Korean Cultural Day!

Sunday was quite the adventure and a great experience as well. One of the women who hangs out with us foreigners is from Korea and speaks great English and she takes a lot of pride in showing us what her country has to offer and the heritage that lay here. She set up a day for us to experience the facets of Korean culture. 1) Making Kimchi, 2) Playing Korean style ceremonial drums, and 3) Making paper mishe trays. We went to an area of Jeonju that I've never been before and I can certaily say it will not be my last time there either. It was stunning and had so much to look at but because we were on a schedule I didn't have a chance to do the exploring I plan on doing in the near future.

Ok so the Kimchi making process was pretty cool. Kimchi is basically fermented cabbage that is seasoned with chili powder and other vegetables. It is THE MAIN ingredient in any Korean dish; they eat this with everything. My aunt warned me of the smell kimchi has to offer and she couldn't have been more right. It is not the most appetizing smell to say the least but the taste will surprise you with a mix of sweet and spicy.

The drums we were playing are traditional ceremonial drums and the guy who was teaching us is a student at the local university majoring in Korean ancient music. He was really funny and very patient with the gap in communication. I really liked this part but after hearing 30 drums all at the same time my head was certainly beginning to beat a bit harder and a headache was coming over very shortly.

After the drums we were escorted back into the main room where our paper mishe was set up for us. This was VERY relaxing and a great relief for the headache to wear off. Jeonju is well known for their paper making abilities and this is because the climate of Jeonju is perfect to grow the trees that are needed to make the paper mishe. When Korea was run by a king and the different provinces had to give the king a gift of some sort, Jeonju would always send their finest paper because it was the highest quality paper in the entire country. We made trays with butterflies on them to give the meaning of relationships. Butterflies in Korean culture stand for a happy relationship and we glued a statement in the middle which said something along the lines of "as long as we're together then we'll always be happy."

The entire day was a lot of fun and I'm certainly lucky to be where I am today!

I APOLOGIZE FOR THE VIDEO BEING SIDEWAYS, I COULDN'T FIGURE OUT HOW TO TURN IT.