Life
[INTERVIEW] Conversations about our English-Friendly City
As part of its effort to become a global hub city, Busan is promoting its English-Friendly City initiative. The goal is to create an environment where residents can freely learn and use English in their daily lives.
Busan recruited city activists to help realize this goal. Busan City Hall sat down with two English-Friendly City activists and discussed their roles and thoughts about this initiative.
Left: Hooper Lewis(U.K., model and actor.)
Right: Suk Ji Eun (Korea, hotel management, Dongeui University.)
Q. Can you explain why you applied to be a civil activist for the English-Friendly City initiative? How is it going so far?
A. Hooper: I was excited in joining the programme, because I feel that I can help make a difference in helping it succeed, as I am a native English speaker from the U.K. My motivation is to help Busan become more inclusive and welcoming towards foreigners which can help Busan grow as a city and help the local community.
A. Ji Eun: As a member of the civil activist, I would like to contribute to making Busan as English-Friendly city by proposing better or upgraded policies regarding inconveniences in daily life. I also want to learn different languages and share the cultures of other countries with my fellow activists in the group. As a student who majors in hotel and convention management, I hope I can encourage my capabilities in collaboration with people having different backgrounds such as nationality and age.
Q. What is the most inconvenient aspect of being a foreign resident in Busan? Do you think Busan's English-Friendly City initiative will improve life for foreign residents?
A. Hooper: It can be hard to understand street signs, as most of them are only in Korean, which makes getting around the city hard at times. Therefore, the policy of an English-Friendly city, is something that I feel strongly about, and I believe that this can easily be achieved.
Q. From the perspective of a college student, what do you think the English-Friendly City initiative can do for college students in the city?
A. Ji Eun: What I most concern about me as a college student is how I will get a job after I finish my course. I wish the initiative can help us to have better English abilities without any greater effort and time to do so. In particular, I hope we can have more chances to meet and share thoughts with foreign residents in Busan which will help me and other students to reduce the cost and time to improve their English skills.
Q. Do you have any goals as a civil activist? Do you have any suggestions for how the initiative should proceed?
A. Hooper: My thoughts and wish for this policy to move forward, is for the local community to have an open mindset in order to help Busan become a destination, which can be done through becoming an English-Friendly city, which this policy proposes to do. One of the first things that I would like to suggest is by helping change public street signs locally to have an English option.
A. Ji Eun: To foster Busan as the English-Friendly city, I think it's prerequisite to provide the place to talk and meet for domestic and foreign resident in Busan alike. I wish Busan City should provide a place for anyone can freely join and share their ideas about various topics in English. If the place becomes a cultural platform, Busan can establish as the English-Friendly city without hard efforts.