Lantern Festival, 2011

It's that time of year again -- Seoul's International Lantern Festival. I went to this last year when I was still so shell shocked that I wasn't able to do much of anything very well. This time, I'm much more acclimated to life in Seoul, so I was able to enjoy the festival despite the crowds of people. 

This wasn't actually part of the lantern festival. It was near the entrance of the stream where the lantern festival was, and it is also close to City Hall. Each flag represents a country that helped Korea during the Korean war. There were also some cool pictures from the war era, but since they were black and white pictures and it was dark outside... photography didn't exactly work in this instance. 

This is the really tall sculpture thing that marks the entrance to the Cheonggyechung (the cool stream running through Seoul). It's much cooler in real life. 

Welcome! 

The theme of this year's festival was the juxtaposition of the past and present. There were several lanterns representing parts of Korean history and folk tales. I'm not sure which one this lantern represents, but it was definitely beautiful with the waterfall all lit up like that. 

The lanterns were incredibly detailed. Each of these figures and lanterns were so tiny. 

This is a full shot of the detail shot above. The whole lantern was on a platform that was maybe 10 feet/3 meters long. 

This was part of a traditional wedding procession. The girl in the litter is actually the bride, but she looks very, very unhappy. 

This is a reproduction of a traditional game that has apparently been banned in schools. You have the "horse" team on the bottom and the "jumping" team on the top. One boy braces himself against something sturdy like a wall or tree. The rest of his team will make a "horse" by putting their head between the legs of the boy in front of them and bracing themselves. They do this until they have a good chain going. The "jumping" team then... jumps. They get a running start and jump and land on the "horse". The idea is the horse wants to stay strong and not collapse under the weight of the jumping team, and the jumping team wants to stay on the horse when they land. If you're interested in reading a bit more about this game and seeing some pictures of actual boys playing it, check out this blog post. 

This is the reflection of a truly creepy lantern. We would later find out that it wasn't the creepiest lantern at the festival, but it definitely wasn't something you wanted to spend too much time looking at directly. 

Pretty waterfalls! 

There were lanterns from around the world. These lanterns came from the Philippines. 

We don't actually know where these lanterns came from. We think maybe they represented somewhere in Africa? Becky and I were both reminded of the Swiss Family Robinson though. 

So remember the creepy reflection lantern dude? And how it wasn't the creepiest lantern of them all? Prepare yourselves... What you will see next may scar you for life. As we progressed down the stream, over the tinkle of the water and the background noise made by hundreds of people, we started to hear a rhythmic squeaking/groaning sound. We couldn't figure out what in the world it was, until we turned a corner and saw this:

It was a 30 foot/9 meter tall peacock with flapping wings, a mouth that opened and closed, and tail feathers that went up and down. It also had red laser eyes of death. The blue peacock had a compatriot on the other side. He was even worse. 

In addition to the groaning and squeaking moving body parts and red laser eyes of death, THIS peacock actually breathed fire.... Actually, they both breathed fire. But the golden peacock breathed it much more regularly than the blue peacock. We were simultaneously horrified and fascinated. 

Because the theme of the festival was past and present and there were lanterns about folk tale heroes, they decided to have some modern day heroes. Batman, Superman, Tae Kwon V and Podoro all made an appearance. 

These are all more of the lanterns from around the world. Again, we aren't really sure what country they are supposed to represent. But they were all pretty!

This is another creepy lantern face. I think he was part of the Japanese lantern. 

This one was some sort of art contest winner, I believe. 

The colors were so bright. It was simply lovely!

Has anyone seen Tangled? Because I have. And I love that movie. They had floating lanterns that you could buy and write a wish on, then float down the stream. It was lovely!!

There was also a big dragon lantern. You could write something on the individual "scale" and attach it to the dragon. 

I'm afraid I have absolutely no clue what this says. My attempts at translating it didn't turn out so well either. 

This was a fountain back at the beginning of the stream. It was so cool, because this is exactly what it looked like in person. The lights were coming up, and the water was all white. It looked like moving clouds made of marshmallows or something. I really wanted to touch it, because it looked so soft and feathery. Of course, I know that it would be cold and wet, and it would probably have enough force from the water that it wouldn't feel so nice...

Finally, there were LED bedecked carriages that you could take for a ride. 

The horses pulling the carriages were so tiny! Becky is standing maybe a food and a half in front of the horse. she's about 5'8"/172cm. They were tiny, tiny horses. 

All in all, it was a good time at the lantern festival. It's still around until November 20th, so if you're in Seoul, you should go check it out!