"It Was A Very Good Year"

Happy 2010!

Koreans celebrate solar new year on January 1st - aslo called Yang-nyeok Seollal (양력설날) or more commonly: Seollal (설날)

Korean New Year is typically a family-oriented holiday. The three-day holiday is used by many to return to their home towns to visit their parents and other relatives where they perform the ancestral ritual known as charye (차례) (worshiping of ancestors). Many Koreans dress up in colorful hanbok. Tteokguk (떡국) (soup with rice cakes) is commonly served.

Many Koreans greet the New Year (both Western and lunar) by visiting East coast locations such as Gangneung and Donghae in Gangwon province, where they are most likely to see the first rays of the New Year's sun.

Near city hall, selected people in Seoul help to literally "ring in" the new year by ringing the toll bell at Bosingak. People from all over come to see and hear it as the clock ticks down the seconds until the New Year. It is similar to seeing the ball drop in Times Square. People in the streets shoot off roman candles and other fireworks too (which is now illegal to do so, but the police can't enforce it).

 

My New Years was relatively quiet. I originally wanted to go into Seoul, but then did some more research into what the experience would entail. It was going to be -13 degrees Celsius, windy, and wall-to-wall people cramming every nook and cranny within a half mile of the main event site.  Last year there were protests against the much disliked president Lee Myung-Bak, and riot police were called out creating a panic. (I didn't want to ring in the New Year by being cold, uncomfortable, and possibly trampled to death).

Instead, Hwayoung and I had dinner and watched a The Blind Side. Maybe next year we'll stake out a coffee shop closer to Bosingak to watch the festivities.

Here's a video I put together about 2009: A Year in Review