Seollal

Essay Writing Competition 2024
Category: 8 - 11 years
- Runner-up -

"Seollal" by Gaon Jang from South Korea was chosen as runner-up in the Junior category 8 - 11 years.

This article was submitted in the Kids World Travel Guide Essay Competition 2024.

Seollal

My name is Gaon and I am from South Korea. I live in Vietnam, though, so we always make sure to visit Korea in the summer.

Korea is a beautiful place. It is a spectacular country that has come from being a poor country with very little natural resources to be one of the most well-known places in the world.

In Korea, we celebrate Seollal – the Korean new year – the first day of the lunar calendar. On Seollal, all the members of my family come to my grandma’s house, wearing hanbok, which is traditional Korean clothes. We eat, we play games, and we tell stories.

A tradition we do is to bow to our elders, showing them respect, and wishing them good luck for the new year, which is called saebae. In return, smiling elders give us envelopes filled with money along with a blessing. This is a tradition that we children enjoy very much!

It is a meaningful day as it is the start of a new year. One of the most representative foods that we eat on this day is duk-guk, a rice cake soup. It is a warm broth filled with rice cakes and vegetables. We eat duk-guk to celebrate the new year because it is a symbol of new beginnings and starting fresh.

Japchae (Korean glass noodles), mandu (dumplings), jeon (savoury Korean pancakes) and yugwa (a traditional Korean dessert that consists of glutinous rice, honey, sesame seeds and more; a personal favourite of mine) are also popular dishes that we consume. Making mandu with my grandma is something I enjoy doing, and I have many happy memories of it!

On Seollal, we also perform ancetral rituals, which are called charye. We offer food and drinks to our ancestors at their alters and we bow to them as a sign of respect. We also play traditional games like yunnori, which is a board game where we throw four 'Yut' sticks forwards and the aim of the game is to move all of your tokens around the board as quickly as you can. We listen and tell stories well into the night and it is overall such a nice holiday!

This is what Seollal means to me.

Congratulations on your essay about Seollal, Gaon! This is a wonderful essay that tells us about the Korean New Year celebrations in general and what Seollal means to you! We learnt a lot! Thank you for sharing your insights with us!

* The Korean New Year will be celebrated on 25 January 2025.

Gaon attends ABC International School in Ho Chi Minh City/ Vietnam. English as first language. Other home language is Korean.