Youth Dreams and Passion Renewed... The 18th Yangsan National Youth Unity Festival Held

November 9th, 10 AM, Hwangsan Park Isek Square

Yangsan City in Gyeongnam will hold the 18th Yangsan National Youth Unity Festival, the city’s representative youth festival, on November 9th from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Hwangsan Park Unique Plaza (next to the camping site) area.

This year’s festival, held in the autumn of November, aims to approach youth with a fresh mindset under the subtitle “Re:Start,” offering a day filled with youth passion and creativity through club competitions and various experiences that satisfy both the eyes and ears.

The event will begin at 10 a.m. with the operation of 20 experience booths, followed by the National Youth Club Competition at 11 a.m. The competition includes 18 teams in the stage category and 8 teams operating experience booths in the club zone category, where participants showcase their honed skills and engage in friendly competition.

After the competition, the commemorative ceremony starting at 3 p.m. will feature performances by the Yangsan Youth Choir, the Samulnori team from the Yangsan Youth After-School Academy, and the Cheerleading team from the Ungsang Youth After-School Academy. The ceremony will include awards for outstanding contributors in the youth sector and prizes for the top teams in the competition.

Awards include the Yangsan Mayor’s Award and a total prize money of 11 million KRW. The grand prize for the stage competition is 2 million KRW for one team; two teams will receive 1.5 million KRW each for the excellence award; four teams will receive 700,000 KRW each for the merit award; and eleven teams will receive 200,000 KRW each for the encouragement award. In the club zone competition, the top team will receive 500,000 KRW, and two teams will receive 250,000 KRW each for excellence.

Additionally, the festival is packed with fun activities and entertaining experience booths. The club zone offers activities such as making wish bracelets, the Gender Equality Value Tree, simple psychological tests, classic games, and Polaroid photo-taking. Specialized experiences, in collaboration with Yangsan Youth Mall, include dessert making, rice cake making, ribbon crafts, natural soap making, and a four-cut photo booth, all led by experts.

Moreover, local youth-related organizations such as the Yangsan Youth Counseling and Welfare Center, Yangsan Office of Education & Yangsan Career Education Support Center, and Yangsan Youth Center will provide a variety of experiences including popcorn distribution, making millennium stamps, and introducing the Hope Hi-Pass program. The Gyeongnam Youth Support Foundation’s mobile cultural center “Iseongkeum” bus and the “Visiting Youth Mental Health Keeper” bus will also be present, offering opportunities for youth to express and resolve their concerns and thoughts.

The 18th Yangsan National Youth Unity Festival is held annually by Yangsan City to provide a platform for youth to come together, express their talents, and foster harmony and future growth. The festival began as a comprehensive youth festival in Yangsan following the first Gyeongnam Youth Unity Festival held in Yangsan in 2003, and has since become Yangsan’s representative youth festival that youth actively participate in and create.

It has also expanded into a national competition to discover high-quality clubs and promote active cultural exchange among clubs. Although the festival was temporarily suspended in 2020 and 2021 due to COVID-19, it resumed in 2022 with many teams from various regions nationwide presenting rich performances.

Each year, 40 to 50 youth clubs participate, and this year, after fierce preliminary rounds among youth clubs from Chungcheong Province, Gyeonggi Province, Gwangju, Daegu, Busan, Gyeongnam, Ulsan, and other regions nationwide, 18 teams in the stage category and 8 teams in the club zone category have been selected for the finals.

A Yangsan City official stated, “As we have seen continuous passionate participation and interest every year, we will do our best to ensure this festival is successfully held. We will continue to plan and operate events that satisfy youth.”