His enthusiasm for KTA awarded him an honorary Seoul citizenship in 2018, but White believes more can be done to encourage participation in the nine jeongs in the capital and the several others scattered around the rest of Korea.
“I would actually say that there’s hardly any promotion from the government. A lot of soft promotions going on like what I’m doing, but in terms of the government, it’s the difference between hard and soft.”
“Hard is promoted by the government, it’s funded and has marketing involved. That’s not really done with KTA.”
“If people show interest and they ask, I’m willing to bring them onto my range, and if there’s not too many people at the shooting line, I’ll give them a bow and I’ll let them shoot because it’s a unique experience that most people really can’t do.”
As strong as Korea in the Olympics have been and will most likely continue to be, it is not just because of their incredibly stringent, hard working camps.
It is a nation who’s culture is significantly intertwined with archery, whether it be for historical military reasons or a previous noble pastime.
Although we are now in 2024 where numerous other hobbies are accessible and known of thanks to the endless prism of the internet, Korean Traditional Archery’s recent rise amongst university students shows that no matter what, the bow will never leave Korea and Korea will never leave the bow.
This was Part 2 on Korean Traditional Archery. Read Part 1.
