On Aug. 14, one day before the 80th anniversary of Korea¡¯s liberation from Japan, a group of Japanese and South Korean students gathered in a conference room in Seoul. One by one, they picked up a microphone and shared words of reflection on the week they spent together.
¡°I don¡¯t speak Japanese, and it was difficult to communicate at times,¡± Suhyun Kim, a 21-year-old Korean student, shared with tears in her eyes, ¡°but I know that I¡¯ve made lifelong friends here.¡±
Kim was one of the 32 participants of the 2025 Japan-Korea Summer Exchange Conference, an annual event alternately held in the two countries and co-hosted by the student-led Japan-Korea Student Conference (JKSC) and Korea-Japan Student Conference (KJSC). This year¡¯s conference, which ran from Aug. 7 to 16 in Seoul¡¯s Gwangjin district, brought together undergraduates from over 20 universities across Japan and South Korea as well as three Japanese students currently enrolled at U.S. and European institutions.
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