Seollal, the Lunar New Year

In South Korea, the Lunar New Year is called Seollal. For most, it's a family-oriented holiday. There's a massive exodus with massive amounts of traffic in the days before Seollal as people head home to their families.

I was pretty excited to be here in Korea during this uniquely Asian celebration, and went out looking for festivities on the day before and the day of (the 23rd of January.) I didn't find much, but was rewarded in a few places.

The day before, a couple of friends and I went to the nearest large city, Daegu. We talked to a tourist helper lady who said there might be celebrations going on in some of the city's parks. So we went to a couple of parks. We saw traditional games being played and were even instructed on their rules.

A popular game involving four sticks that you throw and a gameboard with pieces you move around

 

A boy whips a dreidel/top thing to keep it spinning as long as possible

Gamepieces

This vase with sticks in it is another game. You get all the sticks out and go stand behind a line. Then you start throwing the sticks at the vase, hoping some of them get into the holes (which are worth different amounts of points.)

The throwing-blocks game and another dreidel thing being whipped

Hoop & stick

Also, we were encouraged to write a wish for the new year on a bright piece of paper to be hung with other people's wishes.

Writing wishes

My wish for the new year, with wishes written in Hangul and Japanese hanging all around it

Koreans are generous people who give gifts for many, many occasions - our landlord often gives us fresh fruit and bottled beverages, maybe because we're in a business relationship with him - and shops carry gift boxes full of bottled drinks year-round. They stocked up on extras for Seollal.

Red and green gift boxes of drinks

Other places had gift boxes of oranges, apples, and Asian pears. 

Gifty fruits

More gifty fruits

The lady in the red coat saw me taking pictures of her gifty fruits and kindly invited me inside to take a picture of her and her friend

One thing that struck me in my travels was how many people were carrying gift bags. 

At the train station the night before Seollal

Busy streetcorner on Seollal

Another gift on Seollal. And a Lotteria, which is a lot like McDonalds.

One Seollal tradition, mostly involving children, I think, is the wearing of Hanbok. I really wanted to see people wearing this traditional clothing, but almost no one was out in public dressed that way.

Hanbok and a hoodie

On the 23rd, I went out exploring on a route that took me half a mile from our apartment to the gate of Camp Carroll, then back in the opposite direction maybe two miles to an area where I thought I might find a park and where I'd heard there was a Buddhist temple, then into Downtown Waegwan. 

Closed for the holiday

I managed to find the temple, and that's where the most exciting part of my Seollal happened.

There actually wasn't much to see at this temple.

The temple

Light inside

A fountain and a shrine

Ice in the bowls (it was cold outside) and someone left a 1000 won bill under a bottle

When the exciting thing happened, I had been taking pictures for a little while. There weren't many people at the temple. I was done taking pictures and didn't really want to leave yet without something more interesting happening. 

There was a building that looked like it might be where the monks lived. So I stood at the top of a stairway near the building, looking around, just standing there waiting for one of the temple people to do something, even though they were all inside. I actually didn't have to wait very long. A Korean lady, probably in her 40's or 50's, approached and motioned as if she was eating, and asked me, "You eat?" or something like that. I felt pretty awkward now that my plan had actually worked, and said, "Okay, thank you," and she led me inside the building that looked like it might be where the monks lived, into an empty room with Korean-style tables. I sat at a table on a cushion on the floor, and she brought me a plate of kimchi, bean sprouts, and something I couldn't identify. 

And then, she brought me the soup. I started saying, "Oh! Thank you!" because I was SUPER EXCITED because I recognized it as Tteok guk, a soup traditionally served on Seollal. She told me what it was, and I thanked her profusely, then she left me alone to eat.

Tteok guk (the soup in the stainless steel bowl with seaweed on top of it.) And the bright red stuff is kimchi.

The white things in the soup are thinly sliced cakes ("Tteok") made from rice flour dough. The dough is shaped into long cylinders, almost like short, very fat noodles, and sliced into pieces, then boiled in broth to make this lucky Seollal dish. It tasted very much like chicken and dumplings, without the chicken. I ate maybe half of my soup (but no seaweed) and everything on the plate (except the kimchi.) I took pictures of the room.

Some floor-cushions on a shelf, and the doorway to a kitchen

After my initial excitement, I spent most of my eating time wondering whether I should leave money. I decided not to. You don't even leave tips here in Korea; paying for a meal offered out of kindness seemed ridiculous.

A man I'd seen on the grounds entered the room around the time I was done eating, so I stood up with my plate and bowl to show I was done and was trying to help clean up, then bowed and thanked him and left. I was so happy.

For the Seollal finale, I bought a package of dried things which I had seen in a video about Seollal and which I thought were traditional holiday food. I don't know for sure if they're traditional holiday food or not, but I do know that they're pretty gross. They were dried persimmons, called "gotgam" in Korean.

Yeah, I took this picture.

They were mushy and sweet and would have been like candy 100 years ago but are now kinda ew because we have real candy. That white stuff on some of them, I thought it was mold, but Joe said it was fruit sugar that had risen to the surface of the persimmon as it dried. Turns out he was right.

I was a little disappointed that I didn't get to see any celebrations or many Hanbok, but that soup made all the exploring time totally worth it. (Of course, exploring is an experience in itself...but...I got to eat some tradition!)