Happy New everyone!

2017 passed in a blink, we could not believe it is already the New Year once again! We had so many things happening to us in 2017 and we are happy that most of it was positive.

Traditionally, in Korea New Year is celebrated a little bit differently from anywhere else in the world. While everyone are drinking champagne and shooting tons of fireworks at midnight, to welcome the New Year, koreans are waking up at dawn and welcoming the first sunrise instead.

Even though even in Korea there are many events on New Years Eve (including firework show at Lotte Tower and Bell ringing at Jongro), many Koreans still don’t change their concepts and celebrate the traditional way.

Welcoming the first sun is one of the traditions, but there is more. As some of you might already know, in Korea age is counted differently than anywhere else. When you are born, you are already one year old and then your age adds up at every January 1st. In Korea, people believe, that if you eat Rice cake soup (Deokguk) on that day, you will get one year older. Isn’t it interesting?

Since Gyu is a huge believer of this beautiful tradition, this year we have spent our New Year the Korean way. We woke up at 4 AM, went up to Namsan tower at dawn and set up to welcome the first sunrise. Thankfully, weather was great, so the sunrise ended up being extremely beautiful! Eve though it was really cold, it was worth waiting.

After that, we went to a local restaurant and ate some Deokguk to celebrate this special occasion.

Huge thanks for Nancy (FancyNancyTv) and her friend Den for joining this time. You did a great job, waking up so early and coming with us.

How did you spend this New Year 2018? Leave us a comment below!

We hope 2018 will bring only good to this world! Stay healthy, be happy and spend this year meaningfully! 🙂

Cheers, Gyu and Agata!