Seollal, Or Korean New Year, Is a Major Holiday in the Lives of Koreans

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Seollal – Korea Seollal, or Korean New Year, is a major holiday in the lives of Koreans. Seollal’s celebration lasts for three days, starting the day before and ending the day after the Lunar New Year. It’s celebrated not only to mark the passage into a new year, but it is also a time for families to catch up with each other, pay respect to ancestors and to feast!. After performing traditional rites called ‘Charye’ to honour the ancestors, Koreans spend the rest of the day with their family and relatives. Many will visit their ancestral home towns to take part in Seollal activities, so this can be a busy time of year for travel. The biggest part of Seollal is the food! The New Year’s feast consists of several dishes, but there are a few that are absolutely essential like tteokguk (rice cake soup), jeon (pancake) and ddeok (rice cake). During the New Year festivities, it is common for adults to wear the colourful traditional costume, the Hanbok. Traditional women’s hanbok consists of a blouse shirt or a jacket and chima, a wrap-around skirt, which is usually worn full. Men’s hanbok consists of a shirt and baji which means pants in Korea. Other New Year’s Eve customs are playing Yut-nori, a traditional board game and kite flying. Korean greeting - saehae bok mani badeuseyo pronounced say-hey-bok-mani-bad-a-say-o means “I wish you receive lots of good luck in the new year”.

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