1/20/2024 0 Comments Korean lunar new year customs![]() The women of the family, and especially the daughters-in-law, would prepare food and drink for the ancestral rites (called charye: 차례) at my uncle’s house. Early in the morning of New Year’s Day we children would put on our new clothes, and our parents would wear their nicest traditional Korean clothes (called hanbok: 한복). When I was growing up, we used to spend Seolnal at my grandma’s house in Korea, on the southern island of Namhae. I was so excited! They were usually a colorful, warm sweater and nice pants. When I was a kid, the most exciting thing for me about Seolnal was the fact that we all got new clothes on that day. I set them in a folded pile on my bed the night before, above my pillow, shoes on top, so they would be waiting for me in the morning. Every year around December, major Korean grocery stores give out free calendars which are useful for keeping track of the dates on these 2 calendars. My mom always calls me on my birthday according to the Korean calendar, and my birthday according to the Western calendar. Koreans use the Western calendar for the day to day, but we still observe our traditional holidays on the Korean calendar, too. Both calendars are based on the phases of the moon and the changes of the seasons, so they are lunisolar calendars but most people just call them “lunar calendars.” ![]() The Korean calendar is derived from the Chinese calendar, so Korean New Year’s Day is usually on the same day as Chinese New Year, except every 24 years or so the new moon falls between Korean midnight and Chinese midnight, so Korean New Year starts the day after Chinese New Year. ![]() ![]() It spreads over 3 days: the day before Korean New Year’s day, Korean New Year’s day, and then the day after Korean New Year’s day. Today is Korean New Year’s Day (Seolnal:설날 also romanized as “Seollal”), and is pretty much one of the biggest Korean holidays of the year. ![]()
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