Everyone Watched a Mask Dance Drama Performance

July 21^st, 2011

At Dankook University the lesson plan for the day included showing the students the movie Seopyeonje which everyone should watch as it's fabulous, so I started out with a lecture orienting them to types of vocal music with extra emphasis on pansori (the subject of the movie). I think they really enjoyed it.

In the evening I met up with Kathy and Tim again and we went to the Dragon Hill Spa (찜질방) which was awesome, of course. They were quite impressed and really appreciative of the awesomeness that is Korean bathhouse culture.

July 22^nd, 2011

Prof. Hilary Finchum-Sung came to guest lecture to the class. Not knowing the route to Dankook University I met her at 강남 Gangnam Station and we took the bus together. This meant we had lots of time to chat, yay! She's far enough into her career to have great advice, but new enough to not have outdated information or have forgotten what you really need to know when you're at my stage. She gave a great lecture to the students—her focus was globalization in Korean music, talking about whether fusion is Korean music, for example, but she gave a good solid overview of Korean music before she got to the point of the lecture. Although I had taught the students lots of the same stuff, the reality is that they are being hit with tons of brand new words, an entire world of things they knew nothing about two weeks ago, so a solid well-organized review was great for them. Also she brought her 해금 haegeum with her and demonstrated different types of music on the instrument.  

For the end of class we discussed one out of two planned articles, then practiced 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum motions. The students are getting better and better. I rode back to Seoul with Hilary and went straight to 선릉역. I drank coffee and worked on my computer until it was time to meet Kathy. We briefly walked through the park at the royal tombs, then met Tim and ate dinner before the mask dance drama performance for the evening.

Not the best cell phone photo of Kathy

The performance was the third in this series where they are combining different arts on themes. The theme was 노장, the old monk. Oddly 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum showed their monk dance, then we saw the 은율탈춤 Eunyul Talchum old monk scene, or the start of it anyway. It felt very choppy and artificial and honestly the other two were not displayed well in comparison... Last there was about an hour of 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum. The performance included the 8목중 8 dark-faced monks plus the entire old monk scene all the way through the shoe seller and 취발이 Chuibali. 8 students from Dankook had come (6 of mine and 2 others) and they all enjoyed it. After they show they took photos with some of the performers, then I said bye to my friends who were there and Tim, Kathy and I had a drink before saying good-bye until who knows when. 

Lion Dance

July 8^th, 2011

On Friday, back in Seoul, my most important activity was to go to a performance at 풍류극장 Pungryu Theatre. Before that, however, I went to the first hour of 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum class. I love it when 장용일 teaches because, I realized, he's much harder on me and on all of us, so my skills progress faster when he's teaching than the rest of the time. He had ordered (on Monday) that all the new people  needed to show up early and that 병호 Byeongho had to show up early and teach them. But then as they mostly were doing pretty well, another guy showed up who didn't know anything. I taught him, which was good practice for my upcoming class. He learned super super fast, too, as he's a theatre major with some movement background. We ran through the first several monks (in order with monologue) and then I had to leave for the Pungryu Theatre downstairs.

They're currently staging a mask dance drama series, organized around themes. The theme for Friday was lion dance, and the main performance was by 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum's preservation association. Eunyul Talchum and Bongsan Talchum also joined them on stage a little. As the Bukcheong Saja Noleum friends were performing they kept noticing me in my center front seat and nodding or giving me a grin. I really have gotten to know quite a lot of them. After the show I went to their office and congratulated everyone. 

Two Interviews and Bongsan Talchum

June 7^th, 2011

I essentially spent the whole day writing. It was so productive, I was completely amazed.

June 8^th, 2011

I spent a lot of the day writing, I had intended to go to a concert in the evening but instead I stayed home and worked.

June 9^th, 2011

I interviewed the 인간문화재  National Human Treasure for 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum today. It was not the best interview, as she kept wanting to give me very "what you want to hear" answers instead of the real deal and not really stopping and getting off auto-pilot enough to hear that my questions weren't what she was used to (all the time). Ah, sometimes it's like that.

