With Song Joong-ki’s eight-city China leg of Asian tour, scalpers would surely be earning big bucks from his fan meets with about $1,200 as the going price for good seats.
Korea Herald reports that for the “Happy Camp” guesting of Song Joong-ki on May 10-12, a front row seat at the studio costs $1,227 (8,000 yuan) if purchased from a scalper, according to Sina.com, a news website in China. A regular ticket costs $520 (3,400 yuan).
The minimum monthly wage in China ranges from as low as 850 yuan ($130) in Helongjiang Province for a District D employee to as high as 2,030 yuan ($311) in Shenzhen. That means for the lowest wage worker, it would take four months of salary to buy a regular seat at the fan meet, while even the highest-paid minimum wage earner would need to save also almost four months of his salary to afford the most expensive ticket.
If the “Happy Camp” scalped ticket prices are indicator, illegally sold tickets are likely to be beyond the reach of the ordinary Chinese minimum wage earner.
Unfortunately, unlike the Thailand fan meet where there was sufficient information about the venue and ticket prices from both Blossom Entertainment and Facebook fan pages, it is a different case for the China meet. There are no details about the venue and ticket prices even from Blossom Entertainment.
Song Joong kiTH, the actor’s fan page in Thailand, has a number of photos from the actor’s press conference in Beijing and some videos. The press conference has the MC speaking in Chinese and Song Joong-ki replying in Korean, with a female translator providing the audience the actor’s reply in Chinese.
Unlike “Descendants of the Sun” which had subtitles in various languages, including English, there is none for the China tour, so readers would just have to contend with photos and some videos. Even the YouTube Comments section have a number of fans clamoring for English subtitles to the Beijing press conference.