It's that time of the year when people celebrate the coming of the new year under the Lunar calendar. Chinese people celebrate this event in a very colorful way. The culture and tradition is evident on the clothes they wear, the food, the dance, and the whole celebration itself. Compared to the way my family celebrates the solar new year, it's fun in its own way.
Not only do the Chinese people celebrate at this time of the year. Countries such as Brunei, Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, North Korea and South Korea celebrate this holiday as well, however, it is also widely celebrated here in the Philippines as there are Chinese communities living in the country although it is not exactly a declared holiday. The Lunar New Year doesn't have a fixed date unlike the other celebrated holidays in the Gregorian calendar.
In South Korea, the locals celebrate the new year in a duration of three days. But this year, it falls on a weekend, making it a long holiday of four or five days. Seollal is how they call the Lunar New Year. Most families would travel back to their hometowns and have the celebration with their extended families. Some would don their traditional clothing called Hanbok which comes in different colors and style. The celebration starts early in the morning of the first day as the women in the family prepare the food and the altar table set to honor their ancestors, while some family members would still be travelling back to their hometowns to catch up.
And speaking of the Korean traditional clothing, I made toothpick dolls in hanbok as a little surprise to my students. They were happy looking at the little dolls and it helped us have something to talk about.
I tried my best to make the hanbok and make them close to similar to the actual style. The one in the middle is actually a traditional Korean wedding hanbok. I decided to add it in the picture because it is still a traditional dress, although not exactly worn during seollal. The one on the left is the simple version most women wear on holidays like seollal. I found the design on google and made it into a toothpick doll. For the cuffs and the belt, I used a gold metallic thread to give it a little shine. For the skirt, I cut a gold lining from a ribbon scrap from gift wrappers last Christmas. It's a simple design, falling on the semi-formal category of traditional hanbok, but it suits young ladies since the colors are youthful and elegant in my opinion.
As for the male hanbok, the challenge was on the lower part of the male's long vest and his pants. I think my struggle is very evident in the photo, and it may only be a minor mistake but it bothers me quite a lot. The male pants are loose fitting, and the long vest falls just below knee-level, and that part gave me a hard time fixing. To make the lower part of the vest, I had to glue the threads close enough to cover the pants, but not too tight to squeeze the rest of the pants and make it look like he had elephant feet.
I find Korean traditional clothing amazing. Like how such pieces of garments hold such rich culture. That by looking at them, you can have a glimpse of their colorful history. It's a kind of fashion that it goes way back centuries, but holds the weight of dignity and patriotism of the country.
Anyway,
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