LETTER FROM THE EDITOR - VOL. 19
KCCNYC Monthly - December 2025
By Eun Byoul Oh
It’s already December, and I hope everyone had a healthy and warm Thanksgiving.
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Around this time last year, Korea was going through a major political upheaval caused by Yoon’s declaration of martial law. The coverage of the political history of Korea filled our newsletter, instead of the holiday edition of KCCNYC monthly we had prepared last year. I have to say that I am very glad that we are able to enjoy our holiday mood for this year’s December issue of KCCNYC monthly.
As we wrap up our year, I thought about new friends we have met at KCCNYC and new programs that we launched this year. Over one year, we have hosted 4.5 terms of our year-round Korean courses, and we had many people join us from all over the world and across the U.S. Every year, KCCNYC staff are grateful to see the burgeoning interest in the Korean language and Korean culture in the world. Our program would not be possible without your support, and I would like to extend our deepest gratitude towards every student that accompanies us to bring our community together.
As the KCCNYC Monthly Team, we try to bring you the highlights of our activities in the community and to memorialize them and our history through recording them. We believe that the newsletter is not only the history of KCCNYC, but a comprehensive record of Korean culture and history. We also share the stories of our newsletter on our Instagram.
This year, KCCNYC Monthly was able to present personal essays of Korean adoptees in the November issue, in honor of National Adoptee Awareness Month, and in August we told the stories of the Korean diaspora from Justine and Sergey. In January, we presented stories of Korean-Americans in our community. Finally, we also featured Korean and Korean-American artists.
In April, KCCNYC was able to raise $8,200 in funds for the Korean Gyeongbuk Wildfire Recovery Effort. The funds were donated through Hope Bridge in Korea. We thank everyone, once again, for your contributions.
We were very excited to launch Dosan Hakdang, our monthly book club, in May of 2025. We read the Nobel Prize winning novel Human Acts by Han Kang in honor of the Gwangju Uprising. We invited Bora Chung to talk about her book Your Utopia for Pride month. In August, we were able to share Korean Resistance poems by Korean poets. Last month, we read The Dwarf by Cho Se-Hui, discussing the history of Korean economic development and labor law. The book club report of this issue will cover much more about our book club.
In June, KCCNYC also met SADD (Solidarity Against Disability Discrimination) at New York Seoul Disability Film Festival.
KCCNYC also rolled out the KCCNYC 방과후, KCCNYC After Class series to have gatherings of students in a different ways to interact with Korean culture. The series was an effort for us to bring back our in person Jazz nights that we featured before COVID-19. We had 노래방 Night and our Outing at the MET. We look forward to having more events in person.
During Chuseok, KCCNYC had a booth at KAAGNY’s Korea Day. We were able to share Korean culture and language through our mini lessons at the booth. We were able to have fun with the Korean American community in NYC with traditional games.
In this issue of the newsletter, I hope you enjoy our end-of-year review on dramas and music. Don’t forget to read our literature corner and history of the month.
KCCNYC looks forward to 2026, and we are looking forward to expanding our mission to include more activities and gatherings. I hope you also join us in our journey achieving our mission as a nonprofit organization. Thank you very much for all your contributions to our community this year. I hope you also enjoyed this year.
감사합니다. With Gratitude.
Eun Byoul Oh
