Lunar New Year

Well, as you can see, I didn't quite get to my post about Lunar New Year over the weekend. I was originally going to have a nice quiet weekend at home, just me, grading papers and watching movies. The perfect time to update my blog. The plans changed on Friday afternoon. I ended up going into Seoul on Saturday with friends from church. We went to Itaewon, which is a very "American" neighborhood with lots of American restaurants and shopping geared for foreigners. We also went to Times Square in Seoul, which is basically a big shopping mall. We needed to escape the cold after being outside for several hours. It was a great time with friends, but I was tired by the time I got back to my apartment. And I still had grading to do on Sunday! It's a good thing my blog readers will forgive a few days tardiness.

Itaewon:


Times Square:



Inside Times Square:






Now, on to Lunar New Year. This is the major holiday in the Korean calendar. This holiday goes back centuries to when Korea (like China) followed a lunar calendar. It is the same holiday as Chinese New Year, but the two countries celebrate it differently. While the Chinese holiday lasts for a couple weeks and is filled with fireworks and parties, the Korean version is shorter more sedate. The holiday lasts three days; the day in the middle is the actual holiday and the two days on each side are travel days. That's right, they set aside days specifically for travel. That also means that it is a horrible time to travel around Korea, as most of the country is on the roads at that time. You see, most Koreans travel to see family for Lunar New Year. As a result, sons and daughters (with their own families) are descending on their parents' house. The travel problem is exacerbated by the fact that Korea is such a small country. With 48 million people squeezed into a country the size of Indiana, you will run into travel problems whenever a large percentage decides to travel at the same time. The holiday just exaggerates that trouble, making it difficult to go anywhere in a car during the prime holiday travel hours. On the Saturday of Lunar New Year weekend (the first travel day), I was riding with some friends to go out to eat, and it took us about twice as long to get to the restaurant as it normally would have, and the drive normally only takes about 10 minutes. It was craziness, and we never even left our neighborhood!

Anyway, Lunar New Year is a big holiday for family, kind of like Christmas and Thanksgiving all rolled into one. There are special Korean dishes that they eat for the new year. Traditionally, there are also sacrifices to the gods, but that was before Christianity arrived in the country. Some parts of the traditional Lunar New Year celebration still cater to that tradition, but it has lost most of the religious aspect. Another traditional component to Lunar New Year is that the grandparents give money to the children, which is something that all the kids look forward to. I had some students wish they were going to their grandparents' house so they could get money. While there are other details about the holiday (some of which I'm not even sure about), the important thing about the holiday is that families get together to celebrate the start of the new year.