Student brings Korean tradition and culture to UNH

Donghyun Lee stood nervously before his fellow students on Friday as he presented them with a look into traditional Korean culture.

"I was nervous. I don't really like the stage," said Lee after giving his half-hour PowerPoint presentation, complete with photos and video.

Lee's presentation was held in the Entertainment Center of the MUB and consisted of nearly 50 slides that focused on traditional Korean holidays, most intense being Seollal, the Korean New Year.

Seollal is a three-day celebration that begins on the first day of the lunar Korean calendar. This year, the holiday was observed on Jan. 26.

According to Lee, Seollal is the most important and anticipated holiday for the Korean people.

"It's the more family-oriented holiday," said Lee. "It's like Thanksgiving Day is to American families."

The holiday consists of a number of different rituals. Children pay respect to their parents by bowing and saying, "May you receive many blessings in the New Year." In return, parents offer words of wisdom to the children and give them "New Year's Money."

Seollal also involves the acknowledgement of the dead. Families visit the graves of their ancestors and clean them while performing rituals.

Food is a major part of the holiday celebration as well. A typical Seollal dinner consists of wine, beef and fish, and fruits and vegetables. Tteokguk, a traditional soup, is also served, which acts like an American birthday cake, believed to add one year to a person's life.

Despite the significance of the holiday, Lee didn't celebrate Seollal in January while he was at UNH, but assumes that some Koreans in America did.

"I didn't celebrate the holiday, but Korean villages in Boston and other cities probably still celebrate it," said Lee.

Lee is a senior microbiology major who hails from a small town in Korea. He is part of the Office of International Students and Scholars program, which co-sponsored the event along with the MUB. It is a requirement for Lee to do the presentation through his scholarship program.

When looking for a school to attend in America, Lee wanted to live in an area where there were few Korean people. According to educationportal.com, about 2 percent of the students at UNH are of Asian descent.

"Learning a second language isn't easy," said Lee. "If you're around Korean people, you'll want to speak Korean more and not the new language."

Witnessing Lee's presentation was an audience of about 30, consisting mostly of other international students that wanted to show support for their fellow peer and the program.

Varouna Appiah, a freshman environmental engineering major and international student from Mauritius, knows what it's like to give presentations like Lee's and was there to show support.

"I give presentations too," said Appiah. "It's required to come, but I come because I like it."

English major Kirstin Striker said she's interested in Korean culture, in particular the alphabet, but doesn't know as much as she'd like too.

"I don't know much about Korean culture," said Striker. "This was a good place to start."

Aside from discussing the traditions of the New Year, Lee described other holidays celebrated in Korean culture. There is Daeboreum, which marks the first full moon of the year, Dan-oh, in which the people wash their hair in boiled sweet flags of water to protect them from disease and evil spirits, and Dongji, which marks the winter solstice, to name a few.

Junior Willemijn Doedens, an international student from the Netherlands, thought Lee's presentation was interesting and offered plenty of cultural information.

"I thought it was good," said Doedens. "I feel like I gained a good knowledge about Korean culture."