After that interview I talked to 장용일 for a bit and then went upstairs, 현석 had already arrived and we went to dinner- I interviewed him during dinner. He's a very directed kid, and fairly outspoken—I like him. The interview was good, since we've already talked a million times since I first met him in September.

봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum class today was quite good—we had 하연, 세준, 병호, 병우, 정현, 수미, 하연's friend, 주원 (almost two hours late), 현석 and me. So I took a group photo, because when I am writing the section of the dissertation on the class the only other people I'm mentioning from the class are in three cases no longer around. And in one case only attending on Monday. So this was the most I was ever going to get on the same day, I think. The two high schoolers will use pseudonyms in my dissertation. The others will use their real names. We only practiced the 8목중 the eight dark-faced monks, but we also did the solos at the end.  

A Visit to Bukcheong Saja Noleum and Bongsan Talchum Class

May 19^th, 2011

In the morning I finished the edits for the article in KOREA magazine and sent them to Editor Ines. I'd post at least one of the three stand-alone parts of the article here, except that would be before their version came out and I don't think they're paying me to use the articles in my blog. I can say, though, that in finding a way to add more content because Ines had nixed one section of the main article, I was able to add a nice fat section on Goseong Ogwangdae and even quote one of my past interviews with 이윤석 Yi Yunseok.

After finishing those articles and doing a couple other things that were overdue (including finally scheduling an interview with someone who has been beastly hard to reach). Then I left much earlier than usual for the Intangible Cultural Assets Training Center. I went directly to the 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum office. It turned out it was the National Human Treasure there (이근화선 Yi Geunhwaseon and yes that's a very unusual name for a Korean)'s birthday. I was invited to go to dinner with them, but I really just wanted to have a conversation and practice 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum. So I had a bit of a conversation with 이건홍 Yi Geonhong (이수자 isuja and Yi Geunhwaseon's son-- he has two daughters- one is an isuja, one is a jeonsuja), who is now the director of the new (just instituted in March) 중요무형문화재 총연 합회. I recorded a little of his description of the group and its plans/goals but although I think they're good, the goals seem too focused on communicating Korean traditional culture to foreigners, when honestly the more immediate goal should be to reverse the knowledge drain which is occurring as the older generation slowly but surely dies off. They plan to make a really great center where they can have the people protecting craft arts sit down and work on their arts as an ongoing demonstration, have a gift shop and gallery and have performances. This all really sounds like this building (Intangible Cultural Assets Training Center), why do we need another? How will the new facility be different? The only large difference I could see was that they would be able to offer ongoing performances so that any night (or any night except Monday for example) there would be a traditional performance for the audience (foreigners being the target) to see. It seems to me that there is a lot of desire for an ongoing/permanent/dedicated theatre for a traditional arts show hoping to mirror the success of 미소 Miso (at 청동극장 Chongdong Theatre) or Jump, Nanta and other such shows.

Honestly Miso is crap but it exists, it's already out there in the world, and although I'm not saying it's sold out every night, I am saying I'm not sure that a new show needs to compete with Miso, or more significantly with the Saturday traditional music and dance show (in many ways also focused at foreigners and compared to 40-50 dollar Jump it's quite affordable at less than 10 bucks) at the National Gugak Center It's true that the Gugak Center's show is also not sold out every time, but it's also on a Saturday and competing with everything else that's going on, even at 5 pm, since with transpo time 5 pm would still preclude many other Saturday evening activities. The show at the National Gugak Center, which usually has around 8 parts does include a couple duds sometimes but in general it's pretty good (a million miles away from Miso and its contrived story and orientalism).

Anyway, after a bit of light interviewing I agreed to come back and interview at Bukcheong Saja Noleum's office on another day and I went to Bongsan Talchum's office where 장용일 Jang Yongil was teaching from 중앙대 Jungang University percussion department students 사자춤 Sajachum or lion dance. I secured the right to be a staff member at the full length performance the weekend after next!!!!

