Street Festival

Buddha's Birthday

Buddha's birthday is a week long festival every spring. Bright colorful lanterns are hung through the streets and temples throughout the country, there are lantern parades in many towns on the second weekend, and people flock to the countryside temples to light incense and meditate. I made a trip up to one of the temples in the Insadong neighborhood of Seoul. The temple itself was gorgeous- covered in thousands of bright colorful lanterns. They had some traditional dance performances the weekend I was there as well. On the street just outside the temple there was a beautiful display of paper lanterns showing various Buddhist symbols and scenes of traditional festivities and more of these lanterns further down the way on pedestals in the river. Along the main street in Insadong they had a street festival with booths showing how to make paper lanterns and lotus flowers, selling Buddhist crafts and paintings, and various demonstrations. I particularly enjoyed the yoga and martial arts demonstrations. There were also games to play- many of the children were building tall towers of blocks and learning to make wishes on them and I was challenged to a game of Chinese checkers- I lost the first round but came back to win the second game, much to the delight of my high school opponents! Some of the monks from the temple had come out to do intricate sand paintings and many people were painting gold colored pagoda daranis and signing their name inside- another traditional wish making activity. There was apparently a lovely nighttime parade with all the lit lanterns that night, but I unfortunately had to give it a miss as I needed to catch an early bus back to my town that night so I could teach come morning. A bit of wishful thinking on my part actually as the buses were all full of festival goers and I ended up having to take a bus to another town and stay in a love motel there only to catch the early bus in the morning. Thus a bit hectic at the end, but a wonderful festival nonetheless.

Spring Picnic Day

Another fun day for the students each Spring and Fall is picnic day. Each grade level takes a day off from classes to go somewhere all together. The younger kids usually have a picnic at the park or something close by while the older kids can take a bus out to go hiking in the mountains or go to an amusement park. I went this time with the 4th graders. We walked together from the school to the stadium on the other side of town- a long walk for little legs! Once we got there, the classes split off with their teachers and played games or did little assignments like nature sketches and such for a little while. Then the kids were set free to eat their lunches that they'd brought with them and have some free time with their friends. Some pick up baseball and soccer games, but mostly jiggae, and a jacks game that the girls love to play. There were some cart vendors that had come and set up in the park where we were so many of the kids bought ice creams and sodas and small toys and such. I'm still not happy that they sell baby hamsters at those little carts as many of them don't make it through the day's heat and activities in their little plastic cups. But mostly the kids were buying little squirt guns and candies and I saw one student who had bought a big muppet looking marionette- very fun! After lunchtime, the classes split up again for a little more game time and then all the students came together for some big group games. A lot of charades, duck duck goose and relay games that I've seen before, but also some new games for me. One game that I'd never seen before was like a battle game- 2 kids were matched up and each had to hold one foot bent in front of them at about waist level and then hop around on their other foot trying to knock over their opponent. Crazy! But the kids loved it- and surprisingly no one was hurt. When we were all finished for the day, all the classes lined up to walk back to the school and head home. The kids were a lot of fun to hang out with and it was another nice day away from school.

Spring Sports Day

Every spring and fall each school in Korea stops classes for one day to bring all their students together for a fun day of sports. The initial warm-ups threw me a little- all 1000 students at my school lined up in neat orderly rows with their teacher at the lead and did choreographed stretching and warm up exercises. They looked like perfect tiny little soldiers lined up and following a routine led by a booming recorded voice with music playing in the background. It's difficult to explain, but it seemed a little like the videos of old socialist propaganda camps- maybe because of the music they were playing. The rest of the day was just like any normal kids sports event. They don't do any team sports or games, but each class comes together to compete in various different relays and races against the other classes in their grade. And of course, they have plenty of time to hang out with their friends between races. The kids really get into it; cheering on their friends and classmates. Parents, grandparents, and younger siblings sometimes come along to watch and cheer as well. One of the classes this time even made their own cheering rattles out of old water bottles and pebbles. It was a lot of fun and a nice change of pace from regular classes.

Springtime in Sangju

Winter was long this year- cold and snow for 4 months or so. I was sooo ready for Spring when it finally came. The sun came back out, weather started warming up, flowers started blooming, the gardens and rice fields were replanted and all the little insects came back out. It was beautiful! :)