Fan rice

Fan rice for idol band EXO

Fan rice, usually stacks of rice bags decorated with ribbons and photos, are gifts from K-pop fans to their favourite artists. The amount of donated rice can vary between a few kilograms and several tonnes.[1][2]

History

The first instance of fan-donated rice was at Shin Hye-sung's concert on 11 August 2007.[3][4][5] The trend started in the late 2000s when fans began to send food to their favorite music artists, and took off in 2011.[6] Today, there are entire businesses dedicated to the donation of fan rice in South Korea.[6]

Characteristics

Fans of K-pop buy bags of rice and donate them to their favorite artists. Before rice wreaths appeared, fans used to send flower bouquets. Rice is sorted out in 20 kg bags, arranged into 'towers' by dedicated companies who purchase the rice from local farmers and transport it to the venues according to the orders from the fan clubs. Fans often inscribe special or personal messages onto the bags or attach photos to them. Donating rice indicates that fans take greater social responsibility besides showing their respect and support to their favourite artists. Sending rice bags to venues have also appeared in Japan, as part of the K-pop wave.[1][7][2]

Largest fan rice donations

As of 2013, the record of fan rice donated for a celebrity event is held by the fan club of 2PM, where fans from different countries donated 28.088 tonnes of rice for their <What Time Is It> finale concert. [8]

For Rain's concert,The Best Show Tour, his Korean fan club "Cloud Korea" collectively donate 3.61 tons of rice to the hungry.

References

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 8/21/2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.