In class we had seven people (not that many…), 허세준, 이병우, 현석, 화연, 하연 and 수미. We practiced fairly typically, with 화연 who is new  (4th class?) learning the basics between when the rest of us practice everything. In fact both 병우 and 현석 still make mistakes, but they know it all. After going through the 7 monks (missing monk 1 of course), the four women (including me in spot # 1) went through 사상좌춤 sasangjwachum. Then everyone practiced 소무 Somu. I keep bringing my fan because 김은주 Kim Eunju promised we'd be learning 할미 Halmi (grandmother) but I've been bringing my fan for a month and we haven't started yet. 

In Fact I -Do- Have a Husband

March 17th, 2011
On Thursday I had a very social day of research. I went to meet 백은실 Baek Eunshil from 강령탈춤 Gangnyeong Talchum and interviewed her. Then I headed straight to the intangible culture training center and went to see the people from 북청사자놀음 Bukcheon Saja Noleum. They have rehearsal on Thursday starting at 6, so there was the tail end of a meeting and in addition a bunch of people just hanging around waiting for things to start up. I just hung out and we had a wide-ranging mostly arts-related conversation until it was time for them to go practice (they start at 6). I headed up one flight of stairs to 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum where 현석 Hyeonseok had just signed up. He and I went to eat dinner (of course I bought it) and then I came back and got the entire roster of Bongsan Talchum's job area explained to me by 장용일 Jang Yongil which was really awesome.

Practice was pretty darn good, although Thursday is indeed smaller with no 연식 or 하연 among others.

March 18th, 2011
I went to meet 경진 Gyeongjin in the first Starbucks in Korea where we studied until around 1:30, then ate lunch. I met 현경 Hyeon-gyeong for dinner and met Hengyi Shr a Buddhist nun studying for her Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies at UCLA and her mother at the terminus of the airport railroad, brought them home and set them up for the night.

March 19th, 2011
송파산대놀이 Songpa Sandae Noli was cancelled because the teaching folks needed to be in a meeting at the same time. Instead I spent until 3 with 지수 Jisoo working in a coffee shop. When I got home I was disappointed Karjam wasn't there, but he showed up an hour later. We went to the Tibetan Film Festival and saw two films (and met two Tibetans who live in Korea).

Day 1 of the Korean Mask Dance Festival

October 29th, 2010
In the morning I had class at Seoul National University. The class was excellent again. I am not having much difficulty understanding Professor 박현순 Bak Hyeon-sun’s Korean at all, and she is so knowledgeable it’s really quite amazing. I’m knowledgeable about things, too, but the depth with which she can answer questions I asked such as “were yangban also regulating and taking a share of the profits from fisheries in the Joseon Dynasty?” (a question only tangentially connected to the topic at hand and certainly not closely related to her research)- well it’s just really great to have met her. As I sat in class and thought about the paper she wants me to write (what? I’m auditing!) I realized that the win-win scenario would be to propose we co-write the paper. She’ll get an English language publication out of it, and I can include an incredibly awesome historical analysis section to my paper on the Grandmother scene in Hwanghae and Gyeonggi Mask Dance Dramas. I proposed that to her as she drove me to the subway station after class (third time she’s done that) not enough time to really talk through it, though.

I rushed directly to the World Cup Stadium Subway stop, which is next to the park where the 4th Annual 대한민국탈춤제 Korean Mask Dance Festival was taking place. Or so I thought. Fortunately when I asked for directions, I was directed onto a shuttle bus because the walk was estimated to be 40 minutes!!! I arrived about twenty minutes into the performance of 하회별신굿탈놀이 Hahoi Byeolshin’gut Talnoli. My friends from the group were happy to see me, but I didn’t get a chance to say more than a few words because during the ten minutes between the two shows a TV crew cornered me and insisted on an interview (I was the only foreigner in sight, the entire audience must have averaged past 60 because honestly who else has time in the middle of a Friday? And I say that even considering the grandkids and a few housewives in the audience). The crew particularly insisted because during the show 이매 Imae (the mentally retarded character in the drama) has singled me out and insisted that I (and three Koreans) get onto the stage and dance with him, and of course I’d danced well (and tied Imae’s shirt closed and so on, since I was irritated I’d been dragged onto stage). So they wanted to include a clip of me on the stage and then the interview.

