Memes in Korea

Kim Yuna

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First, we’ll start with a pretty famous and easily understandable one. Yuna Kim is of course the young queen of the ice when she dominated the international competitive figure-skating scene. She has of course been subject to countless interviews, spotlights, and media mobs. But there was one gem of a moment when she was a much younger when she let out this specific reaction that took Korean meme culture by storm.

As some brief context, Yuna was taking a few questions from local Chinese reporters before her debut that day on the ice. These pre-performance questions are typically focused on her upcoming routine, how she’s feeling, and other technicalities of performing on the big icy stage. This time though, the reporter had something else in mind.

She asked a question, which was immediately translated, of whether or not she had a boyfriend. Now mind you, Yuna was at the height of her career at this time, always on the road, and didn’t have much time for leisure. Her reaction was priceless and is now the quintessential image when you just want to ask someone over the phone or internet, WTF?

“WTF are you saying?”

Kim Jung Un

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Memes are born from serious ridiculousness, and nothing embodies that sensibility more than the big bad king sitting pretty north of the border. There’s so much conflicting about the man. On one hand, he’s an egomaniac dictator that will go to any length to conserve the little bit of self-dignity he thinks he holds. On the other, there’s absolutely nothing commanding of this guy, all the way from his stunted pineapple head-shape to his lethargic movements.

I had no idea that KJU was the subject to such incessant memes until I saw @gochuchamchi’s reply to one of my recent posts, writing that he’s taking notes during my post to make sure he remembers to visit me in NYC -

I couldn’t stop laughing. I soon found out that this was just the tip of the iceberg. Despite showing almost no bone structure or defined muscle, Kim Jung Un is one of the most expressive people on the planet and definitely the MOST dramatic amongst nuclear dictators.

Check out a full roster of meme and gif choice for KJU here

Emotionless Emotional Drawings

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The last needs a bit more explanation but it’s really worth it. There is a never-ending stream of sarcasm-driven jokes that takes typical Korean messaging phrases and juxtaposes them with very contrary cartoons. The further the drawing is from what the writing is supposed to mean, the more jarring the meme. It’s hard to describe all the situations these come in handy but overall, they’re meant to be sobering and sarcastic slaps to the face when someone gets too excited or too full of themselves -

- Wow, that’s so much fun.

You can find a number of more common examples here.

Capturing Culture

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I really enjoy these memes and gifs since they so perfectly capture Korean sentiments and contexts in one single place. Memes can often be seed as internet garbage or silly little trolling elements but it’s incredible how much can be mined from these momentary bundles.

Share with me your favorite memes! Maybe I can submit a Korean picture as a meme challenge one day ^^.