Seoul

We arrived at our hotel in Seoul after the group who had come ahead had left for the tour. We called them, and they came back to get us - giving us 20 minutes to shower and get ready.





The first place we went was to the royal palace, Gyeongbok Palace. There is no longer a ruling royal family here. The last monarch was from the Lee family. It doed out in a rather tragic manner having to do with the Japanese occupation, marriage of the prince to a Japanese woman, marriage of a son to an American and their not having any children - very complicated and sad. The palace, whose name means the Palace of Shining Happiness was actually rebuilt as it would have been in 1392. It had been totally destroyed by fire as a result of a Japanese invasion. At the time it was functioning, 4000-5000 people lived there. Besides the royal family, there would be 150 eunuchs, 500-600 ladies in waiting, and then soldiers, etc.

There are a number of buildings - the public ones being in the front and the private in the back. There was a large throne room with a very large plaza in front where the people could gather. When there was a public event, the royal family would use the center of the plaza, the military would be arranged according to rank on the right and civil officials would be on the left. The platform directly in front of the throne room is built out of uneven stones in order to protect the king from falling. How would that help, you may ask. Well, the thinking was it would make the king be more careful in his walking (not run, etc.) so he wouldn't fall....interesting reasoning.
There was a fish net screen in front of the throne area to keep the people from actually seeing the king. You had to have permission to look at his face. Our guide, Park, explained that attitude of not being permitted to look people, especially older or people of a higher rank, in the eyes has impacted the Asian perception of and by the world. While westerners expect to be looked in the eyes, the is a very hard thing to do, and, therefore, they are perceived to shify-eyed.

There was a mural behind the king representing the five elements: sun and moon, water, fire, earth, and metal. It represented long life and alway went with the king wherever he was. People always stood in a kowtowing position - bowing before the king.

Only ladies in waiting and eunuchs were allowed in the private quarters. In their society, eunuchs were those who had been born with that birth defect, they weren't castrated. The royal eunuch was treated as the mediators between the inner people (the queen and ladies in waiting) and the outer people (men and the king). Eunuchs were very powerful and had to pass rigorous examinations. The king's eunuch had to be able to run very fast, carring the king on his back, in order to get the king to safety. He was also hung upside down and tortured in order to assure that he could withstand torture.

Ladies in waiting were chosen from the people and were then required to stay in the palace for life unless the king/queen died and then they were released. They were also required to stay virgins unless the king chose them to be concubines. If a concubine had a child, the child was considered part of the royal family. If the queen died, a concubine could take her place.

Off-spring were very important - especially male, of course. Consequently, while the other buildings in the royal complex had a wooden bar at the roof, that was not the case on the king's and queen's bedroom buildings. They didn't want any obstacle to be placed to keep them from having a boy baby.

We asked about the prevalence of dragons in their architecture and were told that they command all the water creatures.

Both the king and queen had many bedrooms and rotated where they were in order to try to stay safe.

The palace was last lived in in 1895. The queen was assassinated in that year by the Japanese. She had a Japanese maid who was forced to betray her. She was stabbed and then they burned her body. The king abandoned the palace because he was too painful of a place for him to be.
Other miscellaneous stuff learned at that time:

Koreans have strong jaws because the food they used to eat more often was very hard to chew - grains and meat - that trait seems to be disappearing. They also have high cheek bones and double folds in their eyelids.

95 % of Koreans have health insurance, but it doesn't pay for procedures such as MRI's. They have a mixture of public and private insurances. The rate they pay is calculated using some kind of formula that includes their profession, where they live, and land they own, etc. The life expectancy for men is 78, for women, it is 84. They have 1.7 children per family (I always worry about fractional children). That has been a big change when it used to be 5 children per family. So, the current and future work force won't be able to support the retirees.

They have alot of stomach cancer here because of the salty and spicy food they eat. Cars are cheap but gas is very expensive - $7-$8 per gallon! They have to import all of it.

The Korean alphabet consists of 10 vowels and 14 consonants. It was developed in 1443. Before that, they used the Chinese alphabet.

They don't have the issue of only wanting boys. It was an issue up to the 1970s or 80s, but not so now. Men still have an advantage mostly because they are the ones who serve in the military and doing that earns merits which impact employability.

We stopped to see their White House which is called the Blue House. There is going to be a presidential election in December. The president serves one 5 year term. They are trying to change that so there can be more terms. Their will be a congressional election next year, and they can serve multiple 4 year terms. We also so the guest house where receptions, etc. are held.

We then went to the Jogyesa Temple which is the center for Zen Buddhism in Korea. It was very interesting to learn more about another Budddhist Sect. They had a swastika as a decoration on their buildings. It is the syn symbol which represents purification. It reminded me of when I went to Mills, Jewish Grandma Mollia gave me an American Indian rug for my floor. When I unrolled it, it had a swastika on it. It was shocked but learned that it is an ancient Indian symbol. The Nazis took a beautiful and meaningful symbol, turned it backwards (literally), and perverted it so that the associations we have with it are negative. I guess they thought it was the way to represent their "pure" race.

We then had a traditional Korean lunch. I enjoyed it, and Dad ate as much as he could - it really was spicy. We walked around a narrow shopping district callled Insa-dong. There wer things we probably should have bought but didn't, t hinking we'd get back there, but it is pretty far away. We'll see.

We came back, exhausted, took a nap and then went to dinner with the group. We had American food - it was well received.