Recently, there has been a lot of light on Korea because of the supposed “new era for Korea” that has restored hope for a lot of people that there may be an end to the war between North and South Korea. The recent summit between the two had both leaders stepping over the border into both Koreas as a gesture of friendship. The world has been keeping its eyes on the Korean peninsula waiting to see something change and results from the summit to finally show. Some people are waiting for North Korea to show its true colors and revert back to its war mongering ways.

While many see the new advancements in Korea as a new step towards the direction of denuclearization of Korea, many others think it’s a ploy for North Korea to get foreign aid from other countries. However, support for unification isn’t just from the rest of world. Support comes from both Koreas themselves as players and citizens of the different Koreas embrace each other. At the world championship of Table Tennis, North and South Korea were set to face against each other, but instead of playing it out both teams declared unification and that their team would merge as one. This had support of all other teams in the championship and officials.

The players and staff posed in pictures together and for the first time in what seems like forever went on to the next match as Korea.

In the Olympics North and South Korean athletes marched under one flag featuring a white background with a whole blue Korea in the middle. This new flag is a symbol that supports unity. The Table Tennis team also brought out one of these flags after declaring unification. This flag is a universal symbol that Korean people are using for hope to have a unified Korea. Instead of stiff unfeeling looks towards each other, Koreans look happy and hopeful that the Korean Peninsula might once again be united under one flag.

Despite these picturesque photos and all the talk of a new moment in history, not everybody is participating in rejoice for the movements. Some critics of these new promises say that this is something North Korea has done before and didn’t follow through. They say that North Korea has promised to denuclearize before and broke that promise not long after, which is true. North Korea also had previously made talks of peace before but backed out shortly after.

Theorists have also talked about how Kim Jong Un wants to remain in power and won’t agree to give up his power over unifying Korea. They also think that he is only looking like he wants to unify Korea just to get foreign aid of food, money, and more just to keep his country alive. Another thing mentioned by people is the fact that just a few months ago, Trump and Kim Jong Un were trigger happy and ready for war. North Korea was also full speed in its missile launch tests and now all of a sudden the idea of peace and demilitarization appeared to be reachable.

The future of Korea and the world is uncertain, but the hope for unification of Korea is bright as ever. The direction of Korea looks as though there will be peace and after that maybe one Korea, however, sight can be deceiving and there may be another, more dark path for Korea that lies ahead. Nobody can be certain where Korea will end up in the coming months or years, but one thing is for sure, there will be change in Korea, whether that be one Korea united or one Korea that took out the other. Everybody hope the latter will happen, as they should, but should also be prepared to be disappointed in the outcome.