New Year’s Day Memories

SHIN Jayeun

South Korea

On New Year’s Day, I put on the beautiful Hanbok made by my grandmother, combed, and braided my hair and went out to do a New Year’s bow to adults. In early morning, the impatient children filled each one’s lucky bag with New Year cash gifts, flew a kite, played soft shuttlecock, and were excited all day. I hold the stick of sangmo (hat) that someone dropped during the farmers band performance and twirl the long string at the end of the stick with excitement. A few persimmons left on a tree for magpie’s are slightly frozen due to snow that fell in the previous night. It’s the village scenery on the New Year’s morning during my childhood which gets obscure now.
Hanbok are the formal clothing worn during Korean holidays or on special occasions.
Sangmo (상모) is a Korean folk arts hat. A kind of a hat with feathers or paper streamers called pi-ji, made of Korean paper attached to the top which is worn when dancing and moving the head around (Kor. 머리춤, lit. head dance) during a pungmul (nongak) performance.