080815 – Independence Day of South Korea

South Korea declared Independence Day on the 15th August 1948 from the Japanese occupation. This year, they celebrated their 60th anniversary. From the hotel I took an early walk (around 7.30am) toward the Gyeonbokgung Palace for the main celebration. When I was there, everyone was setting up the all the preparation. Guess I was early that day.



The main road was blocked and it filled with rows of chairs.

Around 8am, people started to flock here and sat on the chairs. Most of these people are representative from certain organizations e.g. schools, government and private sectors.

School children waiting for their seat allocated to them.

Shortly when everyone seated, President Lee gave his speech on the huge screen, but I still have not seen him in person yet.

Marching bands

After 30 minutes, President Lee appeared from behind the stage and everyone was clapping and shouting some slogans which I did not understand.


I collected my hat, flags and pin after I passed through the tight security check. I’m trying to be patriotic.

The celebration was rather simple, not much of any parades and army marching. The whole celebration took less than 2 hours and everyone was leaving around 10am. In fact, I’m quite disappointed with it, probably my expectation was high.