Seoul now has its own version of the “Happy” dance.
South African filmmaker Raoul Dyssell released a video this week that shows Seoulites dancing to the hit Pharrel Williams' song by the same name.
Dyssell told the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) that he wanted to help cheer up Koreans in the aftermath of April’s Sewol ferry disaster.
"The atmosphere in Seoul was so dead. Nobody wanted to smile or admit they were happy," he told WSJ’s Korea Realtime blog.
The video, which has over 35,000 hits on YouTube, features both expats and locals.
People featured in the video include conscript soldiers dancing in uniforms at the War Memorial in Seoul; families spending time by the Han River; and high school students jumping around in the hallway.
"It was the Sewol tragedy that really compelled me to do it in the end. So many innocent people, so many children, were lost that day and it broke my heart," the filmmaker told culture website Pop Mythology. "I really wanted to inject some happy energy into the city so I decided I was going to do it."
The video is a fan-made tribute to Pharrel's 24 Hours of Happy Project, according to Dyssell.