Korea Now: Seoul Events, K-pop & Local Guide | NowHitz · 4

Three became nine

On Oct. 16 the Seoul High Court's Incheon bench (civil division 1) partly granted Samsung Biologics' appeal. Industrial action is now banned in all nine processes the company asked for.

The first-instance ruling in April covered only three: concentration and buffer exchange, drug-substance filling, and buffer preparation and supply. Flask culture, bioreactor culture, harvest, media preparation and supply, chromatography and virus filtration were added.

Why the court agreed

The bench pointed to the tangible and intangible damage a stoppage would cause, and to supply disruption for contract-manufactured drugs with a 100% domestic market share. Those processes have to run as usual during a strike.

What happens to the 26th

The union had said it would strike for three weeks from the 26th. It is now reviewing the start date and length, and a change is likely. No new date has been set.

The lunchtime rally on the 21st is cancelled and replaced by a livestream for members. The union says the ruling does not restrict strikes entirely. The company said it will "keep working toward a cooperative labor relationship."

The numbers on the table

According to Yonhap, the company offered a 6.2% base-pay rise plus a lump sum. The union is asking for 9.5%, a flat 3 million won and a bonus of 15% of operating profit.

After mediation failed on Mar. 23, the union held partial strikes in late April and a May 1-5 full strike staged as an annual-leave protest, then refused overtime and holiday work.

What to watch

The questions are whether the union sets a new strike date and whether talks reopen. Yonhap reported that whether the two sides reach a deal is the key variable through the end of October.

Lotte World 50% off, Seoul Sky 35% off

From Oct. 19 to 31, Lotte World gives visitors wearing hanbok 50% off admission. Seoul Sky takes 35% off its admission over the same dates.

On Saturday, Oct. 24, the National Gugak Center's Saturday Masterpiece Performance is half price. More than 410 venues in Korea and abroad take part this year.

Seven days around Hanbok Day

The 2026 Hanbok Culture Week runs Oct. 19-25, now in its ninth year, with Hanbok Day on Oct. 21 in the middle.

The main venue is the Open Plaza at the National Museum of Korea in Yongsan, open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily. Admission is free.

It starts at Gyeongbokgung

On Oct. 19 at 11 a.m., the 'Wear Hanbok Properly' campaign launches near Gyeonghoeru pavilion in Gyeongbokgung, with 24 rental shops around the palace and 17 hanbok influencers.

From the same day you can take a hanbok quiz and see court hanbok and hanbok from K-dramas on display beside the pavilion. A multilingual booklet, 'Hanbok Story', and QR guides are handed out.

The norigae is a coupon

Tourists who wear traditional hanbok correctly at a participating rental shop receive a 'Hanbok Pass' norigae. Show it and you get 10-20% off at 27 businesses.

Named partners include the National Museum's 'Mu:ds' merchandise (through Oct. 25), tenants at Annyeong Insadong and Maetyu Jang Anguk (both through Dec. 31).

Kim Yoon-ah and a fashion show on the 21st

On Hanbok Day, Oct. 21, the opening ceremony runs from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the National Museum of Korea's Open Plaza. Jaurim's vocalist Kim Yoon-ah opens the show and the traditional performance group Yeonhui Connect Ieul closes it, with five hanbok brands staging a fashion show themed 'Hanbok Holding Light'.

In Daejeon, Hannam University Central Museum runs a danui (court robe) exhibition and a traditional knot keyring workshop on Oct. 19-25.

Before you go

The main venue is a walk from Ichon Station. The norigae is only handed out at participating rental shops, so ask before you rent.

The Lotte World deal is for visitors wearing hanbok. Reports do not say whether modern or everyday hanbok counts, so check Lotte World's notice first. Full schedules are on the official site (kcdf.or.kr/hanbokcultureweek).

Two releases, one clock

NMIXX is back after about five months. Jeonghan X Joshua, a new Seventeen unit, makes its first mini album debut.

Both arrive Monday, Oct. 19 at 6 p.m. KST. Earbuds in before the commute home.

NMIXX's first unit songs

'Strange Muse' carries six tracks, led by the title track 'Birthday Wish' (긴 소원), with 'Kerosene' and 'RudE TaLK' among them. It also holds the group's first unit songs since debut, and the members took part in writing the lyrics.

The title track's M/V teaser is up on JYP Entertainment's official channel.

Jeonghan X Joshua at both twelves

'DREAMSCAPE' runs seven tracks. Title track '12 o'clock' draws on 1970s-80s disco and punk, and the album's theme is the border between dream and reality.

