The organizing committee for the 2024 Gangwon Winter Youth Olympics held an inauguration ceremony Monday for the Shine Crew, the nickname for the Games volunteer corps, with actors Lee Dong-wook and Park Jae-min appointed as honorary participants.

Fifty volunteers attended the event at the Seoul Olympic Parktel in southern Seoul on Monday, representing the 2,030-strong volunteer team that will help ensure the success of the Gangwon 2024 Games.


Volunteers will work for 18 days from Jan. 16, ahead of the Games’ start on Jan. 19, in a variety of roles assigned based on interviews, basic training performance and foreign language tests.

Lee Dong-wook, star of hit tvN drama “Guardian: The Lonely and Great God” (2016-17) and OCN and Netflix drama "Strangers from Hell" (2019), and Park Jae-min from 2022 film "Hansan: Rising Dragon" both attended the event alongside officials including Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Yoo In-chon, honorary volunteer leader and Gangwon Governor Kim Jin-tae and organizing committee co-chairs Choi Jong-ku, Jin Jong-oh and Lee Sang-hwa.

As well as his work as an actor, Park has also been involved in the Winter Olympics before. He worked as a commentator covering the snowboarding events for KBS during the 2018 PyeongChang Games.

"Volunteers are the first and most frequently encountered individuals by athletes and spectators seeking the Olympics,” Gangwon Governor Kim said during Monday’s ceremony. “You are the face of Asia's first Winter Youth Olympics.”

The 2024 Gangwon Youth Olympics will begin at venues across Gangwon on Jan. 19, with roughly 1,900 athletes from over 70 countries expected to take part.

Passes for all competitions are already available for free online. Tickets for the opening ceremony, the only event with paid access, are also available online.

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]