Chuseok 추석 , celebrated during the autumn equinox, is one of the three most important and heartfelt festivals of South Korea (and North), along with Seollal (the lunar new year) and the Dano (the fifth day of the fifth month of the calendar related to the lunar cycles, which represents an auspicious date).
During the Chuseok 추석 Koreans celebrate the good harvest and abundance and it is a rest period for the people that can enjoy three days of vacation. Families return to their hometowns and gather on the fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month to commemorate and express gratitude to their ancestors by organizing a banquet with freshly harvested rice, meat, fruit and vegetables, alcohol and songpyeon prepared and donated in honor of the ancestors, rite that takes the name of charye. They then continue with the celebrations and the revelry.
Another custom and tradition of the Chuseok 추석 is the seongmyo , where families visit the tombs of the ancestors, cleaning them from weeds and paying homage to the deceased loved ones.
These rituals and celebrations are related to the idea that the ancestors help to have an abundant harvest, so they are thanked and the blessing is asked again.
During the day several traditional Korean foods are prepared, the most widely used of all is certainly the songpyeon, a half moon-shaped chewy pie prepared with rice flour filled with sesame seeds, beans, honey or chestnuts. Other food eaten is the jeon, the Korean pancakes, a perfect way to accompany Baekse-ju, a rice-based liqueur consumed during the celebrations of Chuseok 추석 .
It is believed that the Chuseok 추석 was celebrated since the reign of Silla, a couple of thousand years ago, probably its origin is related to the shamanic tradition. A festival that is connected to the hope of an abundant next harvest brought by the protection and blessing of the ancestors and an opportunity for Korean families to come together with their loved ones and spend time together.
Traditional games and dances enrich the celebrations. Gifts are exchanged, several days before the holiday can be found in various supermarkets pre-packaged sets with various foodstuffs, ginseng based drinks or personal hygiene products.
The Chuseok 추석 is a period in which people move back to their hometowns, so traveling during these days is not recommended as you may find it difficult to buy tickets for transport (which are usually booked for months), the highways are busy and the hotels full.
