When I first heard the procession on the street below, I thought it was part of the celebrations for the March 1 Independence Movement Day.
The day had started off with various televised events and speeches to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the declaration of Independence against Japanese colonial rule. (Read more about the day on Yonhap News.)
But this march wasn’t part of the celebration.
It was actually a political rally led by conservatives who were protesting against the leadership of President Moon Jae-in. They don’t support the current soft approach to dealing with North Korea and do support keeping American troops in Korea for security.
The protest march went on for over 2 hours below our window as the protestors paraded past waving Korean and American flags and marching to the beat of drums and slogans blaring from loud speakers.
They marched to various songs too, one to the tune of ‘When Jonny Comes Marching Home’ (with changed lyrics) a song from the American Civil War. Apparently the original American song is about longing for the return of loved ones fighting in the war. But it’s now also the tune to the children’s song The animals went in two by two hurrah hurrah (the elephant and the kangaroo).
I couldn’t catch the Korean lyrics but I was told that one of the lines of the song is ‘Get out Moon Jae-in’ The slogan in hangul on the back of the orange jacket of the man in the picture above follows this theme as it says 문재인 퇴진: Resign Moon Jae-in!
To the right of the picture above there’s a flag with former president Park Gun-hye saluting. She’s currently in prison serving over 30 years for corruption. Her supporters opposed her impeachment from the beginning. I wrote about the impeachment here.
These balloons might look as though they are to celebrate something but the slogan on them says: 탄핵 무효 ‘Impeachment invalid‘ referring to the impeachment of former President Park Geun-hye.
The parade participants congregated at Gwanghwamun. Despite the yellow dust warnings, protestors were out in force many wearing face masks.
Last year there was a rally held by the conservatives on March 1 too.
The protestors did not agree with the president inviting North Korea to take part in the winter Olympics. And in 2017 there were 2 different Korean flags waved on Independence Movement Day.
