In a small dance hall in Seoul, the bachata sir judge, by Anthony Santos and Ozuna. Eleven Koreans and one Norwegian sway their bodies to the rhythm of this musical genre originating in the Dominican Republic. Although they are not fluent in Spanish, they understand when their instructor tells them: Change! And the partner is exchanged.
The group dances in front of the Dominican flag that is hung next to the Korean one at the ND Dancing With Us academy. Korea.
“I started to learn bachata because I really liked music”, says Harry Park, one of the students. With the music came his liking for the Dominican Republic, where a friend of his resides. “For this reason I try to learn about culture and music, and now I am learning Spanish.”
The bachatawhich in its origins in the 90s was considered a music of the lower class and of bars, was climbing in popular taste, and in 2019 it was declared intangible heritage of humanity by Unesco.
The Dominican ambassador in Korea of the South, Federico Cuello, informs Free Journal that there are 25 academies of bachata that work in the Asian country, and the Embassy “had absolutely nothing to do with it.” “All of these are Koreans who are interested in dancing; there are people who like to enjoy themselves,” she says.
However, he specifies that the Embassy does help to spread it. “During the time of confinement (due to the COVID-19 pandemic) we introduced the class modality of bachata online, and then the Embassy promoted that the 25 schools of bachata offer this type of service.
Asta Samuelsen, a Norwegian immigrant who has been in Korea from the South, moved in the ballroom from partner to partner. “I thought more about K-pop when I moved to Korea to study Korean, and now I’m with the bachata!” he laughs at the end of class. Although he has not visited the Dominican Republic, he believes that, through music, he could connect with his people.
“During the time of confinement we introduced the online bachata class modality, and then the Embassy promoted that the 25 bachata schools offer this service modality”Ambassador of the Dominican Republic in South Korea
Of Korea to Spain
The instructor of the academy, Hyunho Moon, has not visited the Dominican Republic (13,527 km away from Korea of the South), but considers that he knows a little about the country bachatawho has conquered him and motivated him to travel from Seoul to Spain to master his dance, along with Dakyo Lee, his fellow instructor.
Moon first had contact with the bachata through a video. Aided by an interpreter to converse with Free Journalsays that it was a “big shock” for him when he saw the audiovisual, because of the harmony he noticed between the couple who danced.
At that time I did not have much information about the bachata, which is why he and Lee preferred to go to Europe in 2019. They went to workshops in Paris and Spain; It was in the second country where they found some Dominican teachers who taught them to dominate the musical genre that they teach today.
Moon took classes for a few months, but she stayed for a year learning. They wanted to assimilate as much as they could from each teacher. “One year is not enough,” says Lee.
“Dominican” and “sensual”
Although for the Dominican bachata is one, the South Koreans divide it into “Dominican” and “sensual”.
Lee explains that the “Dominican” is the production that has a more active, faster rhythm, and to dance it you need constant movements of the feet. In the case of “sensual”, the movement is more of the body and the rhythm is slower.
No matter what, for Lee the bachata it’s like a kind of social dance; That is why he considers that men and women can get together anywhere to enjoy it.
“Koreans are very interested in bachata”, emphasizes Moon. In a class you can have up to 30 people.
The dance academy opened two years ago, but due to the pandemic the classes were activated from 2021.
Students can also learn other genres, such as salsa, hip-hop, and K-dance (Korean music), and other instructors also collaborate, including former dancers for South Korean artists during their performances.
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Diario Libre visited Korea from the South as a media selected to participate in the Kocis International Press Invitation Program, organized by the Korean Culture and Information Service (Kocis) of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the South Korean Government
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In South Korea, they dance K-pop… and bachata