Creator Igobart

Hi! Could you please introduce yourself to the readers of Visit Busan Magazine?

Hello, my name is Bart van Genugten from the Netherlands, but I’ve been calling Korea my second home for almost eight years now. I run the YouTube channel and Instagram page “iGoBart,” where I make docu-style vlogs about Korea’s history and culture.
People often describe me as the guy who introduces stories, places, and details in Korea that even locals don’t know about. My main project is called “Welcome to My Dong,” where I’m exploring all 467 neighborhoods of Seoul. Every neighborhood, no matter how small or overlooked, has its own beauty waiting to be uncovered. 135 done, a lot more to explore!
Thanks to this project, I was honored to receive Seoul’s Honorary Citizenship in 2024 and the Seoul City Influencer Award in 2025. Korea is a magnificent, deeply layered country that the world deserves to know, and I’m here to help with that. I couldn’t wish for a better second home.

You earned a master’s degree in Human Geography in the Netherlands, where you focused on conflict, territory, and identity. What inspired you to come to Korea after that?

After graduating, I worked for a year in the Netherlands before quitting my job to travel through East and Southeast Asia. My journey began in South Korea, and honestly, it was the best time of my life. I spent hours in singing rooms, flipping pork belly on the grill, and sipping more than my fair share of soju, only to recover the next morning with one of those magical convenience store hangover cures. Best time!
As my travels continued, I realized that no other country felt quite like Korea. By the end of my five months of backpacking, the thought of returning to the Netherlands felt like a bad dream. Instead, I extended my stay for a few more weeks in Korea, and that’s when I unexpectedly met my wife. The rest is history.

Your profile photo with the Taegeukgi, the national flag of the Republic of Korea, on your forehead really caught my eye.
Could you share the story behind it?

I was watching the 2022 World Cup somewhere on the west coast of South Korea with a group of other influencers. It was a kind of “healing” retreat. Both the Netherlands and Korea were competing, and as long as they didn’t play each other, I cheered for both. When Korea faced Portugal and surprisingly won 2–1, I couldn’t have been happier. To celebrate, I let someone draw the Korean flag on top of my bald head. I mean, as a baldy, there isn’t much I can do with my “hair,” but I can definitely use the surface for art. And what better moment than Korea beating football powerhouse Portugal in the World Cup to turn my head into a canvas?

What inspired you to create the ‘Welcome to My Dong’ series, where you explore the stories and character of different neighborhoods?
If you were to continue the series in Busan, where would you start—and what draws you to it?”

The reason is not that shocking. Even before I started the series, I felt that many places in Seoul were hugely underrepresented in the media and on other influencers’ platforms. There was a bit of an echo chamber online where the same trendy spots and landmarks kept being promoted again and again.
I have always loved walking around the city, especially into the unknown, and every single time I stumbled upon something fascinating, whether it was an old shop or restaurant, a plaque with a folk story, a mountain peak with history, or even a tree with bullet holes. There seemed to be no end to the stories hidden around Seoul. That is when I realized just how many layers this city has, and how little information was actually available about them.
So I came up with the idea to explore Seoul structurally, neighborhood by neighborhood, and uncover as many interesting stories as I could, hoping that maybe some people would be interested too. Luckily, that turned out to be the case. I just never foresaw how much work it would take to cover all 467 of them, but I am not giving up.
On YouTube I focus on longer, slower videos with more information, while Instagram is for quick, easy-to-consume stories about the city.
If I were to continue in Busan, I would start in the Tombstone Village. It is one of the most fascinating neighborhoods that Busan has, and it would be a very strong start for the Busan “Welcome to My Dong” series. It is literally a neighborhood built on top of tombstones from an old Japanese cemetery that was abandoned after liberation. When the Korean War broke out, refugees had no choice but to build their houses on the tombstones, using the stones themselves as construction material. Rituals were performed to appease the spirits, and even today you can still find traces of those tombstones inside walls, in the foundations, and all around the neighborhood. It is just fascinating.

What kind of city is Busan to you? If you had to describe Busan in just one word, what would it be, and why?

Resilience. Busan has overcome hardship and emerged stronger. It was the last stronghold during the Korean War, and much of the city was built by refugees who fled there. The soul of Busan is made of the blood, sweat, and tears of countless Koreans who endured and overcame tough times, from colonial rule to the Korean War and everything that came before and after.
Seoul gets most of the spotlight, but Busan is no less. In fact, it is one of the most exciting cities to explore. It has its own rhythm, with beaches, delicious seafood, and a dialect that you can recognize instantly. To me, Busan feels like a place where people are a bit more laid-back, enjoy the sun more, and are not completely caught up in the ppalli-ppalli culture that Korea is so famous for. It is a city where the sea breeze can truly heal your mind. You know the Korean flag, with the yin and yang? That is what Busan is to Seoul.

As a creator, what kind of stories would you like to share through Visit Busan in the future?

I want to uncover stories that make people say, “I’m local, but I didn’t know that.” Hearing that always brings me joy.