Korean New Year’s Day

New Year’s Day, which is a family-oriented holiday in Korea, has three distinguishing features: the longest holiday for enough rest, a variety of events and games, many foods in home.

First, the longest holiday give a feeling of Korean customs and provide enough rest. Whenever New Year Day is coming, employers normally consider about some advantages, which are incentives and bonus, for their employees. Korean has a New Year Day, which is the last week of February, because Korea was affected by China, so we use a lunar calendar. At that time, however, we might have some trouble like traffic jam on freeway because most relatives, who have been suffering from the workplace in Korea, live in other cities, which are quite far from hometown, so they need enough time to go to hometown that’s why New Year’s Day is quite longer than other holiday. Although we have some complicated problem like traffic jams, a given long holiday is enough time for every Korean to take a rest.

Second, we have not only some events, but also many games such as Korean poker, Sae-Bae, and so on. Korean poker can make relatives get mad because of losing money; however, there is no serious game. Another event is the Sae-Bae, which is a wonderful chance for children to get some money from older adults. The Sae-Bae means that children traditionally wish their parents a happy new year by making a deep bow, which expresses many blessings. Parents normally reward their gesture by giving their some money. Today, custom of the Sae-Bae is quite different between previous tradition and today’s usage. Now, it allows that an older person, who did not get married yet, can do the Sae-Bae, making a deep traditional bow, to get some money from their senior because these days we do not have enough youth to make a deep bow for senior, who got married. Except for some events, many traditional games are associated with the Korean New Year. The traditional game, which is called “A game of Yut”, looks like a board game, but we need two Korean dice, which seems like long dice fit well only in a game of Yut. And men traditionally fly kites and play the Jegichagy, a light object, wrapped in the cloth. On the other hand, Korean women traditionally play the Nulddigy, a kind of jumping on a seesaw.

Finally, many relatives arrive at home early to carry their gift or help prepare a lot of foods for ceremony about respecting ancestor. Traditionally, we used to get together at grandfather’s house, but if we do not have grandfather, instead we get together in the oldest relative’s house. We prepare a lot of different kinds of foods for our ancestors. By an old saying, if we do not prepare to serve a lot of foods to ancestors, our ancestry will be so mad that our families can experience disasters and imprecation before upcoming next year’s day; therefore, relatives should help each other prepare some meals, which includes DDuck-Guk and a lot of foods for ceremony. These foods are just for ceremony, but after finishing ceremony, we can eat everything. Among many foods, eating DDuk-Guk means that we can be more healthful than before.

The evidence suggests that Korean New Year Day is the longest holiday and has many events, games, and foods. During New Year Day, people can put their heart and soul into New years day and pray for family’s health and good fortune by respecting elders, by doing ancestral rite, and by enjoying many events or foods.