Song Hye-kyo donates to Korean Education Center in San Francisco

Actress Song Hye-kyo in a scene from SBS drama “Now We Are Breaking Up” / Courtesy of SBS

By Kwak Yeon-soo

Actress Song Hye-kyo has collaborated with Seo Kyung-duk, a professor at Sungshin Women's University who is at the forefront of promoting Korean culture, to produce and donate 10,000 guidebooks on Korea's independence movement to the Korean Education Center in San Francisco.

The donation was to commemorate the March 1 Independence Movement Day, and it is the seventh time that the actress has sponsored the “Meet Our Country's History Abroad” series. She has previously taken part in donating the guidebooks to the cities of Shanghai, Tokyo, Paris and New York.

The guidebooks, available in Korean and English, tell the history of Korea's independence movement in San Francisco, led by the Korean National Association and the Gong Lip Hyup Hoe. They provide information about Jang In-hwan (1875-1930) and Jeon Myeong-un (1884-1947), two Korean independence activists who assassinated former American diplomat and Japan lobbyist Durham Stevens.

“We wanted to inform overseas Koreans and international students about the history of the independence movement in San Francisco,” Seo said. “Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the conditions of remaining independence movement sites overseas are not very good. I encourage you to pay more attention to them.”

Song and Seo have worked together to produce and donate guidebooks on Korea-related sites and other meaningful Korea-related items across the world for the past 11 years.