Turkey and mashed potatoes were not part of the Korean Thanksgiving (Chuseok) celebration last night.

The event, which Korean Undergraduate Student Association (KUSA) and Korean International Students at Emory (KISEM) hosted, hosted a traditional Korean dinner in White Hall to celebrate the holiday.

The approximately 150 students who attended rushed to get in line for plates of the steaming beef (bulgogi), fried chicken (dak ganjung), rice cakes (songpyun) and other Korean dishes.

“I haven’t had Korean food in a long time and I really missed it,” College junior Daniel Kim said.

KUSA President Eunice Kwon said the organizations wanted to provide students with Korean food for the holidays, even though they are away from home, especially because Chuseok is one of the largest and most widely celebrated official holidays in Korea.

“I came because there’s free food and I like Korean food,” College junior Jacqueline Woo said. “I don’t really know anything about Korean culture.”
After loading heap after heap of Korean food on their plates, students gathered around tables to eat and chat with friends.

“It’s a wonderful opportunity for people to get together,” College sophomore Andrew Jo said. “It’s a great chance to get to know people and to learn about Korean culture.”

Chuseok, which took place on Oct. 3 this year, celebrates the harvest season in Korea on the 15th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar during the Autumn Equinox.

The three-day holiday is not only a chance to get together with relatives, but also a time for Koreans to honor their ancestors. Koreans often visit their ancestors’ graves during Chuseok. The eldest son in each family is supposed to offer food to his ancestors at the grave site.

Last year, KUSA did a demonstration of this ritual, which Kwon said was not very effective.

To explain this custom and others to students this year, KUSA and KISEM chose to show two videos prior to the dinner in White Hall Room 208.

The first video gave background information about the holiday, explaining the significance of certain Chuseok traditions.

“We wanted to give students who are not Korean the opportunity to learn more about Chuseok and to give them the opportunity to celebrate,” Kwon said.

She added that a lot of Koreans do not know that Chuseok is, and that she hopes the video helped them become more knowledgeable about the holiday.
KUSA and KISEM also produced a brief video detailing what Chuseok means to them.

Vice President of KISEM and Goizueta Business School senior Sung In Jung said he thought the informational video was outdated.

He said the first video was not one KUSA or KISEM produced, and he said the organizations should create a new video for next year that will better allow students to understand the meaning of Chuseok.

College freshman Jungmin Cho said she was glad she was able to attend the event since she celebrates Chuseok annually with her family at home.
“I thought they weren’t going to do anything for Chuseok and I was really upset,” Cho said. “It was a really great event.”

Though Jung, like several other students at the Chuseok celebration, said he enjoyed the Korean food, he said he wished the event had drawn a more diverse crowd.

“It was kind of like our own party,” Jung said.

— Contact Molly Davis at molly.davis@emory.edu