The range is wide: house on 'Like You', a bass-led 'Outside', R&B-soul on 'One Plus One', Joshua's solo 'Not Personal', Jeonghan's solo 'Coloring', and a band-sound closer, 'No Looking Back'.

The highlight medley is on the HYBE LABELS channel.

After the album, the arena

Jeonghan X Joshua open their tour at Incheon Inspire Arena from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1, then head to Saitama (Nov. 21-22), Macau (Dec. 11-12), Taipei (Jan. 9-10, 2027), BEXCO in Busan (Jan. 30-31) and Hong Kong (Feb. 20-21).

NMIXX plays an encore concert at the same Inspire Arena on Nov. 27-29, the last stop of the roughly year-long first world tour 'EPISODE 1: ZERO FRONTIER'.

Before you press play

Release is 6 p.m. Korea time, which is 09:00 UTC. Fans abroad can set the time zone math in advance.

Both labels have teasers and medleys on their official channels.

A folding screen of rock rising from flat farmland

Wolchulsan is an isolated granite massif that shoots up from the Honam plain. The highest peak, Cheonhwangbong, is 809 m, ringed by Gujeongbong, Sajabong and Janggunbong, which earned it the nickname 'Namdo Sogeumgang'.

The designation singled out granite weathering landforms and rare vegetation that changes with altitude.

The mountain in the Samguk Sagi

The Samguk Sagi lists the mountain as 'Wolnaeak', a site for national rites. Those rites continued through Unified Silla, Goryeo and Joseon.

On Gujeongbong, an 8.6 m seated Buddha is carved into the rock, a national treasure. Nine holes in the summit rock come with legends about wells.

Temples at the foot of the mountain

Muwisa in Gangjin holds the national-treasure Geungnakjeon hall and the Mita triad murals. Dogapsa in Yeongam is tied to a founding legend of the monk Doseon, and Cheonhwangsa is where mountain faith meets Buddhism.

Jeong Yak-yong and other poets and travellers left poems and travel notes about the mountain. It is a bookshelf with a summit.

What changes next

The city says it will draw up a comprehensive preservation and management plan with the Korea Heritage Service, Yeongam and Gangjin, and will develop storytelling-driven cultural tourism linking nearby temples and historic sites.

Religious affairs director Kang Ha-chun called it "the foremost mountain of Honam," where dazzling scenery and more than a thousand years of Buddhist history sit in harmony.

How to plan a visit

The best-known temples at the foot of the mountain are Muwisa (Gangjin) and Dogapsa (Yeongam). Linking the two covers both counties the scenic site spans.

Trail closures and opening hours can change with local conditions, so check with the county office before you set out.

A drink you inject

The drink riffs on Tomie, the character who keeps dividing. Syrup comes in a syringe-shaped container, and guests squeeze it into the ade themselves. Lotte World says the look and the hands-on bit have made it a hit.

The dessert is the 'Soichi Sundae': the nail-shaped chocolate that prankster Soichi always keeps in his mouth, stuck into ice cream. A cookie set printed with a key visual drawn by Ito himself is sold in limited quantities.

Uniform on, keyring clipped

Goods include a random sound-keycap keyring (one of four), a Tomie doll keyring and a school bag with a Tomie charm, all designed to pair with a school-uniform look.

You can borrow the outfit, too. The 1F Magic School costume room rents Tomie school uniforms, and the 2F Magic School makeup rooms run a character tattoo experience.

Where to take the photo

The third floor of Magic Castle has photo zones recreating signature episodes such as 'The Painter', open daily from 11:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Behind the castle, the 'Ito Junji Photo Street' stitches original characters into a collage.

After dark, scenes from the works are projected onto the castle's outer wall.

An AR residence card instead of a charm

The AR quest 'Secret Invitation from a Strange World' has you collect map pieces around the park and finish a mission to earn a 'resident ID'. Scan the QR code across from the 1F carousel to start.

Before you go

The autumn festival 'Invitation to a Strange World' runs Sept. 12 to Nov. 15, and the Junji Ito collaboration runs Sept. 19 to Nov. 15 around Magic Island.

The ade and the cookie set are quantity-limited, so late afternoon may mean sold out. Photo zones close at 8:30 p.m., so get in earlier if you want the projection mapping.

What ended, what's left

The paid DDP Design Fair ran Oct. 14-18 in the DDP Art Hall, with general tickets at 15,000 won. Seoul Design Week as a whole runs Oct. 14-25 under the theme 'The Design Recipe'.

The part you can enjoy without spending much starts now.

