President Yoon Seok-yeol and his wife, Kim Gun-hee, showed off their retired guide dog, Sae-Rom, who they adopted last December, at the presidential office in 메이저사이트Hannam-dong, Seoul, on a broadcast today (Aug. 28).
SBS program “TV Animal Farm” covered the life of a guide dog for the blind in today’s broadcast, introducing the Yuns and their dog Sae-Rom as he played in the presidential residence’s yard.
Sae-rom, a 2013-born Labrador retriever, is a retired guide dog who lived with blind Kim Han-sook for more than six years, and was adopted by President and Mrs. Yoon as their 11th pet last Christmas.
“Hello, I’m Yoon Seok-yeol, dad to Sarom, Marie, Sunny and Tori,” President Yoon said on the broadcast, while Mrs. Kim said, “I’m Kim Gun-hee, their mom.”
“When I was a candidate, I went to a guide dog school in Yongin, and I said, ‘If I get elected (to the presidency) and go to the official residence with a yard, I want to have a retirement guide dog,’ and I adopted him into our family on Christmas Day last year,” President Yoon explained.
“All the dogs and cats like him a lot more (than my mom),” Kim said.
Yoon then laughed, saying, “(Mrs. Kim) likes to train, so she’ll do right paw, left paw, and so on, and if I don’t feed her and keep training her, she’ll run to me and just ask for it.”
There was also footage of Yoon in the kitchen making food for the dogs, saying, “This is good for me to eat,” and “Sarom eats slowly.”
They have other pets, but Sarom was the star of the show.
In addition to Sae-Rom, the Yoon family currently has five dogs (Tori, Narae, Mari, Sunny, and Ollie) and five cats (Sae-Rang, Butterfly, Yellow, Kiwi, and White), totaling 11 pets.
When asked why he has so many pets, President Yoon trailed off, “Well, I don’t think there’s any particular reason…”.
“That’s actually something I have to tell you,” Mrs. Kim recalled, “He had a child and then lost him, and it was very difficult for him psychologically, but when he adopted a stray dog, he liked it so much, and he forgot about the pain for a while because he thought about feeding his children.”
“Originally, I was supposed to be a temporary caretaker for (the stray dog), but after a day, I realized I had to keep it,” he said, adding, “It just kept growing because of my dad.”
“There are many dogs that serve special purposes, and since they serve the country and society, I think it’s right that the country and society should pay for a certain part of their medical treatment,” Yoon said, “so that it’s easier to adopt them and accompany them.”
When asked if they would come up with a policy during their term, they replied, “We will try.”
“Don’t buy, adopt,” President and Mrs. Yoon told viewers at the end of the broadcast.