A restaurant near the burial site of late actor Choi Bool Am has drawn criticism online after using news of his interment to promote free drinks, reigniting debate over how public grief should be handled after a beloved star’s death.
The restaurant, a camping barbecue business in Tanhyeon-myeon, Paju, posted on its official Instagram account on November 1, according to Sports Seoul. The post said Choi would be laid to rest in its neighbourhood the following day, described him as a warm, neighbour-like figure who had long been a positive influence, and said the restaurant was grateful and honoured that he would rest in the area.
The controversy centred on what followed. The post announced that, during a memorial period from November 2 to November 8, visitors would receive one free bottle of soju and one free beer. It also included the restaurant’s phone number and address along with promotional hashtags and search terms naming Choi and his burial site.
As the post spread, some social media users questioned whether a funeral should be used as a promotional tool. Comments cited by Sports Seoul asked whether it was right to advertise using someone else’s grief, said linking mourning to shop promotion looked inappropriate, and suggested the post should be taken down.
The restaurant responded with a separate post on November 2. It said the owners were long-time fans of Choi who were deeply saddened by his death, and that they had posted out of pride that his resting place was in their neighbourhood, not to gain business advantage. Their response also said, in effect, that people who viewed the post negatively were politely declined as customers, a remark that, according to Sports Seoul, kept the controversy from settling.
The report did not cite a response from Choi’s family. Choi died on October 29 at a hospital in Seoul at the age of 87, known to generations as Detective Ban Young Han in “Chief Inspector” and Chairman Kim in “Country Diaries,” and posthumously awarded the Gold Crown Order of Cultural Merit.
What the restaurant presented as a neighbourhood farewell was read by critics as a promotion, and the gap between those two readings is now the story itself, with no sign yet that the online argument has run its course.
