Meddiebempsters Invading Korea!
Meddies look to first overseas tour in forty years
While it is not unusual for college students to be looking forward to winter break, the Bowdoin College Meddiebempsters have an exciting and unique reason to keep watching the calendar. In early January, for the first time in forty years, the Meddies will pack their passports for a tour as they travel to Korea for a week and a half of performances for service personnel abroad.
With this support, the Meddies will have the thrill of performing in the Embassy in Seoul as well as at the military bases on the peninsula.
The Meddies have recently begun to establish a tradition of traveling to the home regions of members to perform on tours. While these tours usually take them up and down the east coast, and occasionally to the west coast, the upcoming graduation of Seoul resident Josh Chung M'01 is cause for a tour of somewhat more unique proportions.
The Meddiebempsters have been fortunate enough to gain the support of former Korean Ambassador and current Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Christopher Hill, a 1974 graduate of the College. With this support, the Meddiebempsters will have the thrill of performing in the Embassy in Seoul as well as at the military bases on the peninsula.
Plans are also in the works for performances for Bowdoin alumni in the region as well as for local students at schools.
The Meddiebempsters have a long and storied history of travel abroad. Between 1948 and 1965, the Meddies made no fewer than eight trips to Europe as representatives of the USO, performing dozens of concerts for American GIs stationed across the Atlantic. During one of these tours, members of the group arrived in Berlin via the famous airlift, while another tour found a few members singing to Russian border guards. Since that last 1965 tour, the Meddiebempsters have not made an overseas trip as a complete group.
For more information regarding this tour, contact Will Hales M'08.