As the awards ceremony especially takes into account those who help spread Hallyu and work towards the progress of Korean culture, he mentioned how proud he is that Korean culture has become much more widespread. One of the examples he brought up was the recent KBS 2TV's 'Music Bank in Mexico' special, where fans threw underwear at EXO during their performance.

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Shin Dong Yup picked up the Prime Minister's Award during the awards ceremony held on the 17th and shared, "I'm really thankful for this award. When I traveled overseas once 25 years ago, I had the experience of becoming emotional by the sight of a car from our nation. But now that has become a common sighting... In the past, when I heard that the Korean female audience threw underwear [onto the stage] when a foreign artist came to Korea for a concert, I didn't think too much about it. But upon hearing that international female fans threw their underwear during EXO's stage when our nation's artists recently held a concert in Mexico, I felt very pleased and proud, and even almost shed tears," as the audience laughed. 

He humbly wrapped up his speech saying, "The rise of our nation is thanks to the many sunbaenims [before us]. I thank you all."