Singer in pilgrimage for cancer-fighting partner

Kim Jong-jin / Korea Times file

Jeon Tae-kwan

Singer Kim Jong-jin is on a 33-day pilgrimage in Spain in a desperate bid to aid the recovery of his musical partner, Jeon Tae-kwan, who has cancer.

Entertainment agency Spring Summer Fall Winter, named after the duo’s stage name and established by the pair in 2004, said Wednesday Kim had embarked on the cross-country journey with his son.

Kim and his son, who recently was discharged from Korea’s mandatory military service, are walking about 800 kilometers to Santiago de Compostela. It is the capital of the autonomous region of Galicia in northwestern Spain. Part of the city, Old Town, was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985.

Kim, a vocalist of the folk-style duo formed in 1988, and his son will walk for about a month to Santiago de Compostela Cathedral and touch pillars at the site, praying for Jeon’s recovery.

The cathedral has been a popular destination for pilgrims since the early Middle Ages. It is reputedly the burial place of St. James the Great, one of Jesus’ apostles.

Jeon was diagnosed with kidney cancer in 2012 and had part of the organ removed. A cancerous tumor was found in his shoulder last December and he had surgery. He is now having regular treatment for the cancer.

Jeon, the duo’s drummer, showed that he had bounced back from the surgery when he performed as a radio DJ in the duo’s concert on Mar. 13 and 14 in Daechi-dong, southern Seoul.

Singer Lee Si-mon, a 2013 runner-up from cable TV Mnet’s singing competition show “Voice Korea” and the first apprentice trained at the agency, expressed in a recent interview with a news outlet that Jeon and Kim had been like her “mother and father” in how they respected her while training her.