| The Korean people mainly reside in Northeast China. In the inhabitation area of the Korean ethnic minority, especially in the Yanbian area, agriculture, forestry, livestock farming, sideline and fishery are developed in an all-round way. The Yanbian is well known as a paddy production area in the north part of China, and it is also one of the main tobacco areas. The Korean ethnic minority is renowned in the world for its songs and dances.
There are five important Korean festivals, namely the Spring Festival, the Lantern Festival, the Tomb-Sweeping Day, the Dragon Boat Festival and Qiuxi. On the festivals, besides food preparation, various games and sports activities will be organized to intensify the interesting sense. Spring Festival
It is the most spectacular festival in the year. On the eve, every family tidies up the house and courtyard, washes clothes and quilts, decorates rooms and improves the environmental sanitation. The New Year Picture painted with mountains, rivers, stones, clouds, sun, cypresses, grass, tortoise, cranes and deer, is often pasted to the wall. In the wee hours, when the first crow is heard, all the families get up at once. They set up burning incense to worship the ancestors. After that, they kowtow to the elders for the New Year's greeting. After the breakfast, they pay a New Year call to their neighbors and the elders in the village. The programs of the festival are rich and full of folk flavor.
For breakfast, the sticky rice cake or yellow rice are generally served. There are various dishes made of fish, meat and vegetables as well as different games. Men drink the specially brewed Tusu wine, which is made of balloonflower, wild pimiento and cinnamon. It is said that drinking this wine can drive away evils and disasters, and make people live long. For lunch and supper, people prefer Mandetuan or Detuan.
Detuan (a transliteration of Korean) is a sort of soup. The way to make it is to pound the rice flour into sticky ball, then make it a round strip, cut into slices, cook it with chicken or in pheasant soup (if available, in beef soup), and at last, add some sesame oil and lavers. Mandetuan is made of Detuan stuffed with two or three large meat dumplings. When it is ready, open the dumplings with chopsticks and eat it with soup.
At the daytime, each village organizes activities such as tug of war and arrow shooting. Women play springboard and children fly kites. In the evening, the elders play cards, and kids play hide-and-seek or burning light game. Young men and girls take part in the dancing party.
Lantern Festival
On the festival, people take Yaofan (remedy rice) and Corn Rice. In the morning, they drink a special wine, which is said to help improve hearing. Hence, everyone drinks, even if someone could only drink a bit or just taste it. The Remedy Rice takes sticky rice and honey as basic stuff and is cooked with Chinese dates and pine seeds. The Corn Rice is made of five sorts of corns such as rice, millet, glutinous millet, sticky rice and bean.
Taking Corns Rice on the Lantern Festival is to wish a bumper harvest. People will organize many entertainment activities of local flavor. In the activity of Yingyue, people holding torch gather on the square after supper, and set out by order and head for the top of the Eastern Mountain to viewing the moon. It is said that the one who climbs to the highest point of the hill and get the first sight of the full moon will be blessed. When viewing of the moon is finished, people begin to walk on the bridges in moonlight. It is said that walking on the bridges this night will ensure safety for people.
Tomb-Sweeping Day
Every family of the Korean ethnic minority respectively sweeps the tomb of their ancestors and worships them. In addition, they have to renew the earth on the tomb and plant trees around it.
Dragon Boat Festival
Every Korean family cooks some special foods, including small dumplings with red bean stuffing. According to the custom, everyone should drink some specially made wine to avoid the evil. In the meantime, sports meeting will be held. The main sports items are trapeze and wrestling. Nowadays, the programs are even richer than before. Soccer, volleyball, ping-pong and various track and fields are supplemented.
Qiuxi
It is named the Jiafei Festival in the Koran language. After the harvest of each year, the fresh corns lay on the farm ground. To felicitate the harvest, the farmers have chosen an auspicious day in the mid autumn to celebrate the Qiuxi Festival so as to express thanks for god blessing. From the perspective of customs, people think that Qiuxi is more important than the Dragon Boat Festival. During the Dragon Boat Festival, only pigs are slaughtered, but on the Qiuxi Festival, people will slay cows.
All families make sticky cakes with fresh corns. In addition, they sweep tombs and go to worship. Sport contests will be held. All villagers will come to watch the games. It is full of animation. The entertainment programs often last several days.
Eldership Festival
The Eldership Festival of the Koreans falls on lunar September 9. To respect the elder is a long tradition for the Korean people. It is celebrated almost in different Korean inhabitation areas, but held on different days. The Korean ethnic minority in Heilongjiang Province usually celebrates the festival on June 20 or 24, but the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in Jilin Province has fixed August 15 of the lunar calendar year as the Eldership Festival since 1984.
In the reign of the Lee family during the Korea Dynasty (1392-1910), this was the day to comfort the eldership. Among people, the young had to address the elders by honorific title. They were not allowed to smoke or drink at presence of the seniors. It is not allowed to ask for lighter or fire to light cigarettes. It is prohibited to speak in vulgar language. Prior to the meal, the elder have the privilege to be served and eat first. Meeting the elder on the way, the young should greet him and make way for him. Every family pays great attention to the birthdays of the elder and prepares a grand food party for his senior age and the thanksgiving is made for his hardship and nurturance.
In addition, there are other three family festivals, namely the first anniversary of the baby, the 60thanniversary of the old, and the 60thanniversary of the marriage.
The Korean people uphold all along the courtesy and seasons. Once in the annual festivals and happy events, a daintily food custom is always emphasized. All dishes and confectionary are to be decorated with capsicum shreds, egg slices, laver and shallot shreds or walnut kernels, etc.
Besides the traditional festivals, Koreans also arrange grand feasts on the first anniversary of the baby, the wedding ceremony, and the 60thanniversary of the old. On the table, a cooked cock should be served, and a chili has to be inserted in its beak, in addition to a great variety of other traditional dishes and cakes in different shapes. Many of them are modeled after animals. |
