Club Spotlight: MSJ Korean Club

By Daphne Senecal Staff Writer

On Oct. 19, 2022, MSJ Korean Club made its return to the school campus about a decade after the disbandment of its predecessor. The club’s comeback was initiated by MSJ Korean Club President Sophomore Yesun Lee, who noticed that there was no Korean club present at last year’s Multicultural Week celebration. She then decided to take matters into her own hands, contacting other Korean MSJ students to build its current offcer team. Advised by English Teacher Flora Kang, the board of offcers consists of Lee, Vice President Sophomore Jinna Lim, Secretary Junior Cecilia Kim, Treasurer Sophomore Claire Kim, and four dance leaders who work together to host biweekly meetings in P6.

Lee noticed that a lot of her friends were interested in K-dramas and K-pop but were also interested in the Korean culture itself, which is what the club’s meet ings are often centered around. Since the club’s founding, they have held meetings where students could make their own mini kimbap, learn about Chinese and Korean culture through a collaboration with MSJ Chinese Club, and learn the dance chorus of “ELEVEN” by popular girl group IVE. “Even [I] am not 100% familiar with everything [related to Korean culture. Even so,] I would like to share this with people as I believe many people like to experience new things,” Lee said.

In addition to the general meetings, the club has also recently launched a K-pop subdivision that aims to teach participants to dance to parts of popular K-pop songs. The dance meetings are led by the club’s four K-pop leaders: Juniors Annika Cheng, Isabelle Fu, Nikita Kamath, Srushti Nagapurkar, who all have years of dance experience under their belts. “We are having them do short dances because long dances would be too much,” Lee said. The dance meetings are meant to be something that is fun and casual but also grant those who wish to take it more se riously a chance to post their efforts online.

As the offcer team hosts informational meetings and teaches dances to students, the club continues to grow increasingly popular among the MSJ student body. Many of their activities involve free cultural snacks for the attendees; this results in meetings that leave the class packed to the brim.

Currently, the club is planning an upcoming fundraiser in the month of February where they will be selling goodie bags flled with Korean sweets in celebration of Valentine’s Day. Since the offcers have been using their own money to pay for all club expenses, they are planning to use the money raised to further grow their club. “Right now we are [paying for expenses] out of our own pocket but once we [have] a fundraiser, we’ll have more access to [the supplies we need],” Kim said.

MSJ Korean Club hopes to continue to teach students more about the traditions and unique aspects of Korea and its people during its meetings. “We want to spread our knowledge about the Korean culture, especially for people who have an interest in it. We [wish to] present fun and informational meetings and we hope the club is a fun place to learn more,” Lim said.