Christmas Season in Korea

I know it's not quite December yet but it's after Thanksgiving so I'm sure that Christmas is everywhere in America.  It is not quite that way here though.  We have come across some stands set up on the street selling Christmas decorations (usually at ridiculous prices) and some of the bigger department stores set up Christmas lights and decorations in the big shopping areas, but overall Christmas is definitely not the same in Korea.  One of the stores we shop at had a small section of "European-Style Christmas Decorations" the other day but it was not nearly as big or flashy as back home.  I was actually rather disappointed when I tried to do some Christmas activities with my students this week and found out their knowledge of some popular Christmas traditions was almost nothing!  In Korea, Christmas has become intended to be a romantic holiday for couples, rather than families and children.  It's a time where young Korean couples can walk around the areas by the expensive department stores looking at the decorations and buying expensive gifts, though still VERY absent of the commercialism we are used to seeing in America.  Most of the kids talk about getting some presents but it doesn't seem to be a big deal to them.  The real holiday for kids is Children's Day (May 5th).  Children's Day is a national holiday where everything is closed and parents spend the whole day doing things out and about with their kids.  And that's when they get A LOT of presents.  When I realized one of my elementary classes didn't know much about Santa (they guessed Rudolph made the toys so no, it isn't a translation issue) I asked them which holiday they are more excited for, Christmas or Children's Day.  It was quite clear that Children's Day is much more important to the kids here!  Although they do look forward to their winter vacation from school.  We have a one week vacation at the end of December but it doesn't start until after we work our regular full day schedule on Christmas Eve.  But we do have Christmas Day through New Years Day off so we are looking forward to a nice little break.

We plan to go searching for some Christmas lights and decorations to look at over the next couple weekends so that we can at least say we did something Christmasy.  After all Christmas in Korea is intended for couples!  And if nothing else: Starbucks has their red holiday cups and plays English Christmas music at all hours!  We do, of course, have a few decorations up in our house and tonight there is the smell of applesauce coming from the crockpot and a Christmas movie on the TV to go with our hot chocolate.  We think we can still make it feel almost just like Christmas :)