안녕하세요! I’m excited to introduce my fav new Korea-focused YouTubers and longtime friends who began their channel this year. Burger15 is an enticing new look at the tastiest food in Korea, at real restaurants and cafes, with real people and without gimmicks or glamour. Just two people eating delicious food and telling you about it. 

Who’s behind Burger15? 

We’re Sue and Aaron and we’re Burger15! We met two years ago during the Ewha Harvard summer school in South Korea. We were both interested in cultural exchange between Korea and America. Luckily we were language partners in the program, so we got close throughout the program.

안녕하세요! 저희는 버거십오입니다! 저희는 2년전에 이화-하버드 썸머스쿨에서 만났어요. 둘 다 한국과 미국사이에 문화 교류를 흥미롭게 생각했어요. 운이 좋게도 프로그램에서 언어교류파트너로 만났어요.

 

Why did you start Burger15?

We studied Film (Aaron) and Design (Sue) and wanted work on a creative project together focusing on something we love. We love food and YouTube videos, so naturally we wanted to put them together. Our goal is to make people hungry and appreciate good food. We know that there are a lot of food and mukbang videos, but we want to show people the best restaurants, without worrying about advertisements or fake posts. There’s nothing we hate more than food that looks good, but tastes bad (pretty garbage).

저희는 영화(애론)와 디자인(쑤)을 전공했는데요, 저희가 정말 좋아하는 것을 가지고 창의적인 프로젝트를 같이 만들어 보고싶었어요. 저희가 음식과 유투브를 정말 좋아하는데요. 그래서 자연스럽게 이 둘을 연결하지 않았나 싶어요. 사람들이 저희의 영상을 보고 배고파지고 좋은 음식을 먹고싶어지게 하는게 목표입니다. 음식 영상이나 먹방 영상이 많은데, 저희는 사람들이 광고나 협찬 없이 정말 좋은 식당들만 보여주고 싶습니다.

 

 

How did you choose the name?

Burger15 in Korean is (BeO-GeO-SHIP-eOH) 버거십오 which sounds like (Bo-go Ship-oh) 보고 싶어, which can mean I miss you or I want to see it. Also, burgers are Aaron’s favorite food. If you watch our videos you’ll see that Aaron loves puns…so much so that he made the entire channel one big pun.

한국어로 ‘Burger15’는 ‘버거십오’ 읽는데, ‘보고싶어’와 비슷하게 들려요. 한국어로 ‘보고싶어(그리워)’ 혹은 ‘보고싶어(~를 보고싶어)’ 이런 뜻이 되죠. 그리고 햄버거는 그냥 애론이 제일 좋아하는 음식이에요. 비디오를 보면 순전히 애론때문에 언어유희가 많이 나오는데 제목까지 그렇게 됐네요.

 

What are your long-term goals for Burger15? Do you want to do collaborations with other Youtubers or develop it into a full-time job? 

We’d love to turn it into a full-time job. We want to not only show people food, but all the wonderful parts of traveling. In Korea, we felt like most people know or travel NY and LA a lot but not the rest. We want to introduce other beautiful cities in the States that we saw on our road trip crossing over 35 cities. We want to collaborate with other creators, and intend to with our friends like you (Jamie/서울드림) and KennieJD or even people like Aaron’s friend, MikeDiva.

풀타임 유투브가 되면 좋겠죠. 음식뿐만 아니라 여행으로도 좋은 곳들을 소개하고 싶어요! 특히 한국에서는 대부분 뉴욕 혹은 LA를 잘 아시지만 다른 도시들은 여행을 많이 안하시는거 같더라고요. 저희가 작년에 미국에서 로드트립을 하면서 35개 도시를 넘게 횡단했는데, 그때 봐뒀던 다른 아름다운 도시들도 소개해드리고 싶어요. 당연히 기회만 된다면, 다른 크리에이터분들과 콜라보레이션을 해보고싶습니다. 인터뷰해주시는 제이미랑 KennieJD랑 애론의 친구분인  MikeDiva 등등 기회가 되면 좋겠어요.

There actually is an old vlog with Aaron, Kendall, and me – on KennieJD’s channel when I arrived in Seoul for summer 2015 and we met up in Hongdae. I went straight from the plane to meet them, so don’t judge my 외모… ㅠㅠ 

 

How do you pick a place or food to make a video?

For picking places, we only show places we truly love and want to share. So we’ll generally go somewhere once or twice before deciding to show it. We consider the atmosphere, food, pricing, and even the ownership (we love helping out good people).

소개할 식당을 고를때 저희가 정말 아끼고 좋아하는 곳을 소개해요. 한두번 가본식당보다 저희가 재작년 작년부터 단골로 다녔던 식당들이에요!

 

Any YouTubers that you look up to or would want to collab with?

We really enjoy a lot of YouTubers, so we are subscribed to a bunch, but as far as big names we look up to 영국남자 and CaseyNeistat, so maybe someday we’ll get there! We also love Wootso as well!

유투브를 많이 보는 편이라 정말 많은 유투브들의 채널을 구독중인데요! 큰 채널중에 영국남자와 CaseyNeistat을 오래전부터 구독했고 롤모델로 삼고있어요. 열심히 하다보면 언젠가 그렇게 될수 있지 않을까하는 소망이에요.

 

Weirdest or funniest moment while filming Burger15?

Because Aaron is a foreigner living in Seoul, many people ask him things like where he’s from and things like that in English. One time when Aaron was ordering, the server asked him things like, “Where are you from and what are you doing in Korea?” in English, and Aaron responded in Korean. Aaron can carry out daily conversations in Korean, but they tried to be considerate and speak in English to him. As a third person watching it, it’s really funny to watch a foreigner speaking Korean and the Korean person responding in English.

애론이 외국인으로 서울에 있다보니 많은 분들이 관심을 가져주시고 어디서 왔냐고 영어로 물어봐주시기도 하고 그래요. 한번은 주문하는데 애론한테 어디서 왔는지 한국에서 뭐하는지 등등 대화를 이어 가셨는데, 애론은 한국어로 말하고 한국분은 영어로 말하셔서 이상한(?) 모습이 연출되어서 재밌었던 기억이 나요. 애론이 일상적인 대화가 한국어로 가능함에도 불구하고 대부분 영어로 대화를 이어가시더라고요. 배려하시는거겠지만 제3자가 보기에는 외국인은 한국어로하고 한국분은 영어로 말하는 광경이 재밌었던거 같아요.

 

Anything else you want to say to your followers?

We want our videos to reach both Koreans and English speakers, that way they can be used as a fun tool for learning!

---

 

If you’re studying Korean or English, Burger15 has subtitles in both languages. Subscribe to Burger15’s YouTube Channel and like them on Facebook! You can also follow on Twitter and Instagram. #socialmediaguru 

Special thanks to Aaron and Sue for doing this interview and providing their answers in both English and Korean. 버거15 화이팅!!