Seollal (설날) or Lunar New Year is arguably the most celebrated national holiday in Korea. Solar New Year on January 1 is also observed in Korea, however Seollal is much more celebrated and significant and lasts for three days (the day before, the day of, and the day after). In 2019, Seollal falls on February 5 of the Gregorian calendar and Chungdahm teachers have all of February 4 to February 6 off for the holidays.
Read MoreTags: New Years, seollal, teaching at CDL, holiday season
Seollal, or Lunar New Year, is one of the holidays celebrated in South Korea, along with other countries like Japan, Indonesia, Cambodia, and places with a large Chinese diasporic population. In South Korea, it is one of the most important holidays of the year, in which loved ones congregate in festivities that can last for three days. People travel far and wide to spend time with family, dress up in hanbok, the traditional garb, and perform rituals of filial piety and ancestral worship. They play folk games and eat traditional foods like tteok, rice cake, and jeon, savory pancakes.
Read MoreTags: Lunar New Year, Holidays in South Korea, New Year's in South Korea, teach and travel,, traveling, seollal
In my six years living and teaching in Korea, I’ve been lucky to take many vacations all over Korea and Asia. However, I’ve only been able to go back home to America twice using my personal vacation. After reading these tips, you should be well prepared on how to plan a vacation while abroad to ensure you won't become stressed and so you can fully enjoy your time off.
Read MoreTags: Vacations in Korea, vacation, Chuseok, lesson planning, annual vacation, seollal, substitute teachers
When you are teaching in Korea and have a 3 day weekend working for ChungDahm or April, it's always worth your while to take a mini vacation if you can afford it. Now that I am splitting my time between teaching ChungDahm and April Academy, I am getting more time off. Knowing that Lunar New Year would be coming up, my friend and I realized how expensive those tickets would be. So we decided to go on our trip the weekend before the major holiday. She had never been to Osaka or Kyoto so we decided to see if we could spend one day in Osaka and one day in Kyoto. My advice would be to not do it. A one day trip to either place is not nearly enough time to soak in what each city has to offer. There is so much to see and do in both places, you will not do either city its justice. Many teachers love to go to Osaka because it is only a 2 hour flight from Incheon International Airport (ICN) to Kansai International Airport (KIX). The last time I took this trip, we spent a full day at Universal Studios Japan (Osaka) and toured the following day. However, many teachers don't realize how close, how beautiful, and how historic Kyoto is. Here was my to-do list for traveling to Kyoto.
Read MoreTags: Japan from Korea, vacation, vacation destinations, japan, Osaka, Kyoto, visit japan, teach and travel,, traveling, weekend travel, seollal
Annually Koreans celebrate their New Year, Seollal. The holiday falls on different days each year. This year the holiday is being held over January 27-29. The period is decided according to the Lunar Calender.
Seollal and Chuseok are two of the biggest holidays in Korea where millions of Koreans take time off to travel to their home cities to spend time with their families. The Western equivalent would be Thanksgiving and Christmas. Seollal is very traditional with various associated foods and activities. Our students usually get money from their parents, aunts and uncles and Koreans festively say to one another 새해 복 많이 받으세요 (sae hae bok manhi bah doo seh yo) – which means “Happy Seollal.” This blog will help explain the customs and traditions of Seollal, so you will have a better understanding of the holiday when you are teaching in Korea.
Read MoreTags: things to do in Korea, Vacations in Korea, vacation, Lunar New Year, Holidays in South Korea, seollal