Senior civil servants parody viral music video to promote Yeongju ginseng festival

Deputy mayor and 60 senior officials star in clip

Shot in 20 minutes with no rehearsal

A scene from the promotional video for the 2026 Yeongju Punggi Ginseng Festival. [Yeongju City/Newsis]

A quirky promotional video produced by Yeongju City in North Gyeongsang Province to advertise a local festival has gone viral online.

Senior city hall officials starred in the clip, performing a group dance modeled on the hit music video "STORM II" — and they pulled it off in just 20 minutes with no prior rehearsal.

According to Yeongju City on Wednesday, the city released a series of promotional videos ahead of the 2026 Yeongju Punggi Ginseng Festival, which opens Saturday.

The Punggi Ginseng Festival video opens with a middle-aged man in a white dress shirt and tie taking a bite out of a fresh Punggi ginseng root.

Behind him, dozens of people dressed in matching black stand in rows on a staircase. As the man in white — ginseng in hand — takes his place at the center of the group, everyone begins moving to the music. A sign in the back row reads, "If you're feeling sluggish, come to Punggi."

The video parodies "STORM II" by French producer GENER8ION, whose original music video carries an anti-drug message.

The man who appears first in the Yeongju parody is Deputy Mayor Eom Tae-hyeon, and the roughly 60 group dancers are city hall officials at the Grade 5 level or above.

The dancers did not prepare special costumes for the shoot. They wore the black uniforms they normally use during emergency wildfire duty.

There was also no advance rehearsal. Officials were told about the shoot immediately after a morning senior staff meeting and went straight in front of the camera. The entire shoot took about 20 minutes.

The idea for the video came from a Grade 6 employee in the city's public relations office.

An earlier promotional video for the Punggi Ginseng Festival also drew attention.

A scene from the promotional video for the 2026 Yeongju Punggi Ginseng Festival. [Yeongju City]

Titled "Where Did You Dig That Up?", the earlier video parodies the "Siren's Song" scene from the film "Odyssey." In it, a man is tied to a ship's mast and listens to the song of "Samiren" — a ginseng-shaped siren character created for the festival.

The ginseng-shaped Samiren sings, "Come to Punggi, take home a root of ginseng," and the man cries out, "I found it!" — a traditional Korean exclamation used when unearthing ginseng.

"Government agencies need to reach citizens in fresher, more entertaining ways to keep up with the changing media environment," a city official said. "We will continue to put out a variety of content that captures public attention and resonates with people."

Meanwhile, the 2026 Yeongju Punggi Ginseng Festival runs for nine days from Saturday through Oct. 11 along Namwoncheon stream and at the Punggi Ginseng Culture Pop-up Park in Punggi-eup, Yeongju.

This year's festival, held under the theme "My Strength, My Life," will feature a range of events and hands-on experiences showcasing Punggi ginseng.

Also opening Saturday, the 2026 Yeongju Museom Stepping-Stone Bridge Festival runs for two days through Sunday at Museom Village in Munsu-myeon, Yeongju.

A variety of programs centered on the village's iconic single-log bridge are planned to highlight Yeongju's traditions and local culture.

jshan@heraldcorp.com