Mulloskeys Adventures Abroad

It doesn’t take an interest in political science to be fascinated with some of the tactics used during election campaigning in Korea. Simply put, it’s much more fun. All candidates are assigned a number and choose a colour which they heavily promote in everything they do. Next they choose songs and dances to accompany their traveling campaign mobile. These are mostly pre-existing popular songs with the words changed slightly to include the candidates name and their constituency. (i.e. Choi will, Choi will, rock you!). We first experienced this with the presidential election. Then the representatives for congress, and a third time for mayor.

Imagine a normal Tuesday evening in your classroom on the 5th floor of a random building near a main intersection in your town. Suddenly a deafening drumbeat followed by Korean singing that is so loud teaching is no longer possible. The walls are shaking. Then you look out the window to see a small truck with huge speakers and a large number 3 (for example) and some Korean guy’s face the about 10 feet by 10 feet. The truck stops in the middle of the road, folds open to reveal a stage and podium. Out come 5f scantily-clad dancers who start choreographed movements to the music. After about 4 songs, the music stops and the candidate steps to the podium and starts shouting out his slogans and platform. The speech itself is firery and charismatic, causing you to think that this dude could be an evil dictator, if the speech wasn’t preceded by cheerleaders and 80’s-like Korean synthesizer music. This is what is was like for a solid month.

We were blessed to catch some clips of the following mayoral race. A little less hype but the same vehicles and campaign tactics were used. What above all I love about the following clips, it shows what I feel to be one of those things that makes Korea truly unique and different. Watching from home you should be thoroughly entertained and amazed. Please watch both.

Note also that this seemed (from our limited perspective) to be the primary mode of campaigning with candidates vehicles driving aimlessly in circles around neighborhoods and commercial areas. Awesome.

For the second clip, this form of campaigning is similar to advertising. New stores and dance clubs will often drive around on flatbeds with some dancers and a girl yelling slogans over loud speakers. I will not miss the noise pollution here, but I will miss the randomness.