The Korean Wave 2006 - Korean Cultural Service

The New York Times, sunday, june 18, 2006
cy7
Beer for Breakfast
By SAKI KNAFO
When it comes to soccer madness, South Korea
is generally not regarded as the equal of countries
in Latin America or Europe. But it had a
sort of conversion experience in 2002, when South Korea
and Japan jointly played host to the World Cup. The South
Korean team went on an unexpected winning streak, ultimately
beating Spain to earn a berth in the quarterfinals.
In anticipation of this year’s World Cup, large groups
of immigrants from soccer-mad countries like Mexico
and Senegal have been rallying around the teams of their
native countries in ethnic enclaves around the city. On
Tuesday, it was the South Koreans’ turn to go crazy, as
their national squad made its debut in the World Cup.
The country’s late-blooming soccer fanaticism was proudly
displayed in the mostly commercial blocks huddled around
the base of the Empire State Building, where the reverberations
of that famous 2002 victory could be felt and heard.
Early on Tuesday, hundreds of Koreans converged on a
tree-dotted plaza on West 32nd Street near Broadway
– the heart of a cluster of bars, restaurants and other businesses
collectively known as Koreatown. Dressed in the
signature red of Team Korea’s uniforms, they had come
to watch their national soccer team square off against the
team fielded by the West African nation of Togo. The
match was displayed on an enormous outdoor television
screen that is permanently affixed to the wall of an office
building on 32nd Street.
By the time the game began at 9 a.m., a sea of red jerseys
and thrumming inflatable noisemakers had spilled
across the street, with the crowd chanting “Dae Han Min
Guk!” (“Republic of Korea!”) in a thunderous voice.
Kang Seok Lee, 22, a spiky-haired student at Borough of
Manhattan Community College, wore a red shirt emblazoned
with the yellow words “Again, Corea!” He stood
beside Jay Shin, 29, proprietor of a clothing boutique
on 32nd Street near Fifth Avenue, who had closed his
shop for the morning. Mr. Shin wore a red cowboy hat,
a shredded red T-shirt and red sunglasses. His girlfriend,
Yunni Choi, 30, was ablaze in outsized sunglasses, cowboy
boots, elbow-length gloves, a bow tie and plastic
devil horns – all red, of course.
“I don’t know about soccer,” said Ms. Choi, who immigrated
to Woodside, Queens, from South Korea in 2002.
Neither did many others in the crowd, who were drawn to
32nd Street less by an appreciation for the beauty of a perfect
penalty kick than by straightforward ethnic pride.
That pride burst the confines of the plaza at 32nd Street.
Korean restaurants and bars from 32nd to 36th Streets,
and from the Avenue of the Americas to Park Avenue,
seemed to be full of Koreans glued to television sets
showing the match.
The South Korean national team
makes its 2006 World Cup debut,
a perfect time for a party,
even if it’s 9 a.m.
Outside Shilla, a sleek restaurant on 32nd Street near
Broadway, fans lined up in front of a wide-screen television
set mounted in the foyer. A few doors down the
street, at the Players Lounge and Sports Bar, a packed
house watched the match on multiple screens while guzzling
breakfasts of Hite beer – a Korean brand – and free
shots of vodka mixed with lemonade.
“I could die right now!” shouted an exultant 34-year-old
actress named Mi Sun Choi, moments after South Korea
put the finishing touches on a tense 2-1 victory.
The frenzied atmosphere had swept up even some of
her non-Korean friends. “You put on the red,” Michael
Horan said. “And it makes you part of the action.”
Correction: June 25, 2006, Sunday. A story last week about
Korean soccer fans misstated the South Korean team’s results in the
2002 World Cup tournament. South Korea defeated Spain to earn
a place in the semifinals, not the quarterfinals.
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Copyright © 2006 by The New York Times Co. Reprinted with permission.