"This is the New Year"

Happy New Year! 

새해 복 많이 받으세요!

Wait....isn't New Year on January 1st??

True, but in Korea they also celebrate the new year based on the lunar calendar (aka Chinese New Year).

" Korean New Year, commonly known as Seolnal (or Seollal) (Hangul: 설날), is the first day of the lunar calendar. It is the most important of the traditional Korean holidays. It consists of a period of celebrations, starting on New Year's Day. Koreans also celebrate solar New Year's Day on January 1 each year, following the Gregorian Calendar. The Korean New Year holidays last three days, and is considered a more important holiday than the solar New Year's Day."- Wikipedia

Basically, everything in Korea closes as people head home to visit their parents, play games, eat a ton, receive money from their parents and grandparents, and listen to words of advice from their elders about how to live their lives for the next year: (get a better job, get married, have kids, -- etc).

Some people dress up in hanbok's (the traditional colorful outfits)

Eat tteokguk (떡국) (soup with rice cake)....

and later in the day, the family may play some traditional games such as yutnori (윷놀이)

 

As for me, I'm just staying in my apartment today and watching movies! Maybe next year I'll get to experience the New Year first hand with a Korean family.

Maybe.

"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