This weekend was the Lantern Festival in Seoul. It celebrates Buddha's birthday, which is on this coming Thursday. If any of you were every thinking of coming to Korea, come for this festival. It was one of the best festivals I've been to. I generally don't care for parades, but theirs was impressive. They also have tons of free activities.
Saturday night was the Lantern Parade. The parade marched from a nearby university to a temple. There were so many beautiful floats, lanterns, and dresses. They had two incredible floats. One was a huge elephant that could move its' head and ears, and made elephant sounds. Trumpet????? The second one was a dragon that could breathe real fire, and once you were thoroughly impressed with that it let out a resounding roar. Seriously, it was impressive, but unfortunately my camera died well before they came by. Here are some of the pictures I did get.
I kind of like the ones with the Buddhist monks in focus but it blurry around them. It looks like life is moving super fast around them, but they are still. I'm super deep. It was actually really hard to get any really steady pictures, especially of the walkers. I couldn't figure out their pace and they are all blurry.
Today I went back to the festival to make my own lantern. I did and it was challenging. I was told it is an activity in which to practice patience. While I was making mine three or four film crews video taped me. I'm not sure what they are using it for, but they got super close and stayed for a while. I refused to look up, but maybe they liked that. The 10 year old near me even said that I was in the hot spot. There are now so many videos of me making my lantern. I didn't take a picture when I had finished. I figured I would take one later, but that didn't work out. It was near the end of the lantern making part of the festival and there was to be a competition and then you could collect your lanterns. Sadly, I did not make it back in time to pick mine up. I'm very disappointed, and trying very hard not to blame it on the girl I work with. Ultimately, it was my fault because I could have went back by myself to get it.
They had so many other activities there as well. They had a bunch of places where you could make mini lanterns, clay buddhas, Korean paper, prayer beads, and many more things. They also had a few different kinds of temple stay foods. That is the kind of food you would be eating if you spent a day or two at temple, which I plan to do, but I didn't try the food. I figure when I go there I will really experience it. There were also buddhists from all over the world, each country had their own little tent.
The festival was very enjoyable, and affordable. They barely charged for anything. I made my lantern and prayer beads for free, and I even got a wagon wheel for free (they love wagon wheels here). It was a great weekend and I would highly recommend it.
Take care!
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