Mary Xiong
Exploring the Changdeokgung Palace was very inspiring and beautiful place to see. I was a bit familiar with the palace because I’ve seen them in Korean dramas, but it was even better to see it in person. Even though I've seen the building/palaces in movies being able to be at the place and having the tour guide explained more about the palace made more sense to me why some movies portray the past. Besides learning from Korean drama about the palace, I’ve learned from the tour guide why they (the royals) built small doors and why they had fire place under the palace. The reason why they build small doors is because it’s only for certain officials that could enter and they had fire place under the palaces to heat the floor. I thought that was pretty neat and unique idea. I would love to go back to see and explore more of the palace and see the other side of the secret garden.
Patricia Thao
In dance class, we learned how to dance in the traditional Korean style. The dance professor told us that traditional Korean dance was very different from other types of dance like salsa, ballet, and such. Other forms of dance are very expressive while traditional Korean dance is about restraining your emotions. It includes graceful movements with precise footwork where the toes are pointed upwards. So the goal of traditional Korean is to be elegant and non-sensual. Also, we were given fans to practice with during class. We were able to learn how fans were incorporated in the dance and different ways to use it. Although we didn’t have time to learn contemporary Korean dance, it was nice to see the professor perform a short preview. It was a combination between traditional Korean dance and modern dance. I was happy that we were able to learn more about Korean dance because it made me appreciate the dance form even more. Also, I realized that although it is a simpler form of dance it could still be difficult to learn and perform.
Daisy Vang
I really had no expectations for our visit to Seoul National University (SNU) since I was told it was just like the University of Minnesota. Much to my surprise, it was so incredibly beautiful that I don’t think the U of M could compare, in the category of beauty. Besides having trees everywhere, I thought it was so neat that the Seoul National University had many historically important places to visit right on campus. One very specific example was the pond that they had, which was so beautiful and I forgot to take a picture of it, which I really regret. The pond, named the Jaha Pond, was beautifully surrounded by cherry blossom trees and was home to many creatures, like turtles and koi fish. In addition, Kyujanggak on their campus was home to thousands of ancient documents and national treasures. I really enjoyed touring the Seoul National University campus because it was so beautiful! I think I would enjoy being a student at SNU.
Ellie Choi
One thing that I am really looking forward to is the Korean traditional dance class. Since I have learned different kinds of dance before, such as ballet, Chinese traditional dance, Korean traditional dance, I was so excited to go to the class. We learned Buchaechum (부채춤), which is a dance with a folding fan, and the dance represents a collection of scattered rhythms or movements. Buchaechum is very meaningful to me because this was my last time to be on the stage five years ago. After the performance, I quit dancing and focused on my college entrance exam in Hong Kong. When we were having the class, it kept reminding me the dancing classes I had before. Even though I haven’t danced for five years, I still remember some basic steps and it was so fun to see other people doing my favorite thing. I am really appreciated that this program has dancing class.
Grace Nelson
This week in our classes we learned a lot more about Korean culture. We learned TaeKwonDo and Korean Traditional Dance. These two classes were very interesting in the fact that these arts are very old and deeply rooted in Korean culture. We had two excellent teachers that, I appreciated, tried to teach to our beginning level and keep things interesting. The first class we had, traditional Korean dance, was very fun. The teacher explained that in Korean dance they believe that you do not need to show your body on purpose to be beautiful. This is why they use the big loose fitting Hanbok (traditional Korean dress). She said that you must control your emotions when you dance traditional Korean dance. This is different from western dancing as it is often seen as an expression of emotion. I had a hard time with this in particular because I could not keep controlled movements, the teacher told me that I had too much emotion while I danced.
Dan Hodac
One of the classes that I had the most fun in was when we learned about Korean traditional music. My favorite part is that it wasn’t just a lecture with samples of Korean traditional music. There were live demonstrations of the core traditional instruments, and we were also able to try them out. Although this was fun, the real value of this class emerged when the class took a trip to see a Korean traditional performance. Nearly every instrument used in the performance was one that I had gotten to play and hear their sound up close. This helped to bring out much more value to me from the performance. I have been playing a number of instruments as well as studying music theory for 7-8 years now, so I really appreciated the music of the performance. However, I have never seen or heard the instruments used in the performance prior to the Korean music class. The pairing of these two classes made for a wonderful experience of Korean traditional culture!
