Category Archives: News

IKEA opens first store in Seoul.

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Seoul’s first IKEA store opens April 17, 2025. Though IKEA entered the Korean market in 2014, this will be their first store in Seoul. This location is in Seoul’s Gangdong (강동) neighborhood within the IPark The River shopping complex. IKEA now has five locations in Korea though all of their other locations here are of the typical large stand-alone blue box type.

As the company tries to cater to the Korean market, the Swedish retailer setup 44 demo rooms for single-person households. They will compete with other furniture retailers, such as Japan’s Nitori and Korea’s Emart, in the same shopping complex.

IKEA is open daily 10AM-10PM.

51, Godeokbizvalley-ro, Gangdong-gu, Seoul

IKEA Gangdong website.

Our article on single person households.

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South Korean Presidents and controversies

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With the impeachment of President Yoon Sun-Yeol (December 2024 to April 2025), many have reflected on the downfall of several modern leaders in South Korea. The Korea Herald featured a visual highlighting the controversies of these leaders.

A special election will be held on 6/3/2025 to select the next President. “Under South Korean law, a presidential election must be held within 60 days of a president’s removal from office.”

We have covered several Korean Presidents in our series.

President – 대통령 (daetong-lyeong)

To impeach – 탄핵하다 (tanhaek-hada)

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Free WiFi on Korea’s bus networks

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Starting April 8, 2025, all express bus passengers in Korea will have access to free WiFi without any login pages or passwords. There are eight bus companies in Korea and the Wi-Fi network name will be the English name of the bus company.

Free WiFi will cover 240 express bus routes and 1,724 buses at speeds up to 400Mbps. Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.

KTX, SRT high-speed rail, subways, and city buses already offer free-WiFi.

More on buses in Korea in our posts.

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Korean exports to the U.S. and Trump’s Reciprocal tariffs.

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President Trump has enacted 25% tariff’s on goods coming from Korea to the U.S. And beginning at 1pm on April 3, 2025, a 25% tariff began on Korean automobiles imported into the U.S.

According to the Korea Times, “No U.S. tariffs had been imposed on Korean cars since 2016 under a bilateral free trade agreement.” In all, Korea has the highest tariff rate among all free trade agreement countries with the U.S.

Imports – 수입 (su-ip)

Exports – 수출 (su-chul)

Continue reading →

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Koreans and small talk.

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An article in the Korea Herald today discusses why some Koreans may be less inclined to entertain small talk, outside of the workplace and more so with strangers. The suggested reasons include anxiety from answering personal questions and fatigue from politeness at work.

We covered small talk in a vocab-filled post.

잡담 – (japdam) small talk

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K-perfume.

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The Korean cosmetics industry blossomed into a $10.2 billion dollar export in 2024. While still in their infancy, the Korea Heralds sees “Korean consumers growing attuned to the nuances of fine fragrance and younger generations seek individuality over mass-market appeal,” And a Vogue Singapore post on Korean fragrances.

Want to learn who to say perfume and more in Korean, here’s our post.

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Biggest wildfire in modern Korean history

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As of March 27, 2025, the North Gyeongsang Province fire has spread to over 36k hectares. At least 26 deaths and 30 injuries have been reported since March 14 when the fire started. Sadly, the Gounsa Temple, built in 681AD, was completely destroyed. The fire is only 54% contained.

We have covered quite a bit of related fire topics:

Firefighters part one

Fire prevention and Safety: part one and part two.

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