National Palace Museum

With our little guy in tow, it took two trips for us to see everything in the National Palace Museum of Korea, but it was worth the time. We've loved visiting all of the palaces and other Joseon era attractions, but much of the time our view of the details has been from afar or down below. This museum, which is on the western grounds of Gyeongbokgung Palace, enabled us to see everything at our eye level - so awesome! Here are a few of our favorite pictures from our visits:

example of a palace throne

map of Gyeongbokgung Palace grounds

architectural dragon element

ceiling tile from above a throne

stone haechi guardian

large urn

ornate wooden cabinet

The next set shows an example of a traditional water clock - the animation of how it worked is so very cool. I managed to find a Youtube video describing this and the sundial's use in Korea - there are English translations along the bottom, so click HERE to watch it.

the chiming mechanism - gongs and drums

There is a mix of old and "new" within the museum.  Michael liked the cars on display.

We liked all of the ornate artifacts.

a shield

Liquor containers

liquor container

jar for keeping the royal placentas from childbirth

On our most recent visit, there was a temporary exhibit of artwork from the Vatican on display - so we visited Italy while in Korea.  :)  We were not allowed to take pictures in most of those rooms, but were allowed to do so for the last exhibit - these beautiful golden doors.

Interested in visiting the museum while here? Here is a MAP link.

Not able to visit it in person? No problem - it ha s a GREAT website feature, which showcases their top 50 artifacts with pictures and historical descriptions. 

Take a virtual tour!

Full directions and details can be found in my article for Korea Ye! HERE.

January "Korea Ye!" Articles

Here is a monthly round-up of my articles for Korea Ye!, just in case you missed them:

The Painters: Hero








Nami Island

Aww, poop!

The National Palace Museum of Korea

An Afternoon of Pansori

So every once in a while I like to flex my music muscles a bit. I know - it's crazy that a former music educator would want to do so (wink, wink). One sunny afternoon I convinced a few friends from my music club here to join me at a free workshop about Korean Pansori, hosted by The Institute of Confucian Philosophy and Culture at Sungkyunkwan University. Once I found the venue, which was in a downtown fire department hall, I was greeted warmly, handed the program and some snacks, and settled in for the experience.

Pansori (판소리) is the Korean style of musical storytelling, which dates back to the 17th Century during the Joseon Dynasty. It is performed by a male or female vocalist and there is usually a drummer. The singer is called a sorikkun (소리꾼, singer) and the drummer plays a barrel-shaped drum called a buk (북).

This was a lecture recital, in Korean, about the history, forms, and manner of pansori. The first performer was Ki-hyung Ryu, the Artistic Director of the Ugeumchi Drama Company. From what I could gather, he took us through the traditional styles of pansori.

As things progressed, I was very thankful that I had taught myself to read Hangul, the Korean alphabet, as we were asked to sing along with our lyric sheets at various points.

The first half of the workshop covered five different pansori: Binari (a song of praying), two lullabies, Monaeki-Sori (a song of rice planting), Yu Heung-Yo (a celebration song), and two funeral songs. The rhythm, accompanied by the drum (which we copied by clapping), seemed to fall prevalently into a three-beat pattern, with simple variations within that framework. As an example, the lullabies were clearly in 3/4 time and used a dotted-eighth sixteenth drumming pattern. It was quite fun for me to try singing along with the rest of the group, and here is a quick clip of us all singing the "chorus" part of one of the funeral pieces, as well as an example of the pansori style, as sung by the director.

The second half of the workshop was lead by Ms. Bora Kim, a singer and songwriter of Korean Folk songs. Just from the change in style and manner of the songs, I gathered her portion was about more modern versions of pansori. 

She was dressed in a beautiful, traditional Hanbok outfit.

The music in this set was: Taepyungga (a song of peace from the 1930s), Gunbam-taryung (a ballad about chestnuts), Yeokido Hana, DubeonJae Yiyaggi (a contemporary story song), and Arirang (the traditional Korean folk song). Where the first five songs had been in 3/4 time, these had a mix of meters and I noted some jazz and music theater influences.

Here is an example of the "jazzy" feel of Gunbam-taryung:

The last song we sang was the Gyeonggi province version of Arirang, which was recognized by UNESCO in 2012 as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. It was the version of the melody that I am familiar with, both from my past teaching experiences and since it is the melody sung all over South Korea. What was interesting to hear were the various versions of the melody that Ms. Kim sang, with the different vocal trills and stylings of pansori.

So there is a glimpse into a piece of Korea's musical culture - next I hope to tackle a bit of drumming...

Out and About at Changdeokgung Palace

Last weekend we took a few hours to explore a different palace and surrounding area - we headed north on the subway to Jongno 3-ga and ended up on Donhwamun-ro, headed toward the Changdeokgung Palace. As we walked along, we did a bit of window shopping:

We'll be back for one of those^^

We took a mini-break and then found ourselves at the main gate.

Your history lesson for Changdeokgung:

As we entered, I saw this sign next to an older tree - note the red circle on the picture, showing the tree depicted in an early 1820-1830 map of the area:

And here is the same tree today:

Next, we entered the parade ground, which is one of the longer ones we've seen here.

One more entrance gate...

..with ornamental guardians,

and we found the palace.

This building is Chong-jon Hall, the main hall of the palace used for coronations 

and other official grand ceremonies. Inside is the throne area, with the royal irworobongdo screen behind it.

I just love the architecture and colors on these buildings!

Some more pictures (with my puny little cell phone camera) in my continuing effort to capture the beauty of these buildings and the really cool animal fixtures guarding the rooftops.

"Mommy, enough pictures - find me!"

A map of the entire complex, with a "Secret Garden" area on the northern end.

This sign made me laugh, but was glad to be warned...

..when we saw this dangerous wild animal! Seriously, though, it's a pretty cool squirrel with long black tufts on its ears.

The palace complex included this next set of buildings, in the traditional hanok style, but without the elaborate decorative painting. It was a place for the king to rest and read, away from the general business of the main buildings.

Due to the cold temps, we opted not to take the separate Secret Garden tour, so I snapped a picture of one of its buildings above this terraced area.

We wandered for a bit more, checking out the back of the palace and resident areas, where I focused on some of the other elements present:

Inside one of the covered walkways:

One of the more modernized parts of the buildings - it threw me for a second, 

with its modern windows:

The tiled kitchen area inside:

This was part of the king and queen's residence area, and there were some pieces of furniture on display inside:

A meeting room:

We said goodbye to the palace, and this sculpture of a haechi, and headed towards Insadong for lunch.

We opted for a sit-down Korean restaurant and found Insadong Gujib down one of the alleyways.

We got ushered to the back of the restaurant, through the kitchen, where there was additional seating, found our call button to order, and made use of the handy-dandy utensil mats.

We ordered Beoseot-bulgogie:

And enjoyed our feast:

And so ended one more adventure in Seoul!