Lunar New Year in Busan

If you do not live in a country that celebrates Lunar New Year, you probably went about your day as usual on January 31st. However, in Korea and several other Asian countries, Seollal (설날) is a much bigger deal than Solar New Year on January 1st. Since it landed on a Friday this year, most Koreans got Thursday and Friday off work, and thus enjoyed a four day weekend. This is a huge travel holiday and trains, buses, and flights were booked within hours of being released.

Most Koreans spend the say with their family. Younger children will dress up in hanbok, or traditional Korean clothes. They bow to their elders and wish them a Happy New Year (새 해 복 많이 받으세요). In return, their parents/grandparents/etc will give them some amount of money. I asked my students about this custom, thinking they would be really excited to get money and gifts in return for a simple bow. It turns out, most kids have to hand the money immediately over to their parents who put it in the bank for them. Or in their words, "mom take."

They also eat tteokguk (떡국) or rice cake soup. Once you have eaten tteokguk, you are another year older. Korean age is different from American age. Usually, you can just add two years to your American age and you will have your Korean age. The difference is caused by two things. First, a baby is one year old at birth because they count the time in the womb. Second, you don't gain a year on your birthday, but instead with every new year (and bowl of tteokguk). This caused much confusion when students the size of thimbles told me they were ten years old, but in reality they are eight (but still more thimble-sized than any eight year olds I have ever met).

Tteokguk

Anyway, we had to take advantage of a four day weekend. So what started as a coworker trip merged with the Gawi Bawi Go! group to create a massive trip to Busan. Busan is in the very southern part of Korea. It is convenient to travel from Seoul to Busan on the KTX, or high speed train. However, all tickets sold out within several minutes. We were able to make the trip via bus, which usually takes about 4 1/2 hours, but with holiday traffic took us about 7 1/2 hours to arrive in Busan. Luckily, we left early in the morning so we rolled into the beach town at 2pm on a gorgeous Thursday.

 The weather in Busan was glorious compared to Seoul: sunny and 50-60s during the day. It was so great to wear Birkenstocks and feel sand on my feet. I fooled myself for just a second that I was back in Santa Barbara.

We reserved a penthouse from airbnb on the 16th floor of an apartment building overlooking Haeundae Beach. It was relatively cheap split between 15 people and definitely worth the luxury.

View from our room

The second floor windows

The living room, from the second floor

The second floor kitchen, not that we needed two kitchens...

Haeundae Beach

	Relaxing with makkeolli while being serenaded by Emily on the ukulele Playing some cards One of many group ukulele sessions

Sunrise the next morning on the beach

It was a little difficult to find stores open on Seollal, but we bought some groceries and whipped up a delicious breakfast. Audrey even made us some tteokguk for the occasion. It was delicious! ...And we were officially one year older.

Audrey, our adorable Korean coworker

That afternoon, we headed to Haedong Yonggungsa 해동 용궁사 Temple

Stairs to Yonggungsa Temple

Bryan, my coworker, buying some street food.

The most famous fish market in Busan is called Jagalchi 자갈치.

This vendor looked so nonchalant smoking his cigarette.

Step right up.

Bethany and I got our Korean names engraved on dojang (seals). For some reason, several Korean men gathered to watch the process. One weird guy started photographing us.

This is your typical food tent, where you can get delicious Korean street food: tteokbokki (rice cakes in red pepper sauce), twigim (like tempura), sundae (blood sausage), kimbap (like sushi usually filled with vegetables), odeng (fish cake), and a lot more.

After the fish market, we were all craving fresh seafood. So we went to Taejongdae for barbeque clams. Taejongdae has rows and rows of BBQ clam tents that serve various types of seafood that you cook at your table.

There is nothing better than eating fresh caught seafood, sitting in plastic chairs on a floor made of stones, overlooking the water, and smelling the most indescribable aroma of Korean sauces sizzling over hot coals. 

The first course: mussels

The second course: clams two ways

The women workers were buzzing around us constantly, putting more shells on the fire, dishing out cooked ones, and giving us eating tips (using mussel shells as a clamp to hold onto hot clam shells).

사랑방 = love room, apparently the name of our restaurant.

Rows of other clam tents lining the beach.

And the next morning, it was time to head home. We took a final group picture to say goodbye to our beloved penthouse apartment. 

 

We had some time to kill in Gimhae before the bus left, so we rented bikes and rode around the bike-friendly city. It was glorious and took me back to college and biking around Santa Barbara.

 Farewell, Busan. It's been real. Back to Seoul, the cold, and work.