By GI Korea on February 6th, 2011 at 1:00 pm

Picture of the Day: Spring at the National Folk Museum

Staff pin up scrolls welcoming spring at the National Folk Museum in Seoul on Monday, ahead of the day of Ipchun or the official beginning of spring by the lunar calendar.

• Teadrinker
  11:06 am on February 6th, 2011 1

  Don't tell me those kids don't look cold. No gloves or mittens in sight, and only two are wearing a tuque. Oh, but it's okay….It's spring.

• Nathan
  1:51 am on February 7th, 2011 2

  Flash backs to those model 1800s reenactment villages they used to do school excursions to when I was a kid… … actually, I seem to remember getting some really nice root beer and licorice from those, important things for a lad.

• Glans
  8:11 am on February 7th, 2011 3

  Those scrolls look Chinese, not Korean.

• Teadrinker
  11:07 am on February 7th, 2011 4

  #3,

  Yes, it is. Based on my knowledge of Chinese, the one on the left is something about a man carrying sticks and the one on the right is about some guy who really likes running.

• ChickenHead
  2:16 pm on February 7th, 2011 5

  The one on the left says "STUDY WORK SPEND CONFORM". The one on the right says "(this) SIGN (has) FOUR DISTINCT CHARACTERS".

• Glans
  6:21 pm on February 7th, 2011 6

  Does anybody know what that scrolls really say? They seem to be Chinese script, but maybe they represent Korean words. Or maybe they're Chinese all the way. Anyway, they're incomprehensible to me.

• ChickenHead
  11:30 pm on February 7th, 2011 7

  Glans,

  I have only a basic knowledge of Chinese characters and am mostly unaware of the added levels of complexity with combination and nuance…

  …however, the second one is easy.

  Become Spring Big Luck.

  All of those characters are commonly used in daily life in Korea.

  Every department store will have the character for spring as the background of their sale signs in March. The character for big is in the names for Daejeon and Daegu which you can see at the train or bus station. The character for luck, often stylized, is in many places… painted on mirrors, carved into the woodwork, etc.

  I would guess that many long-term residents of Korea will suddenly look at that sign in a whole new way now and go, "Ah-haaaaaa. Damn. I CAN read that!"

  Lots of stuff in life is like this if you open your eyes and mind.

  The first one is more difficult. I don't know the exact intention. Construct Light/warm Many Good events. This makes some sense but there is probably a deeper meaning.

  You will notice that the 2nd character is Yang (from yin/yang) which has lots of meanings. The character for "many" is common and easily recognized. The other two I'm not so sure of… there are probably many other meanings and I may not have the right ones.

  I'll ask my wife tomorrow and see if she has a better answer.

  She will probably tell me they say, "Round-eye Foreign Albino Snake-devil Can't Read Simple Sign".

• Teadrinker
  12:46 am on February 8th, 2011 8

  "Anyway, they’re incomprehensible to me."

  Yes, they are Chinese to me too.

• Teadrinker
  12:49 am on February 8th, 2011 9

  "I’ll ask my wife tomorrow and see if she has a better answer."

  My wife, a college professor, would say, "I don't effin' know. Do I look like an old lady?"

• Glans
  8:57 am on February 8th, 2011 10

  Thanks ChickenHead 7, that's progress. I didn't know that Chinese characters are widely understood in Korea. I wonder if the banners are grammatically correct Chinese sentences, or maybe just phrases, as in a motto or slogan; that could be equally correct in Korean as in Chinese.

  Now I wish I could think of a way to paste them into Google Language Tools.

• Kevin
  2:20 pm on February 8th, 2011 11

  the sign the woman is holding. 입춘대길 (ib choon dae ghil) spring is coming with great fortune.

  the sign the male is holding. 건양다경 (guhn yang da gyung) bringing many good things to build upon.

  something like that.

• Glans
  3:12 pm on February 8th, 2011 12

  Kevin 11, so then it's grammatically correct Korean, written in Chinese script? Read top to bottom, then right to left? I hope spring brings you good fortune!

• Kevin
  5:39 pm on February 8th, 2011 13

  chinese characters used in the korean language is called hanja. and yes it is read right to left. top to bottom.

  it is a proverb so if one only understood hangul (korean) they wouldnt be able to understand what the characters mean even with the translation i provided.

  ie the first character on the right is pronounced 입 (ib) and translated from the pronunciation it is mouth. but the character used means stand, begin or establish.

  i couldnt tell you if they do this in schools in korea, as i was neither born nor attended school in korea, but the old yangbans or nobles would have to be able to read these proverbs and then explain what they meant.

  so in old korea a student would be asked to read the characters in the picture and he/she would reply "ib choon dae ghil guhn yang da gyung. spring comes with great fortunes, bringing many things to build upon."

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