From tourists to temporary locals: Busan bets on longer stays for K-culture fans

A new program in Busan is inviting foreign visitors to experience Korea beyond sightseeing, pairing Korean language lessons with K-culture workshops and local tours during a five-day stay.

K-Bridge International will run the program, called K-Culture Experience Village, at Busan Arpina in Haeundae-gu. Two five sessions are planned: Oct. 19-23 for 50 participants and Nov. 16-20 for 60, each backed by the Korea Tourism Organization and Busan Metropolitan City.

The four-night, five-day program costs $550 and covers lodging, meals, Korean classes, K-beauty and K-food workshops, K-pop dance sessions and Busan tours that include a yacht trip and coastal walk.

The idea is to move beyond the short, sightseeing-focused trips that have long dominated inbound tourism by giving visitors a chance to experience aspects of everyday life in Korea, Kim Kee-hun, founder of K-Bridge International, told The Korea Herald on Sunday.

K-Culture Experience Village combines education and daily life with sightseeing for those who want to experience Korea firsthand and learn more about its culture, rather than simply pass through as tourists, Kim said.

The first session includes overseas influencers in K-culture and travel, chosen for engagement with young Hallyu fans rather than just follower counts, with their content meant to help recruit later participants. The second session widens to general enthusiasts, institution-recommended participants and foreign residents, with early interest strongest in Malaysia, Vietnam, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Kim, who spent 36 years at the Korea Tourism Organization and now teaches tourism at Youngsan University, said the idea came after seeing a Hallyu school in Minnesota and asking why Korea did not have one. Two months of recruiting trips abroad, he said, showed no shortage of demand to learn Korean and experience the culture firsthand.

Starting next year, K-Bridge plans to expand into a one- to four-week program: Korean classes in the mornings, K-pop dance or K-beauty in the afternoons and weekends exploring Busan and South Gyeongsang Province. The goal, the company says, is turning one-time visitors into a "related population" of those who return for language study or a degree.

The model reflects a broader shift in how Hallyu tourism can be approached: Rather than simply bringing fans to Korea to consume K-culture, the aim is to use that interest as a gateway to longer stays and deeper engagement with the country.

Kim said that Korea’s second-largest city already has ample tourism resources and needs to focus on packaging them into products that visitors will pay to experience.

“Good raw material” is already there, he said, but the city needs to keep developing it into tourism products if it wants to become a hub for Hallyu tourism.

He also said Busan needs to build the infrastructure to accommodate major K-pop events, which could help strengthen the city’s position as a destination for international Hallyu fans.