The lunchtime crowds drifted slowly back to their offices along central Seoul’s main boulevard, heads up and phones raised to the sky.
High above, a narrow ribbon ran between the Koreana hotel and the Dong-A Media Center, a few hundred metres from the capital’s famous Gyeongbokgung palace and Gwanghwamun square.
A countdown ticked down on a big screen, and at 1pm, a figure stepped off the roof of the Koreana and out over the drop.
Jaan Roose, an Estonian aerial athlete and three-time slackline world champion, was in Seoul to cross a 160-metre long highline suspended 120 metres above the city, in what organisers called South Korea’s first high-altitude slackline performance.
The 34-year-old has made a name for himself slacklining dramatic urban environments, such as his 185-metre high feat between Qatar’s Katara towers.
In 2024, he became the first person to slackline the strait of Messina between mainland Italy and Sicily, completing the 3.6km traverse despite a fall near the end, caught by his safety harness. Last month, he covered 14.7km over 12 hours on a line above the Danube in Bratislava, Slovakia.
Below Roose, the Seoul traffic kept moving and the crowd held its breath each time he wobbled.
“Just looking at him makes my legs go weak,” said Kim Young-sook, an office worker. “I can’t imagine how he can do that without being scared. It’s incredible.”
Midway across, Roose sat cross-legged on the line, then lay flat on his back, drawing gasps from below, before the daredevil rose and continued.
“I’m worried he might fall”, said Choi Eun-jung, who came out to see Roose. “I know he’s a professional, but it’s still a little frightening to watch.”
On reaching Dong-A Media Center, he turned around, and started his return to the hotel rooftop.
At the halfway point, he again dropped down and waved at the crowd. But this time he hung from the line with one arm and then dangled by his feet.
When he finished his performance, the crowds clapped, some clearly relieved.
At nearby Cheonggye plaza, people tried out their skills on slacklines, but these were set a mere 30cm and 50cm off the ground. Roose was scheduled for a second performance at 4pm.
Roose said a visit in 2022 to South Korea inspired his Gwanghwamun walk.
On that trip, Roose encountered jultagi, Korea’s traditional tightrope walking, which Unesco added to its list of intangible cultural heritage in 2011.
Unlike tightrope walking elsewhere, jultagi is as much comedy as acrobatics. The walker sings, jokes and dances on the rope, trading banter with a clown on the ground as musicians play.
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