Chuseok is a time for enjoying many different traditional foods in Korea. Among them, one of the must-have sweet treats is songpyeon. Songpyeon is a Korean traditional rice cake, or tteok, with filling that varies from region to region. Vibrant five-colored songpyeon of Seoul Seoul-style songpyeon are colorful and small, while most of the images of songpyeon that people know well are osaek songpyeon. Osaek, or five-colored, songpyeon is traditionally dyed with natural colorants including omija,

A man in his 40s has been sentenced to prison for producing child pornography using an artificial intelligence image generator for the first time in Korea, local media reported Monday. According to reports, the man was sentenced to 2 1/2 years on charges of violating the Act on the Protection of Children and Youth. The accused created a total of 360 sexually explicit images on an image-generating AI program installed on a laptop in April with commands including "10 years old," "nu

A woman in her 20s has been arrested on charges of attempted murder, after she allegedly attacked with a knife an acquaintance who blocked her online. According to Seoul Dongdaemun Police Station, the 24-year-old suspect allegedly stabbed the 27-year-old victim on Friday. The victim sustained injuries to her back and hands, and the suspect was apprehended later the same day. The attack is said to have been motivated by the victim having blocked the suspect on social media after the two had a fal

A man in his 40s has been detained for using an electric shocker on a woman in her 50s. Yangsan Police Station in South Gyeongsang Province said Thursday they have requested an arrest warrant for the suspect on the charge of special violence. Special violence under local laws is punishable by imprisonment of between one to 10 years, and can be applied in cases such as assault using a potentially lethal weapon, and assault carried out by a group. The man also violated the act on the safety manage

Discovery of a veterinary drug in ham that was served as part of a public high school meal has ignited a government probe on Wednesday. According to local news reports, the foreign substance -- later confirmed as Aluspray, a veterinary spray used to stop bleeding in livestock and not meant for human ingestion -- was discovered in ham at a high school in Chuncheon, Gangwon Province. According to the school, the substance was found by the school’s nutritionist. The ham was produced by a well

The police officer who fell to death in August during an alleged drug-taking gathering may have at times supplied drugs to the group, local media reported Tuesday. The officer in his 30s was found dead in an apartment complex at around 5 a.m. on Aug. 27. An autopsy showed that he had fallen to his death. According to local media reports, the officer -- affiliated with the Gangwon Provincial Police Agency -- purchased drugs directly from his mobile phone. It was found that he had searched for ket

One in four nurses suffered physical or verbal violence from doctors in the last six months, a study showed Tuesday. The research team, led by Park Eun-jun, a nursing professor at Korea National Open University, recently published a paper on the theme of nurses’ experience of violence at work in the journal of Korean Academic Society of Nursing Education. In the study, 71.1 percent of the 1,000 nurses who voluntarily participated in the study at 40 hospitals nationwide from Nov. 14 to Dec.

The authorities are searching for a man apparently swept away by the current in a fatal swimming accident in which another man drowned in North Chungcheong Province. According to the police and fire authorities, two men of Thai nationality in their 30s seem to have been swept away by the current in Cheongmicheon Stream, Jucheon-ri, Gamgok-myeon, Eumseong-gun, North Chungcheong Province on Sunday at approximately 3:44 p.m. Police and fire authorities were dispatched to the scene after receiving a

The death of a man in Osan, Gyeonggi Province, has sparked a row over police response, with the man having been killed after being brought under police custody. According to reports, the deceased, a man in his 20s, was killed after he was run over by a bus while lying on the road in the early hours of Aug. 13. According to Osan Police Station in Gyeonggi Province on Monday, officers were dispatched to a restaurant in response to a report by the restaurant owner at 1:59 a.m. on Aug. 13. When two

As K-pop’s global reach continues to expand, so has attention on K-pop fan culture. It's common for fans around the world to devote their time and resources to their favorite celebrities, but Korean fans’ expression of their love stands out for the way in which it is more organized and systematic, and often based around communities. “On the way home” One fan phenomenon is named after the Korean expression that literally means “the way home after work,” a

