Simple, sweet, and fictionally fatal: the stallholder who makes the traditional South Korean children’s treat featured in the global cultural phenomenon Squid Game — and once associated with post-war poverty — has hit a real-life jackpot.
The Netflix smash hit series features a group of South Korea’s most marginalised and deeply in debt, who compete in children’s games for the chance of 45.6 billion won (US$38 million), with lethal consequences.
In one particular challenge, the contestants try to cut out shapes including a star and an umbrella from a crisp sugar candy called a dalgona, without it cracking — and those who fail are killed.
Photo: AFP
The life-or-death game was inspired by director Hwang Dong-hyuk’s experience growing up in Seoul in the 1970s: but then, the prize for a child who successfully removed the shape was another free dalgona.
Hwang was always determined to win an extra treat and remembers employing multiple tactics in his efforts, including licking the candy to loosen the shape and using a needle heated over briquettes — techniques repeated in the show’s nail-biting dalgona challenge scene.
“I would make the dalgona maker extremely perplexed by succeeding on the most difficult shape of umbrella,” the director recently said in a YouTube video. But the candy was a difficult prop to manage on set as it softens easily, especially during South Korea’s humid rainy season, so Hwang and artistic director Chae Kyung-sun hired “dalgona experts” to have the candy freshly made on location.
Photo: AFP
Those specialists were Lim Chang-joo and his wife Jung Jung-soon, who produced between 300 and 400 dalgonas over three days of filming.
Now, their humble roadside stall in Seoul’s theatre district — little more than an umbrella, an awning and their equipment — is one of the hottest spots in the South Korean capital.
Orders for the 2,000-won (about US$1.70) sweets start piling up as soon as it opens, and before long, customers face six-hour waits, with some giving up and leaving empty-handed.
In about 90 seconds, Lim melts an individual portion of sugar above a burner, before adding baking soda, flattening it into a circle, and punching it with the customer’s preferred shape.
He offers a wider range of choices than the four forms in the show — and has a newly added “N” for Netflix.
“I never imagined it would become this popular,” Lim said of the series, adding that his life has now become “super hectic.”
“Of course, I’m happy because my business is doing well and how dalgona has become famous in other countries. I hope they make and eat their own dalgonas,” he added.
Historians say dalgona first emerged in the 1960s when the South was still assailed by post-war poverty while desserts — such as ice cream or chocolates — were not widely available and prohibitively expensive.
Very sweet, with hints of nuts and bitterness, the candy was hugely popular, with many vendors setting up their stalls near schools.
Lim and Jung started their dalgona operation with 30,000 won after closing their tailoring business of 20 years around the time of the 1997 Asian financial crisis.
The sweet endured throughout the South’s rise to become the world’s 12th-largest economy, following decades of rapid economic growth during the authoritarian rule of the post-war period.
And Squid Game is the latest manifestation of the ever-widening influence of the country’s popular culture, epitomized by K-pop sensation BTS and the Oscar-winning movie Parasite.
“South Korea has always been at the nexus of the modern and pre-modern, Western tools and Eastern ways, and preserving the past while sacrificing everything for the future,” said Michael Hurt, who teaches cultural theory at the Korea National University of Arts. “Dalgona is a nexus item in a nexus culture.”
As mega K-pop group BTS returns to the stage after a hiatus of more than three years, one major market is conspicuously missing from its 12-month world tour: China. The omission of one of the group’s biggest fan bases comes as no surprise. In fact, just the opposite would have been huge news. China has blocked most South Korean entertainment since 2016 under an unofficial ban that also restricts movies and the country’s popular TV dramas. For some Chinese, that means flying to Seoul to see their favorite groups perform — as many were expected to do for three shows opening
A recent report from the Environmental Management Administration of the Ministry of Environment highlights a perennial problem: illegal dumping of construction waste. In Taoyuan’s Yangmei District (楊梅) and Hsinchu’s Longtan District (龍潭) criminals leased 10,000 square meters of farmland, saying they were going to engage in horticulture. They then accepted between 40,000 and 50,000 cubic meters of construction waste from sites in northern Taiwan, charging less than the going rate for disposal, and dumped the waste concrete, tile, metal and glass onto the leased land. Taoyuan District prosecutors charged 33 individuals from seven companies with numerous violations of the law. This
Taiwan’s semiconductor industry consumes electricity at rates that would strain most national grids. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) alone accounted for more than 9 percent, or 2,590 megawatts (MW), of the nation’s power demand last year. The factories that produce chips for the world’s phones and servers run around the clock. They cannot tolerate blackouts. Yet Taiwan imports 97 percent of its energy, with liquefied natural gas reserves measured in days. Underground, Taiwan has options. Studies from National Taiwan University estimate recoverable geothermal resources at more than 33,000 MW. Current installed capacity stands below 10 MW. OBSTACLES Despite Taiwan’s significant geothermal potential, the
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chair Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) returned from her trip to meet People’s Republic of China (PRC) dictator Xi Jinping (習近平) bearing “a gift” for the people of Taiwan: 10 measures the PRC proposed to “facilitate the peaceful development of cross-strait relations.” “China on Sunday unveiled 10 new incentive measures for Taiwan,” wrote Reuters, wrongly. The PRC’s longstanding habit with Taiwan relations is to repackage already extant or once-existing policies and declare that they are “new.” The list forwarded by Cheng reflects that practice. NEW MEASURES? Note the first item: establishing regular communication mechanisms between the Chinese Communist Party
RSS