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Journalism of Courage
On Wednesday, the Korean track skating team came second at the men’s 5000-metre relay race at the ongoing Beijing Winters Olympics 2022.
The team’s leader, Kwak Yoon Gy, celebrated the win by performing a hook step of popular Korean boyband BTS’s hit song ‘Dynamite’. Just before stepping on the podium to receive their silver medal, Yoon Gy, broke into a brief dance as his beaming teammates clapped and cheered him.
This gesture soon went viral on social media as not just Korean sports fans but international fans of BTS widely shared the clip from the medal ceremony.
BTS leader Kim Namjoon, who is known by this stage name RM, also shared Yoon Gy’s dance clip on his Instagram story and wrote a caption in Korean that according to translations done by BTS fan accounts said, “I saw your Dynamite well”. In another story, RM posted a picture of his band member SUGA and wrote “Please take good care of our Yoon-gi as well”, referencing SUGA’s real name Min Yoongi with rhymes with the Olympian’s name.
Kwak Yoon Gy was hosting a live session for his fans when he was alerted through comments about RM’s story. The silver medalist was seen thrilled after seeing that the Grammy-nominated artist shared his dance clip.
https://twitter.com/Taehyung_india_/status/1493952677679546368
https://twitter.com/yellowacebts/status/1494047582255034377
In a statement to Koreaboo, Yoon Gy said he chose to dance on a BTS song to show his appreciation to RM who had supported the Korean team against the backdrop of allegations that the refereeing at the Beijing Olympics was unfair towards his country’s ice skating athletes.
“I’m a fan of BTS on the regular too, but I also I wanted to repay RM however I could for the comfort I received when I was having it rough during the early stages of the Olympics due to the biased judging,” he said.