A lap of Seoul in 150 spots

The Seoul Design Road links 150 design spots across five districts: Dongdaemun, Seongsu, Yeonhui, Seochon and Apgujeong. Design studios, brands, exhibition spaces and lifestyle venues are grouped into walkable district routes.

Design exhibitions around the city are free through Oct. 25.

What's still on at DDP

Exhibitions inside DDP are free, including 'Designer Scale-up', 'Collective Seoul', 'Ist Alien: Unfamiliar Italy' and 'Studio Practice'.

The outdoor Design Market, a stall fair of small designer goods, ran Oct. 16-18 and returns Oct. 23-25.

Before you go

DDP is closest to Dongdaemun History & Culture Park Station (Lines 2, 4, 5), Exits 1 and 2. Check market hours and the participating spots on the official site, seoul-designweek.or.kr.

Last year's edition drew about 30,000 paid visitors, so expect the final weekend to be busy.

From 60 m to 2 km

The device was developed by a Korean company and patented with the Korean Intellectual Property Office. It can keep birds away from about 2,000 m, more than 30 times the 60 m effective range of the shotguns used before.

There are four runways and four laser guns, in use at the site since Oct. 15.

Dawn and dusk are the real test

Around sunrise and sunset birds are hard to spot with the naked eye, and thermal cameras had to be brought in. The corporation will deploy the lasers mainly in those hours, at night and in the seasons when birds gather.

Every winter, large flocks of geese and other migratory birds arrive. The lasers are planned for those flocks too.

Why now?

Lasers were hard to allow at airports over fears they could dazzle pilots. The transport ministry has since revised its guidance, the corporation set safety and operating procedures in July, and the Seoul Regional Aviation Administration approved operation in September.

Next up: radar

A bird-detection radar is planned for around 2028, watching bird movement within 13 km of the airport.

"We expect bird-control capability and flight safety to improve greatly," said Cho Yong-su of the corporation.

35 minutes was plenty

In Saturday's semi-final An beat Japan's Nozomi Okuhara (world No. 11) 21-16, 21-8 in about 35 minutes.

Every match from the round of 32 on has finished inside 40 minutes, and her season record now stands at 60 wins and 1 loss (98.4%).

Yamaguchi awaits

World No. 3 Yamaguchi beat No. 2 Wang Zhiyi 21-10, 21-19 in the other semi-final. An leads their head-to-head 23-15.

She has won the last nine meetings, including the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games final earlier this month, where she became the first women's singles player to win two straight Asian Games golds.

Denmark has history

An lost the Denmark Open final to Yamaguchi in 2021 and to Wang in 2024 before finally winning it last year against Wang.

Beating Yamaguchi would make it 20 straight wins over Japanese opponents and add a ninth title to a year that already includes the Malaysia, India, Singapore and Indonesia Opens and the Asian Games.

A rough day for the doubles

Men's doubles world No. 1 Seo Seung-jae and Kim Won-ho lost their semi-final 14-21, 18-21 to Malaysia's Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik in 38 minutes.

Watch it again

The video above is the full An vs Okuhara semi-final from BWF TV's official channel. The final result will be posted by the BWF and the Badminton Korea Association.

Fifth for tickets, first for money

On Oct. 12, KOFIC's ticketing network showed 12,188,631 admissions, fifth among foreign films. Revenue, though, is No. 1.

The trick is the ticket price. Average revenue per viewer is about KRW 11,391, roughly 30% above Endgame's KRW 8,787. The report adds that general ticket-price rises over the years helped.

IMAX took a fifth of the take

According to CJ CGV, IMAX drew 1.73 million viewers as of Oct. 11, 14.2% of the total. Its share of revenue climbs to 22.6%.

'Odyssey' is the first feature shot entirely on IMAX film cameras. That is why IMAX's share of revenue is bigger than its share of viewers.

After Troy, the long way home

Released Aug. 5, the film follows Odysseus trying to return home after the Trojan War, with Matt Damon in the lead.

Ilgan Sports' Oct. 10 tally puts 'Avatar' at KRW 125.2 billion, 'Endgame' at KRW 122.4 billion and 'Frozen II' at KRW 115 billion.

The catch in the premium boom

IMAX, Dolby Cinema and 4DX have become cinemas' weapon against streaming. But they cost a lot to build and run, and if hits concentrate on a few blockbusters, mid-sized films could get squeezed.

Before you go

Premium screens have fewer seats and the popular showtimes fill early. Check your preferred screen and time on a booking app first.

The official trailer is on Universal Pictures Korea's channel.

The factory now has an AI assistant

Its name is 'Polaris'. It reads and interprets production data, searches manufacturing know-how and even drafts equipment manuals.

