Recruiting 'Jongno Travelers (Yeohengja)' Seeking Happiness

Jongno-gu Operates 'Jongno Travel' (Yeoheng: Together Happiness) Program to Spread Local Happiness Consensus... Accepting Applications from First 40 Residents, University Students, and Workers Living in Jongno-gu

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jong-il] Jongno-gu (District Mayor Kim Young-jong) is conducting the resident participation program 'Jongno Travel (與幸: Together Happiness)' every Wednesday from May 20 to July 8 to spread a sense of happiness in the community and is recruiting participants.

Composed of special lectures, on-site workshops, and group campaigns, Jongno Travel was planned to discover happiness practice tasks led by residents, promote them in the local community, and invigorate a happy atmosphere throughout the district.

The program is open to 40 people on a first-come, first-served basis, including residents or university students and workers living in Jongno-gu. Those who wish to apply can register by phone through the Health City Division Happiness Dream Team at Jongno-gu Office.

Also, from April, applications can be submitted through integrated applications on the Jongno-gu Office website or by commenting on the official Jongno-gu blog.

Participants will form five groups and participate in the sequence of ▲Dreaming of Travel ▲Making Companions ▲Excitement for Travel ▲Preparing for Travel ▲Enjoying Travel ▲Sharing Travel, as if they were on a journey.

In ‘Dreaming of Travel,’ participants share happiness experiences and attend orientation, and in ‘Making Companions,’ they attend happiness special lectures and explore happiness for themselves and Jongno-gu.

In ‘Excitement for Travel,’ participants go on field trips to various places in the district to find happiness cases, and through ‘Preparing for Travel,’ they have planning time to prepare for the happiness sharing campaign. In ‘Enjoying Travel,’ they actively practice and share happiness through campaigns, and finally, in ‘Sharing Travel,’ they share the results of their activities and participate in a completion ceremony to conclude the grand journey. However, the program schedule may be adjusted depending on the COVID-19 situation.

Since 2015, Jongno-gu has been conducting the ‘Jongno Happiness Dream Project’ to discuss, empathize, and implement happiness in Jongno with residents. On January 1, 2015, it established the nation’s first dedicated happiness team, the ‘Happiness Dream Team,’ and recruited cooperative resident partners called ‘Happiness Dream Leaders’ to lead resident participation in policy proposals for happiness promotion, deriving local issues and alternatives, and community activities.

▲The happiness practice expansion campaign ‘Finding Happiness’ ▲The ‘Jongno Happiness Dream Boomerang Project’ linked with socially responsible companies ▲The open conference for a happy Jongno ‘Jongno Happiness Imagination Table’ ▲The project ‘Introducing Our Happy Neighbors’ to discover residents’ happy stories all demonstrate that the district has drawn the blueprint for happiness policies and carried out all processes with residents, building great empathy and trust.

Furthermore, based on these processes, the discourse on ‘how to make residents happier’ was deemed essential, and it was concluded that there must be basic principles for future initiatives to ensure the continuous promotion of happiness policies.

Accordingly, a bill containing the effectiveness of happiness-related policy projects and the direction of resident-led policies was proposed, which is the ‘Seoul Special City Jongno-gu Resident Happiness Promotion Ordinance,’ the first of its kind among Seoul’s autonomous districts.

In addition, Jongno-gu has continuously attempted to diagnose the current status of happiness in Jongno and build a solid consensus with residents by developing the ‘Jongno Happiness Index’ through Seoul’s resident participation budget.

District Mayor Kim Young-jong stated, “We prioritize resident happiness and safety as the top values of local autonomy and strive to create a community where all residents are equally happy,” adding, “I recommend participating in this ‘Jongno Travel (與幸: Together Happiness)’ program to learn about happiness, share it, and have a meaningful time to share it again through the community.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.