A man was arrested on Tuesday after a failed attempt to take his own life after killing his two children. Gimhae Jungbu Police Station announced Tuesday that a man in his 50s is being investigated on charges of murdering his two children on a hill in Gimhae, South Gyeongsang Province. According to the police, the man is suspected of murdering his two children -- his 17-year-old daughter and 16-year-old son -- in his vehicle. The daughter's teacher reported the teenager's absence from s

An unidentified woman’s body was found at sea near Gyodongdo, an island of Incheon bordering North Korea along the coastline. The Korea Coast Guard announced Monday it had received a report at around 10 a.m. on Sunday of a person who had drowned in the sea near the pier. The body was in an advanced state of decomposition and was found wearing both top and bottom garments. The Coast Guard initially identified the woman as a man, but later made a correction. The Coast Guard believes the body

The lights of key landmarks in Korea will be turned off for five minutes Tuesday night, including at Gwanghwamun and N Seoul Tower in Seoul, Busan's major bridge Gwangandaegyo and the landmark Cheomseongdae in Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province. The event is to mark Energy Day, with an estimated 1.27 million people in South Korea taking part, which is more than twice the number of participants last year. The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced that lights-out events will start

Avoid wearing dark clothing and using strong scents, the local emergency service authorities advise, as casualties from bee and wasp attacks continue to rise. According to local authorities, 11 people died and more than 6,400 people were injured in bee and wasp attacks last year alone. According to the Fire Department, the highest number of bee attacks causing human casualties occur in August, with the three-year average death toll standing at 9.7. Most recently, a man in his 70s died after bein

An injured leopard cat kitten was euthanized at an animal shelter in Taebaek, Gangwon Province, after staff mistook the animal to be a domestic cat. While the shelter and the veterinarian have claimed that there was little that could be done to have helped the animal, a number of issues with the handling of the situation has been raised. Leopard cats are listed as class II endangered wildlife, which means they are threatened with imminent extinction, and have been protected by the Ministry of En

A man in his 30s has been arrested on charges of raping and seriously injuring a woman in Seoul's Sillim-dong, which was also the site of a recent indiscriminate knife attack. The man is suspected of attacking a woman in her 30s with brass knuckles, and sexually assaulting her in a park near Gwanaksan at around 11:40 a.m. Thursday. Hikers who heard the victim’s screams called the police at around 11:44 a.m. and the police apprehended him in the act at around 12:10 p.m. The suspect and

An attempt to remove a beehive has resulted in about 50 trees being burned at a park in Incheon, fire authorities said Wednesday. According to the Incheon Fire Department, the fire broke out in a tree at a sports park entrance in Oryu-dong of Seo-gu, Incheon, at 1:18 p.m. on Wednesday. The fire is said to have started when park employees used a lighter and insecticide spray to remove a beehive found among the branches. No human casualties were discovered, but 50 Dwarf juniper trees were burned.

A house cleaner has been charged with animal abuse after allegedly causing injuries to a client's pet cats. According to the cats' owner, the worker was hired through a cleaning service app. The cleaner was notified of the presence of cats beforehand and given instructions not to approach or touch the cats. However, when the cats' owner returned home after running errands, the owner found blood on the floor and on the cats. The cats were immediately taken to a veterinary hospital

A man in his 20s was fined 2 million-won ($1,500) for spiking another man's drink with laxatives last year. The victim, a 19-year old preparing for the national college entrance exam, developed enteritis and suffered from emotional distress after the incident, which the victim claimed affected his performance in the exam. The incident took place on Aug. 30 last year, just two months before South Korea’s state-administered college entrance exam, in Seoul's Gangnam area. The suspec

A teenage boy has turned himself into the police for allegedly threatening to sexually assault a minor in an online post, police said Tuesday. The high schooler turned up at a police outpost in Guro-gu, southwestern Seoul, confessing to posting the notice, according to Seoul Guro Police Station. A notice, published in an online forum at 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday, read that a person would sexually assault an elementary school girl aged 8 to 13 near Gangnam Station. The original post has been deleted.