At the Oct. 16 media event, asked for the status of this week's trial work in the virtual factory, Polaris put per-process progress up on a monitor and talked it through.

Test it in a virtual plant first

A physical-AI 'virtual factory' being built with Nvidia recreates the shop floor so robots and equipment can be trained in advance. The aim is to cut costly real-world trial runs.

Systems that each plant ran on its own are being merged into one standard manufacturing platform. The concept is called the software-defined factory (SDF).

Drive through the tunnel, get inspected

The 'tunnel-type exterior inspection vision' scans a vehicle's body with 3D simulation as it passes through a tunnel-shaped rig. The carmakers used outside vendors' systems until now; this one is in-house.

A 'robot teaching' technology automatically analyses and sets travel paths for more than 1,700 weld points.

When does it reach the line?

The technologies will be validated at the Singapore innovation centre, then applied to mass production in sequence from as early as next year. The new Ulsan EV plant, starting production this month, is the first stage; the target year is 2032.

"Our goal is an autonomous factory that judges, learns and evolves on its own," said E-FOREST Center head Choi Young-tae, adding that workers should be freed for higher-value work.

Good to know

E-FOREST TECH DAY is an annual exhibition where Hyundai and Kia present technology to industry peers and partner firms, alternating between the Uiwang R&D center and production plants. This seventh edition is at Uiwang and runs Oct. 19-21 at the Uiwang R&D center, with a new-manufacturing-technology contest and partner seminars on physical AI and manufacturing AI.

It started at Busan port

Dosirac debuted in 1986 as Korea's first container noodle with a lid and a square tray. In the early 1990s, Russian sailors and traders traveling between Busan and Vladivostok began buying it by the crate.

It looked like their portable soup containers, its flat square base stayed put on a ship, and the spicy broth felt like Russian soup.

It stayed when everyone left

Paldo opened a Russian office in 1997. When Russia declared a moratorium the next year and most global companies pulled out, Paldo stayed and pushed into Siberia and the Urals.

Local factories followed in the 2000s. Dosirac now holds 60% of Russia's container-noodle market, according to Money Today.

A fork, and mayonnaise

Russians eat a lot of noodles on trains, so every product comes with a fork. That is a big reason it became a Trans-Siberian essential.

Russians' habit of stirring mayonnaise into the broth until it melts like cheese led to 'Dosirac Plus,' launched in 2012 with a mayo sachet.

Now it's a 'kingdom'

Paldo's Russian sales arm posted record revenue of KRW 500.9 billion for 2025 (Bizwatch). In February it set up a new entity, 'Dosirac CG,' with about KRW 10.6 billion (Asia Economy).

Now Nongshim is entering Russia too, pricing mid-range lines at around KRW 2,000 and premium from KRW 3,800.

Worth knowing

In 2014 Dosirac won Product of the Year from the Russian National Trade Association, a first for an instant noodle, and in 2021 it received 'well-known trademark' status from Russia's patent office, a first for a Korean company.

The Russian lineup differs from the Korean one, with chicken, pork, mushroom and shrimp flavors for local tastes.

The transport Olympics comes to Gangneung

The 32nd ITS World Congress runs Oct. 19-23 in and around Gangneung Olympic Park. It is billed as the world's largest gathering on intelligent transport systems, with about 90 countries taking part.

Gangneung Convention Center, which opened in late August, hosts the ceremonies and academic sessions. All 434 exhibition booths are sold, and 449 papers and 193 sessions are confirmed.

4,000 drones, then stars on the ice

On opening night at 8 p.m., a drone light show of about 4,000 drones fills the sky over Olympic Park. On Oct. 22 at 7 p.m. an ice show follows at the Hockey Center, with national figure skaters Cha Jun-hwan and Lee Hae-in, the city says.

All side events for citizens and tourists are free.

What to do in the daytime

The outdoor plaza at Olympic Park gets a hanbok experience, kids' and teens' booths and a tech zone where you can try AI and self-driving. Local acts busk on the outdoor stage.

A local market, food trucks, a convenience store and a rest zone mean you can eat while you wander. Live demos of advanced transport tech run around the Hockey Center parking lot.

Getting into the exhibition

The technology exhibition is at the Speed Skating Oval. It is free if you register in advance on the congress's official website. Technology-tour and ITS-experience slots closed early.

The Gangneung Coffee Festival runs the same week, so you can pair the global event with a local one.

Before you go

The drone show happens on opening day only, and the ice show on Oct. 22 only. Programs and times can change, so check the congress's official notices once more.

When crowds and event vehicles peak at Olympic Park, public transport is the easier way in.