Locality Summer School

2017 Locality Summer School - HUFS

Por Cecília Bohrer (Brazil Team)

Say that I had high expectations about Korea is not enough. I've written over 150 journalistic articles about Korea and when you write so much about a place and talk so much about it with everyone, you end up creating a lot of ideas about this place. Many things have been confirmed, but Korea has surprised me in many ways.

Well, let me go in parts.

I must begin by saying that I already expected the education and responsibility of the Koreans and the people are very kind here and the city is very clean, you dont see any paper thrown on the ground or nothing like that. It's really fascinating.

Korea is a reference in education and I must say that the HUFS really has a structure that lives up to the praise of Korean education. I was amazed by the library, the computer rooms, the resources available in the room that I do my presentation, the auditorium, and the structure of the university as a whole.

The Korean food and snacks are truly wonderful and everything I that try was amazing. I could confirm the differences of the Korean seasoning for the Brazilian, as well as talking with my team I could understand a little about the Korean taste, like what they like to eat. Although I already know Korean food and I like it very much, I had no idea how the meal times and what is usually eaten at each time. Here I had a better view of it. I found that breakfast is extremely similar to lunch and dinner, very different from what I imagined. It was interesting to realize that the Koreans have dinner around 6pm, I always thought it was later like in Brazil.

Still on the food, I had the pleasure of having lunch at a Brazilian food restaurant, RioBrasil, which is run by Koreans. I must say that it was a unique experience to sample Brazilian food made by Koreans. The cool thing was to see how they adapted the food to the Korean palate. “vinagrete” is chopped so that you can get it with jeotgarak, even if there people eat with a knife and fork. The food is also bittersweet, similar to the Korean delicacies.

I already knew that Korea is an extremely technologically developed country, just as in Seoul there are several traditional Korean palaces. However, I did not understand how that flowed. To what extent technology and tradition are together and how they met. I was amazed when I did. Seoul is an extremely modern and developed city, but in several places we can see traditional monuments with an absurd preservation. The best part was entering the Changdeokgung Palace and feeling as if it had goes back in time. It's all so preserved, so alive and the Palace is so big that you forget that within seconds you were in a city as modern and technological as Seoul. It's something out of this world, it's like finding a haven from the hectic big city life.

This experience was even more remarkable because I was able to visit the Palace wearing a Hanbok. I had no idea how it would feel to wear traditional Korean clothing and it was surprisingly warm. I had no idea the clothes were so hot. The first five minutes were wonderful, I really felt honored. However, having lunch and walking around the Palace with the clothes is really difficult. 

You know, this is the kind of experience that makes you happy to do it. That you stop for a few seconds and think about how grateful you are to be living it. If it has this meaning for me, I imagine it for the Koreans. I was even ashamed to love something that is so significant to other people, at the same time flattered that they let me have this experience. The funny thing is that I expected to feel this way, the only thing I did not expect was the heat. Which brings me to the next topic, the Korean summer.

Well, for a long time, I wrote about the Korean beaches for the BrazilKorea website and I must admit that I still imagined a cold Korean summer. When I talked to my team before coming to Korea, I was surprised by them saying that Korea's summer was very hot. I brought summer clothes, but just to make sure I brought several cool clothes too. Only when I arrived and felt for myself the heat, that I believed.

However, despite the hot weather the sky here has many clouds, I believe because of the rainy weather, leaving the sky all white.

One curious thing is that the days in Korea seem to last longer. I had this feeling because here it starts to get dark around 8pm, while in Brazil it is around 6pm. When I asked Danah about this she explained that during the winter the opposite happens and by 05pm it is already dark. I found it fascinating because in Brazil this does not occur and so we adopted summer time in my country, for save energy.

When my team and I chose to talk about fashion, it was no surprise to me because I always thought that Koreans dress very well and that they care a lot about what clothes and shoes they wear. What struck me as I walked through the streets of Seoul was the diversity of styles.

In Brazil, diversity is a lastname. I see everyday people of different colors, ethnicities and styles living in harmony. Of course I know that everywhere people are different, but I was surprised by the number of tribes present in the day to day lives of the Koreans.

Now, let me go to my favorite part, the street performers. How many talented people live here, it's frightening. In Hongdae we went through a festival of street singers and at each step was a different rhythm and one was more talented than the other.

One of the cool things I experienced here was going to Everland. I've written a few stories about the festivals and presentations that happen in the park and I've always been fascinated by that place. Having the pleasure of knowing those scenarios that I must say, are wonderful, it is inexplicable.

Another magical experience was to meet the DDP and see the display of Loius Vuitton, that is wonderful by the way, and has everything about who likes fashion. The composition and colors perfectly matched the structure of the building.

Finally I left to speak of one of the most fantastic experiences that I lived here these days, that was to sleep in a Hanok. The Korean architecture is very rich, both the modern and the traditional, and the Hanok have a singular beauty. I found incredible everything I experienced there, from the joy of packing the beds to sleeping to the pleasure of sitting around the table to eat.