Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Customs in Celebrating New Year in Korea

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). 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.


Sebae

Sebae is a traditionally observed activity on Seollal, and is filial-piety-orientated. Children wish their parents a happy new year by performing one deep traditional bow (rites with more than one bow involved are usually for the dead) and the words saehae bok manhi badeuseyo (Hangul: 새해 복 많이 받으세요) which translates to please receive many blessings in the new year. Parents typically reward this gesture by giving their children new year's money (usually in the form of crisp paper money) and offering words of wisdom, or deokdam. Historically, parents gave out rice cakes (ddeok) and fruit to their children instead.


Folk games

Many traditional games are associated with the Korean New Year. The traditional family board game Yutnori (윷놀이) is still a popular pastime. Traditionally men and boys would fly kites and play jegi chagi (제기차기), a game where a light object is wrapped in paper or cloth, and then kicked in a Footbag like manner. Korean women and girls would have traditionally played neolttwigi (널뛰기), a game of jumping on a seesaw (시소), while children spun paengi (팽이).




Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_New_Year


See also: Sending Flowers, Online Florist, Florist

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