This summer I attended my first Suwon baseball game in South Korea. It was a blast with that familiar American feeling with the bizarre Korean twists that I’ve come to expect when doing anything ‘American’ in this country.
The best of times, the worst of times
Best Part – No mark up on food and beer! With large cups of beer for 6,000 won, and a wide variety of food at standard Korean prices, eating at the parking isn’t going to break the bank.
Second Best Part – They have unique chants for each player which they are able to switch between seemingly without hesitation, which is quite impressive (*see second worst part)
- Also pretty cool, got to meet Wes Benjamin (the new relief pitcher for the kt wiz from the US) after the game as he was signing balls and shirts. It was neat to see the team is so assessable and he was extremely kind, making sure even got something signed.
Worst Part – The Koreans stand up for the whole time their team is batting, and likely you will have to as well if you don’t have the front seats in your section in order to see the game.
Second Worst Part – the chanting will continue non-stop all game
There is a wide variety of fairly priced foods and drinks – with venders like chicken shops, pizza chains, snacks food venders with products ranging from dried squid to popcorn, convenience stores, and coffee, beer and slushy venders. Many of the venders are big brand chains such as BBQ chicken company that sells fried chicken at the same rate in the park as outside! The convenience stores are likewise normally priced.
The store selling jerseys and other KT wiz goods is located on the outside of the entrance of the park, with jerseys at roughly 65,000 won and small plastic bats used for chanting at 20,000 won. They mark your hand with an invisible ink, and you still have half of your ticket so you can exit the park to go to the shop, and then re-enter.
Park and Ticket Information
Suwon KT Wiz Park
경기 수원시 장안구 경수대로 893 수원종합운동장(주경기장)
775 Jowon-dong Jangan-gu, Suwon-si Gyeonggi-do
Tickets can be purchased online or in person at the stadium. The online booking process requires a Korean back account for online purchases, or card/cash for in person booking.
- If you don’t have a korean bank account, you can (1) have a friend book for you online and you just need the confirmation number and their date of birth to get the tickets from the machine or (2) You can create an account on ktwiz to look at available tickets to describe the exact seats you want to the ticket booth worker.
- 9 ticket limit per person
- Like in the US, the home team is on the first baseline
- Tickets aren’t checked for seating for most seats, so you are able to wander to new seats once the game has started if you so chose.
*YOU MUST RESERVE PARKING*
While logically if you have your ticket bought you have parking, but in fact you must go through a separate process for booking your parking spot at the facility.
The parking application is found on a separate website, and you click “예약하기” to start the application, then select the game date, input your car liseance plate number, and then write your phone number. You have to prepay the parking fee, so korean bank account will be needed here as well. Parking reservation opens 7 days before the game day, but does book out for some games!
When I went we hadn’t realized that there is a parking process and they let us in anyways saying “you are foreigners so you didn’t know” – but it seems likely to me that the lot wasn’t fully booked and that’s why we were allowed in. I would advise making a booking to be safe!
Booking a ticket online
- Go to the ktwiz website ticket reservation page , selecting the tab “티켓 예매” and click the ticket line.co.kr link – This site cant be searched you have to first find it on the kiwis website
- Create an account on the kt wiz site
- Select the game you would like to reserve – in the case there is a special event there maybe an initial selection menu and you will want to select 2023 kt win 정규리그 (regular season). Games are able to be booked 9-10 days in advance. Displayed in this selection screen is also the start time and date for when future games will be available for purchase.
- The select your section, click next, and then select your seat(s).
- Then a complex slection pops up for picking your type of payment – they offer discounts for membership as well and other discounts. The first option “일반” means regular and put the number of tickets you want to that pay way.
- Then you check out using a korean bank account
Ticket Information and Options
Weekend tickets range in price from 9,000 won to 160,000 won, with the majority of the tickets being priced near 20,000 won. While there are ‘normal’ bucket seats occupying the majority of the park, there are table seats in the outfield and in select infield areas. These seats are the Korean flare that lets you enjoy the game with a full meal spread in front of you.
We had a great time! I hope you do too!
-Aurora
