Many Koreans celebrate"Pepero Day" every year on November 11.

A pepero is a long stick-shaped Korean snack covered with chocolate which has been on the market since 1983. Because of its resemblance to the number 1, it has been a custom to give peperos to friends and loved ones on November 11, when four 1s come in a row.
Pepero Day was first celebrated in 1996, when teenage girls in Busan first started to give each other peperos as a way of wishing each other good luck on growing up tall and slender. Today, people exchange peperos to show their love or friendship, rather than to hope for a beautiful figure.

This year's Pepero Day was special, as the year being 2011, it was the only date in this century when the number 1 showed up six times in a row. The SNU Student Ambassadors (SSA) held a special event to celebrate this day; only, peperos were not a part of it. Under the theme"Campus Warming Day," they set up a booth in front of Jaha Pond, selling garraetteok (a stick-shaped type of rice cake which resembles the number 1) and hot beverages.

SSA is a student organization under the university's Office of International Affairs (OIA), whose main duty is to receive foreign VIPs and provide assistance during the university’s international events. In addition, SSA hosts an"I Love SNU" event every semester to create a positive impression of SNU among the foreigners on campus, which takes different forms every semester such as a sports event, a party, or a fundraising event."Campus Warming Day" was this semester’s"I Love SNU" event.

"Instead of peperos, we decided to celebrate November 11th with garraetteok, which resembles the number 1 just as much as pepero, but is more traditional," says KIM Tae-hoon, head of SSA."We wanted today to be a warm day on campus for everyone, which is why we are selling warm food and hot beverages, and offering free hugs and fun games at the booth. At the same time, we also wanted to introduce traditional rice cakes to the foreigners at school."

The event was a fantastic success. There were many visitors at the booth, Koreans and foreigners, who enjoyed the event immensely. There was even a Spanish professor who bought more than 30 rice cakes for the students attending his lecture. Another foreign student exclaimed his enthusiasm."I was just passing by when the booth came to my attention. The rice cakes are delicious! I would come here again if they held this event next year. I wish that more foreign students could have known in advance that there would be such an event," said Qua, a Vietnamese student studying for his master's degree in mechanical engineering.

The event, which began at 11:11 a.m., lasted until 5 o'clock. The earnings from the sales will be donated to a non-profit organization helping multicultural families (families with members of different ethnic backgrounds, for example, a Korean husband, a Filipina wife and their children) who are having trouble fitting in to the generally monocultural Korean population.

Written by KIM Jaeseung, SNU English Editor, brainophone@naver.com   ?
Reviewed by Eli Park Sorensen, SNU Professor of Liberal Studies, eps7257@snu.ac.kr
Proofread by Brett Johnson, SNU English Editor, morningcalm2@gmail.com