One More Day of Vacationing

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And, lest you think my Chuseok holiday vacationing was over after Busan, I will set the record straight. Indeed, I traveled to Gyeongju, Andong, and Busan, then back to Yeosu, but the fun didn't stop there. The Saturday of my return (the 7th), I was swept away to Nagan Folk Village by some friends of a woman with whom I volunteer at Sam Hye Won orphanage (teaching English to elementary kids). I went with a family who all lived in the US (Ohio) for 18 months-- father, mother, daughter, son. The daughter is in elementary school, and the son (who's English name is Sonny) is in middle school. They are all very proficient, so it was nice spending time with them, getting to know them, talking, etc. etc.

Nagan Folk Village was really cool. I've actually gotten to go twice, but both were equally fun because different things were going on. This time, they were celebrating Chuseok, so they had all kinds of traditional stuff. The second time, I went with an English teacher and his daughter for a food festival, so it was a totally different but equally wonderful experience (I'll explain more later).

So, there was all kinds of cool reenacting and things like that going on. The village is a thatched-roof village with many displays and restorations, a museum, etc. It also has a nifty castle-type wall around it-- really thick and mean-looking-- which was fun to walk on. And it's also pretty cool that while many houses are open for touring and such (restored to how they were when a castle wall was necessary), many families still live in the folk village, so it's still operating on a modern basis-- just inside the walls, it doesn't necessarily look modern.

So, there are bunch of pictures here of that. Afterwards, we went to a local temple. Overall, a grand time, good company, etc. etc.

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Photos

Making Rice Cakes
The old-fashioned way

Posing with the Mayor
Posing with the Nagan mayor and the Korean family who took me on the outing. Yes, even the mayor of Nagan dresses up and re-enacts (people still live with their families in the village, by the way... it's not just for tourists!)

Kimchi Pots
Storage for kimchi and other fermented things in the olden days... I think...

Nagan Folk Village
And the great wall of Nagan. It's actually pretty thick and could maybe fit three across or so...

Making Rice Cakes
A woman making rice cakes (or dokk) the old-fashioned way

Making Rice Cakes
The old-fashioned way

Making Rice Cakes
...or "dokk"

Making Rice Cakes
A traditional Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) treat. Here they are mashing together the wet rice to make it into a kind of dough.

Making Rice Cakes
A traditional Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) treat. Another kind of "dokk" that isn't filled (unlike the colored kind). We got free samples. They'd just smashed it all together to make it doughy (as in the previous two pics), and then they put a kind of soy bean powder (I think) on it. I ate it warm and delicious!
(By the way, all these people in traditional dress are all re-enactors of sorts... most Korean people don't dress like that these days ;-))

Crime and Punishment
One of the implements used to make prisoners uncomfortable in Korean olden days. I tried it on for size, and it was pretty heavy. Wouldn't want to stay in that position for too long!

Crime and Punishment
Old Korean prison in Nagan.

The Mayor Doles Out Punishment
This was a very funny scene. even though I couldn't understand the Korean. The poor tourist! Glad it wasn't me!

Posers
The children from the Korean family I was with, posing with the Korean guard statue.

Nagan Folk Village
From atop the village wall

Changing of the Guard
Nagan Village main gate

Seonam-sa
One of the temples close to Nagan