Jared and I went to eat downtown tonight. When we got to the restaurant, there were a bunch of women, including a woman in a Hanbok (Traditional Korean Clothes) and a bunch of kids there. The kids smiled and a few talked to about us (in Korean) to their (presumably) mothers. This is pretty common. Kids seem really interested to see foreigners, and it’s pretty normal to get stopped on the street by someone who wants to say “Hi. Where are you from? Bye!” or just wave at someone different than themselves. In a place like Pohang, where there are significantly fewer foreigners than Seoul, we stick out and for the most part, we’re received with a smile. I couldn’t ask for more.
Anyway, at the restaurant, the group of women and children were getting ready to leave, so the women put bright orange aprons and orange triangular cloth hats on the kids (For anyone who has played Ragnarök Online, the hats were orange versions of the Ghost Headband). Anyway, it was cute. They left, we ate, and nothing much more happened (except that when we went to the salad bar two school girls took our table, much to our amusement).
When we left and were heading back to Jared’s car, we saw the group again, this time at a booth on the main walking street downtown. There were a bunch of kids and the Hanbok lady sitting on a mat, doing something, and a bunch of other people standing around. They were making Korean Cake, a small, dumpling sized ball, filled with some kind of nut. The ball itself is made of rice flour and very chewy. They had different colored dough and the kids were playing around in it. Very cute. There was also a TV camera.
When they saw us, they called to us and asked us to come over. We stood and watched for a bit, until it was clear that they were asking us to join. Jared agreed and we took off our shoes and sat beside the kids. The Hanbok woman showed us how to make the little cakes, and the TV camera guy taped us. When we were done, they even gave us each a set of cakes that they had prepared. We thanked them, they thanked us, we got up. The camera guy talked to Jared (with surprisingly good English), and explained that it was Korean cake, and that it was for Chusok. We said the cakes were delicious, in Korean, to the camera, and went on our way.
Chusok is Korean Thanksgiving, but “SuperThanksgiving with Christmas jr” would be more correct. They give gifts, they get 3 days to weeks off work, and pay bonuses, they have ceremonies; it’s a bit more than we’d consider standard Thanksgiving. I will likely spend my Chusok in Sunlin campus, doing not much. It’s a very family oriented holiday, and I wasn’t invited to join anyone, nor did I try to invite myself. But it will be interesting to see how things play out. This is, along with Lunar New Years, the country’s biggest holiday. There hasn’t been much lead up to it on Campus (except that everyone gets 3 days off and there was a singing competition), but it was really fun to get a taste (ouch, terrible pun) of it downtown.
