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Gangwon-Chuncheon World Taekwondo Cultural Festival

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(Gangwon Ilbo) Taekwondo friends of 60 years flew halfway around the world and reunited at a Taekwondo festival

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The 2023 Gangwon-Chuncheon World Taekwondo Cultural Festival is a hot topic as it serves as a bridge that reconnects the 60-year relationship with Taekwondo across the other side of the world. The main characters of the story are Lee Gyu-seok (82), president of the Asia Taekwondo Federation, and instructor Kim Han-chang (85), who popularized Taekwondo in Argentina.

Chairman Lee and Master Kim are close friends who trained together at Cheongdo Gwan during their high school and college days in the late 1950s. In 1967, they parted ways, with Master Kim leaving for Argentina and Chairman Lee for the United States.

Master Kim is a senior Taekwondo expert who spread Taekwondo in Argentina and stayed there. When Chairman Gyu-seok Lee began his activities in the Asian Taekwondo Federation, he briefly reunited with Master Kim in Argentina in the early 2000s, but the meeting could not continue due to the distance between their respective hometowns.

Afterwards, a happy reunion took place when Master Kim Han-chang returned to his home country, a thousand miles away, after hearing about the World Taekwondo Cultural Festival being held in Chuncheon and Chairman Lee Kyu-seok's attendance. Accompanying Master Kim was his local Argentine student, Mr. Pablo. All expenses for the teacher's visit to his home country were borne by the disciple.

Chairman Lee Gyu-seok said, “I am grateful and surprised that a 60-year relationship was reconnected only in the name of Taekwondo, and that a foreign student served his teacher and formed a new relationship.”



View the original article : https://www.kwnews.co.kr/page/view/2023082117212884035