1. End Of The Line

Korean version proofread and edited by Park So-yeon

soyeonaaaa@naver.com

The 2025 football season has finally arrived, and the first leagues to engage in battle are the Professional K League 1 and semi-professional K4 League. In the K League 1, FC Anyang are set to play their first-ever top-tier league match against the team who they dislike most, FC Seoul. As an FC Seoul supporter, I would like to be there, but that is not part of the plan this year. Instead, I’m off to Yeoncheon for the first round of K4 League. No regrets.

Yeoncheon FC is, as the name suggests, based in Yeoncheon County. It's a small county with only 35,000 people, and much of it borders North Korea. This team is not the first to play here, but they are new to the area. The team's turbulent history saw it starting out in Chungju as a city-owned team, changing ownership into private hands, fighting multiple financial controversies, leading to Chungju City refusing to renew the stadium use agreement. With nowhere to play their football, management was forced to look for a new home, which they found in Yeoncheon.

On the Seoul Subway system, Yeoncheon is the end of the line in the real sense of the phrase. Yeoncheon Station is the Northernmost and final station of Line 1. I start on Line 4, but the moment I transfer to Line 1, I’m reminded why it has a reputation for being the strangest line in the system. The cars are packed despite it being a morning train heading out of Seoul. 97% of the passengers appear to be retired, and with them comes their flair. Coloured sunglasses, wild scarves, canes, odd leather shoes and flamboyant hats abound. And those are just the men. At least I’m not put in a coma by the smell of mothballs. For better or worse, old Koreans do not like to sit at home and die. They go out with a bang, and it's great.

I expect passengers to disembark as we cross the borders of Seoul, but that does not happen. At least half of the passengers stay on to Yeoncheon. Is Yeoncheon bigger and more important than I was led to believe?

By the time we reach Yeoncheon I’ve been on the train for almost two hours, and I need a bathroom. However, the train was packed with elderly people, so everyone else was also heading there. Am I getting old? As I move with the crowd, I can’t help but feel that, yes, maybe I’m old now. 

No surprise, there is a queue for the urinals. In front of me is a man who looks like he’s wearing four thick layers, and about a minute before there is even a urinal open, he starts fishing for his penis under all the layers. Most of us there would not fault him overly much, but does he have to hum to himself while doing the fishing? I haven't even left the subway system, and I can already call the trip an adventure.

Crises averted, it’s time to head out into my first town of the season. Yeoncheon itself is small, maybe even tiny. Where did all the passengers disappear to?! As I wander around, I’m struck by the extraordinary number of gukbap and sundae restaurants as well as the baffling number of spiffy-looking coffee shops separating the restaurants. The combination just does not seem right. The streets are quiet. So quiet that the traffic lights on the main street are switched off. Again, where did all those passengers go?! 

We are barely out of winter, and we’ll be sitting exposed to the elements, so before heading to the match, I need to find something to eat. It’s no surprise that I find a Gugkbab restaurant open, right next to the 30-metre-long central market with its 10 vendors. Seriously, where did all those passengers go?!

With a belly full of warm food, I head out. The stadium is a 15-minute walk from the station and can hold 9000 spectators. But getting to the stadium is the easy part. Getting into the stadium is the real challenge. When you arrive, you have the options of going up a ramp that seems to lead up to the back of the seating areas or staying on the ground floor and walking alongside the stadium. From the outside, the main stand looks to be elevated, so it’s reasonable to assume we should go up to find the entrance to the eating area, but like many of us come to learn, all those gates are closed, and we end up walking over and down the other side.

I find the entrance on the ground floor, and as I enter, I see the teams lined up to enter the arena, Yeoncheon on the left, Pyeongchang United on the right. Next to Yeoncheon are two lines of children, ready to go onto the field. No one explained to them that one line should accompany the Pyeongchang players. There hasn't been football in the town for a few years, so we can forgive them for not knowing the ins and outs yet. The “security” in the stadium is so lax that one father has his little girls walk up to the players to pose for a photo. Not even the players notice as they are too distracted by two lines of noisy boys.

After a minute or two trying to find out where to go, I notice someone entering a door behind which is a staircase. I follow them and we make our way up to where the seats are. Officially, 538 spectators are seated on the main stand, though how they would know that is beyond me. No tickets were given out, and we weren’t counted as we entered. I find a seat to the side, hoping to get some useful game photos, just in time to see the players take the field for the pre-game introductions.  

Possibly the most entertaining part of the whole match is the children. The boys who came onto the field with the players to line up with them are dismissed before the team photos are taken. But they don't leave the field in an expected, orderly manner. Instead, they run off the field, in a screaming ball, triggering universal laughter in the stands. But they are not finished. They spent half of the match trying to one-up each other while performing one chant, over and over, louder and louder. From time to time, they get bored and start running around, kicking a ball that appeared out of nowhere, before resuming the single chant.

But the most memorable child, the most memorable thing about the whole day, is a little girl who is here with her parent. I’m not good at guessing the age of children under 6, but she was old enough to walk, talk and most importantly, climb. She was dressed for winter, complete with a pink jacket, pink gloves, and a pink beanie. And she was exploring. Somehow she made it down 4 steps/seats and wanted to come back. Because she is barely bigger than the steps, getting back involves climbing. I watch her lean in, put her hands on the step and lift her stubby little leg up and on. Then,  as she pushes herself up, she utters this unforgettable phrase: “Oh-choh-cohgi! Museoweo!” And each time she climbs a step, she says: “Oh-choh-cohgi!” The image of her climbing and “Oh-choh-cohgi!”-ing like an old woman will forever be stuck in my head. 

The match was fun, even if it was completely one-sided. Yeoncheon holds on bravely and finishes the first half only one goal down. But their inability to complete even simple short passes, and the keeper fumbling every time an attacker rushes him, lets them down completely. The first half ends with Pyeongchang United leading 0-1, but by the time the final whistle blows, they are 3 0-5 ahead. It's a fantastic start for Pyeongchang, but a nightmare first home match for Yeoncheon.

 2025.02.22 - Yeoncheon Sports Complex

Yeoncheon FC 0:5 Pyeongtaek United FC