pm the past month. So hv bn feasting my eyes over suddenly “widewide eyed” Rain every commercial break! I feel so juvenile waiting 4 the commercial breaks but how did Rain got his eyes tt big! Very active promo by KTourist Office here. KTO sponsors Kmovies over TV, hEhE, the list of movies is the same from Tour2Korea website! The last 3 month the Korean Embassy tog with our local National Film Board organized a mini film fest of 3 Kmovies. Very concerted effort in getting the Kculture n entertainment across 2 their target audience.
Last year 3 Kministries joined forces (Min of Tourism, Min of Economy n I forgot the 3rd)2 work tog 2 ensure the tourism figures grow, riding on the Hallyu tt the Kentertainment industry has so successfully created. That is what I call synergized bureaucracy! But with only 2% growth…! However, their efforts certainly worked in my country, we (with a small population of 24 million)r ranked the 6th country with the most no of tourists visiting Korea. Due to high cost of living in Korea, I noticed a reciprocal traffic of growing trend of Ktourists visiting here. The younger generation r sent here during summer breaks 2 improve their English n Mandarin and the older generation for retirement bcos of cheap golfing n very economical cost of living with above average infrastructure, so much so tt in the capital, we hv a thriving two horse (2 streets) Korean town, 3-4 super or minimarts, numerous restaurants, hair dressing salon, laundry, bakery, butcher, etc. Virtually if one patronizes these outlets, one doesn’t need to speak any other language but Korean, however, the reverse isn’t true. I hv a problem with buying groceries from these marts, bcos, all products (from food items to detergents) r labeled in Hangul n getting help is rather basic.