[Sportschosun Reporter Park A-ram] A controversy has arisen over YouTuber Park We and Song Ji-eun, formerly of the group Secret, receiving help from local residents during a past visit to Kenya, despite allegedly having gone there to volunteer. However, it has been confirmed that the itinerary they joined was a “vision trip,” not a volunteer program from the outset.
According to Sports Kyunghyang on the 12th, Park We and Song Ji-eun participated in the “Kenya Vision Trip” organized last August by Compassion Korea, an international Christian child-support organization.
A vision trip is a program in which participants visit countries where Compassion supports children, tour local country offices, centers, and homes, and observe how sponsorship funds and letters from sponsors are delivered. The itinerary also includes opportunities to see and meet local children in their living environments.
Compassion Korea presents vision trips as a program separate from volunteer work. The organization explains that it does not operate a separate program for volunteer activities at home or abroad, and that no volunteer work is carried out during vision trips either.
The document issued to participants is also a “experiential activity certificate,” not a volunteer confirmation certificate.
In a video of his visit to Kenya uploaded to his YouTube channel Weracle last October, Park We likewise described the itinerary as a “trip,” not volunteer work. Song Ji-eun also said on social media that she had “left for Kenya on a vision trip with Compassion.”
The controversy resurfaced after footage from Park We’s visit to Kenya showing him receiving help from local residents began circulating again. The video shows local personnel assisting Park We as he traveled along unpaved roads and through narrow alleys.
Some netizens who saw the footage responded, “He went to volunteer but ended up receiving volunteer work,” and, “Who is helping whom?”
However, because the itinerary was not originally a program intended for participants to perform volunteer work locally, some have pointed out that criticizing it on the premise that it was “volunteer work” differs somewhat from the facts.
Meanwhile, Park We’s past video of his visit to Kenya has recently drawn renewed attention as older content was successively revisited amid controversy surrounding the release of CCTV footage of a recent KTX fall accident.
tokkig@sportschosun.com
This article has been translated by GripLabs Mingo AI.
