Jinju Floating Lantern Festival

This week, I went to the Jinju Namgang-river Floating Lantern Festival, and I had a blast! The festival was beautiful, and it was the people I met that made this an awesome weekend.

The city of Jinju is located at the southern end of Korea. While I can't remember exactly how long it took, I'm pretty sure it took about four hours one way to get there. This was partly due to stops we took and grid-lock traffic inside of Seoul. The trip there was interesting itself because I was able to see a little bit of the Korean country side. There was a lot more agricultural land than I thought, and there was also a lot of mountain ranges. At one point, I almost thought I was back in Oregon. We were in a mountainous area that was covered in green pine forests. They looked like the wind swept forest by the coast where all the trees are huddled closely together like they are helping to protect each other from the brutal winds of the ocean. This combined with the golden autumn sunlight caused me to remember autumn days spent outside in the crisp but sweet air of Oregon.
Next time I travel on the road, I have to take a picture of the Korean rest stop. It is simply amazing. Many people admire Oregon for its many convenient rest stops, but Korea has to be the winner in this category. Not only are there extremely large public bathrooms, but also, there were gas stations, food courts, and convenience stores at each rest stop. The first stop we went to even had street musicians. It was a very big deal.

Before I get further into this story, I want to explain about the group I went with. My friend Mark from work/school added me to the Seoul Hiking Group when he heard that I liked to hike so much. I had been wanting to meet up with the group but the schedules didn't line up until this weekend. The leader of the group is Warren, and while I wasn't able to meet him in person on this trip, I know from just via email that he is an awesome person. He is from Korea, and he hosts this group as his side project. He not only plans multiple events but he also coordinates all the arrangements for the trips and this is all a part of his side projects.
 
I went with a group of about 15 foreigners and 3 Koreans. The group leader was Julie. She was so funny and she made us relaxed enough to experience the things we would be afraid to try on our own. While I didn't get to really talk to everyone, it was great to talk and get to know people from all walks of life. For example, I met a foreign teacher who is from Hollywood, CA and who's ethnic background is Armenian, a soldier based in Korea who has fought in both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and has a family in the US, a foreign teacher from England who has been to almost all the ski resorts in the world having snowboarded for 14 years, a professor from Spain who teaches Spanish at a University in Korea and knows 7 languages, and a professor from Hungary who teaches physics at a different University in Korea. It was such an experience to feel connected to people from all around the world. I think it might have torn down some of my mental barriers and boarders that I have placed on people who I have only ever read about or seen on TV. Altogether while the festival was really great, it was the people I met that made this event so awesome and beautiful. Thanks Warren!

When we arrived at Jinju, we stopped for lunch at a Korean restaurant that was buffet style. It was located in the back of the basement of a building. When we went down the stairs, I was thinking, "The only reason I am going down here is because everyone else is." LOL Logical reasoning was telling me, "You are going to get mugged and get transported to the local hospital with a knife in your back if you continue to follow these people." I guess the ol' peer pressure still wins against logical reasoning, haha. The restaurant was actually nice and clean. I just would have never thought of going into the sketch basement of a building to find some place to eat lunch. LOL As it turned out, the jinjabong, the place where I stayed the night, was located in the same basement. All that to say, Koreans do not waste space!!! I also was really happy with the fact that it was a Korean Buffet. It had a lot of the foods I had been wanting to try but was not willing to buy a whole bunch of it at a market or order it as a meal. As a result, I have added somethings to my ordering menu for the future. Stupid me, I forgot to take pictures of all this, and so, I will have to allow your imaginations to indulge your fears as to the degrees of severity for this experience, lol.

Anyway, I'll try and let the pictures do the talking from here...

 My friend Shake gave me the great idea of taking the picture of the reflection. It looks like a painting!

 We all thought this was an interesting take on Christmas, lol. I'm not sure I'm able to negotiate these two ideologies.

Here's a funny story. When we went to the festival, we were told that we would be making lanterns. I, along with others, was very excited as the imagery of such an event would produce some similar to what is seen in these pictures. We searched all day for the lantern making booth, and we finally found it at dusk. As you will see, the lanterns that we made were quite different. We didn't really do much making at all, but it was still a lot of fun.

An indigenous American group performed as part of the festival. While they performed music indigenous to South America, I thought my good friend Rex would have appreciated their display the most.

After seeing this roasted pig, I think will continue to prefer my pork in an non-identifiable format. I'm not sure what it is, but I just don't like to see that I'm eating a Pig's butt, lol.

You can also have squid with it's
tentacles inside its head.

Watch the Korean children's reactions. They are hilarious!!

The vendor's section of the fair seemed to stretch for miles.

Unfortunately, my pictures are nothing in comparison to actually being there in person. It was so much more beautiful than this.

This is the lantern that I 'made'. The only part I made was the wish that I taped to the side. It was still a really cool experience of letting the lantern into the water. It almost seemed as if those worries were carried away on the lantern because what really is a wish? Isn't it just the desire to have an answer to a worry. But if the worry is not there, then the wish is sorta granted because the worry is gone. The lantern now carries it down the river.

This tunnel of lanterns was so beautiful! I want one! It also sorta reminded me of the planet eating machine in the Original Star Trek episodes. The only exception was that there was any dramatic eating music at the entrance. Maybe this was one of the happy planet eating machines. It's a vegetarian planet eating machine. :)

This turkey isn't going down without a fight. It knows Thanksgiving is coming up.

From our viewpoint of the fireworks, it looked like they were tiered. My friend Melanie said that she was closer to fire works and there was bits of molten fireworks falling on the crowd. Wow! Now that's fireworks!

Wait for it ...

The international language of "Oooo and Ahhh!"

These are my favorite pictures. It literally looks like a dramatic Japanese Godzilla film were the dragon is coming to eat the crowd of people.

"And on the right you will see a lantern of how we execute people we don't like. Does anyone have anyone have any questions? Good! And we are walking..."

And what is any Korean festival without at least one Kpop concert? They were actually really good singers. My video makes them sound aweful, but at least you get an idea.

This was our great trip leader Julie. She made the trip really fun!

This is the group of friends I hung out with for the most part while at the festival. They are all really great people to know. From left to right: Craig is the one in the infantry, Sung Eun Jung (sitting) helped me figure out the jinjabong and helped us find a good Korean breakfast the next day. (I now love hot pumpkin soup! So good!), Julie our group leader, and Shake who is the great photographer amidst other great talents.

So one last story before I end. I need to explain the jinjabong. It is a Korean spa or bath house. It is a place where you can just go and relax. It had several large sauna's and hot and cold pools. It isn't really fancy which is nice because it keeps the price really low. However, they keep everything really clean and comfortable. They also keep it really warm which felt so good after being in the nippy autumn air that evening. The only downside was that it is hard to get a good nights rest. In Korea, a really nice and fancy bed is made of wood for the frame and marble for the mattress. I'm absolutely serious! Kinda puts a whole twist on the soft/hard bed debate. "Honey, you always did like a soft mattress, so I layered ours with soapstone." LOL Thus, it was totally normal for the Korean to sleep on the marble floors of the jinjabong. Despite the curious look of the front desk lady, I asked her for three blankets. I will also remember to bring earplugs, lol. Still, it was well worth having a good, dry, clean, warm place to stay for the night for only $7.

Here is a link to more information on Jinju

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jinju
Here is another link that is an online slideshow of the festival.

http://www.yudeung.com/10E_index.php

So till next time, Anyang-ke-say-oh :)