A Day Out With Professor Chun (Again!)

This past Saturday Professor Chun arranged for our Religion and Culture class to go tour the Korean Folk Village outside of Seoul.  The weather was beautiful that day and we all had so much fun.  We met around 9am in the lobby of SK Global House and walked together to the bus stop.  We took 2 buses to get there, one to Gangnam and then the other to the village, and it took about 90 minutes to get there.  I enjoyed the ride though because I took a nice nap on the way!

The village was beautiful.  It's essentially a museum-like park set up like a traditional Korean folk village.  You can walk around, go into most of the buildings and houses, and there's even a small market and food court.  Also there's demonstrations and activities for the kids, as well as a horse show that we caught the tail end of (no pun intended).

Yes, that man is riding upside-down!

We walked around with Professor Chun and he explained a bit about eastern culture and religion at each stop we made.  It felt like we had our own personal tour guide!  We then all ate lunch at the market.  I had a potato pancake (it made me very excited for Hanukkah time!) and some soup, and as a class we shared some rice cake that Professor Chun bought.  At the market place we got to meet Professor Chun's reverend from his church back home in Kansas City.  His reverend is visiting South Korea with his family for the week and they decided to come to the folk village and meet our class.

One of the performances we caught was actually a national contest between grade schools.  Students were competing in the "Traditional Korean Mask Competition" where each school's team would perform a folk dance incorporating the traditional masks.  It was very interesting to watch and the kids were very cute.  It reminded me of when I would compete in chorus and band against other schools in the area.

Korean grade school students getting ready to perform their folk routine.

We continued to walk around and see things like traditional servants' quarters, the government house, a rich man's estate, a silk farm, etc.  Before we left we sat down in one of the tea houses and we all shared a cup of traditional medicinal tea and some candied ginger.  The tea had a very strange taste but it was really fun sharing the tea with the class and "experiencing culture", as Professor Chun says.  We headed back in the late afternoon, and after walking around for most of the day, we all enjoyed a nap on the bus ride back.

Sharing some tea with Professor Chun and the class, very Korean of us. 

Unsuccessfully trying to make friends with a donkey.  At least I tried.