1.18

Locations Visited

Seodaemun Prison History Park
Observing the "Wednesday Demonstration"
Ahn Jung-geun Memorial Museum
Memorial Statue of the Comfort Women
Memory 6 at Nam Mountain @Seoul

Photo Gallery

Soedaemun (West Gate) Prison History Park

While Japan was colonizing Korea from 1910 to 1945, the Seodaemun Prison was used to arrest, torture and execute Korean people who stood up against Japan. The park displays pictures of people who suffered and died, the prison cells, and execution chambers.

Ahn Jung-geun Memorial Museum

He is considered as a national hero in Korea for assassinating Hirobumi Ito, the first prime minister of Japan who led the colonization of Korea.

Memorial Site of the Comfort Women

Comfort women were women forcefully taken to comfort stations to be sexual slaves for Japanese soldiers before and during World War II. Most of these women were Koreans who were ruled by the Japanese imperialists during that period.

The statue located at Seoul's Mount Namsan, upholds four women, one of them being the first woman to talk about her experience as a comfort woman publicly, Kim Hak-Sun. The other three represent Koreans, Chinese, and Filipina girls whom the Japanese had tortured.

Memorial Statue for the Comfort Women

The women's names are inscribed in one of the monuments, with one of the paintings made by the comfort women portraying Japanese brutality and symbolizing the Japanese soldiers as monsters. One of the monuments has the quote, "History not remembered is repeated."

Wednesday Demonstration demanding Japan to redress the Comfort Women problems

Every wednesday, protesters gather outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul to protest for the rights of comfort women. They demand an apology from the nation, and also want them to acknowledge the wrongdoings of the Japanese soldiers. These protesters also have taken the vow to protect the statue of a comfort woman called the “Statue Of Peace” that stands upright representing the many women whose voices were silenced.