Photo: classic Imae pose


The next show was 동래야류 Dongnae Yayu, but this time there was any excellent announcing during their performance, in fact the entire announcing for the day consisted of a man and a woman behind the scenes, only communicating the bare facts of name and geographic home of the various groups. I later found out that they were people from Hahoi that were on the microphones. At any rate, I still enjoyed Dongnae Yayu’s performance. They had 12 musicians including the standard bearer, which really makes them the group with the largest number of performers on the stage. Some of the old ladies sitting by me (who gave me an excellent macaroon!) were copying along and responding on the lines, and kept up a running commentary throughout. They always wanted to know if performers were men or women, they cheered loudly when Halmi chased off the concubine and they and the rest of the audience exclaimed and giggled at appropriate moments (such as when the giant acupuncture needles come out). Having such an old audience actually meant the audience was much more appropriately responsive throughout the show.








The last show for the day was 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum. Since the show began at 4 p.m. I was sort of surprised to see my friend 지훈 Jihoon dancing. The show felt a little frustrating to me, since just three weeks earlier I’d seen an extended version and it was still fresh in my memory, today was unsatisfyingly abbreviated. Many parts were included but then rushed, so that the perfect flavor wasn’t communicated. [Video file of excerpts from the performance]








After the show I talked a bit to one of my 고성오광대 Goseong Ogwangdae friends who was running a lot of organizational details backstage before I left.

The shuttle bus took me back to the stadium which has a Homeplus built into the ground floor, so I bought some good food before taking the subway home. Karjam walked down to the subway station to help me lug it home, he’s so sweet when he’s worried about my health.

Bukcheong Saja Noleum Performance

October 8th, 2010
My morning Seoul National University class was even better than before. The professor is sometimes a little off the mark (as in her understanding of Korean history has been understandably colored by being trained only in Korea by in many cases nationalistic scholars), but she’s super knowledgeable, and I enjoy talking with her. The problem is that the rest of the students are half asleep and say NOTHING. Actually some are only occasionally awake (at least no one snored). If they engaged with the material I’d believe they were in graduate school, seriously, it’s embarrassing. This was a problem during my MA at Yonsei, too. Do they expect information to be spoon-fed to them? The passivity of learning is just phenomenal.

I took a nap in the afternoon and then went to the performance of 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum in 풍류극장 Pungryu Theatre, which is on the first floor of the Intangible Cultural Properties Training Center that houses both Bukcheong and Bongsan Talchum among other arts. I paid for a ticket, despite knowing how to get in for free (and knowing that no one would challenge my right to be there), because I feel bad about the situation that’s cropped up. This year they decided to charge 5,000 per ticket but they didn’t do any extra advertising and last year’s standing room almost non-existent has become this year a half empty theatre (and it’s a small theatre).

The performance was awesome, Bukcheong is so different from the other mask dance dramas. I actually wrote detailed notes, in abridged form:
The performance began with a short, educational but fairly general intro by the theatre staff. Then most of the dancers danced in and out again after circling the stage. At last the Yangban is dragged onto stage by his servant, they talk and the Yangban says to bring music, so the servant calls the musicians onto stage.
The musicians were on 징jing (one person) and 북 buk (one person) and 통소 tongso (four people). They stood to the back and side of the stage, they do not wear masks (like 양주별산대) or flower hats (like 풍물 pungmul performers wear), but have exposed faces, a headband (of the type worn under a mask) and exposed heads. Next the Yangban wants dancers and 한삼 hansam (sleeve extension) dancers come out (exposed faces but wearing hoods), then knife dancers (exposed faced men with no hoods, 지훈 Jihoon was the leader of the two and cued the other guy as to what to do). Next two 소고 sogo dancers (both in men’s clothing, although they were women) and two older women in hoods and hanbok with 한삼 hansam came out. The following act was Jihoon and his partner back again with the two little children dancing on their shoulders. This was followed by the dance of the physically retarded hunch-backed woman (how would that ever go over in the US?), one of the highlights and one of the only other masked characters. After another dance by the married women in 한복 hanbok and hoods the lions finally come out. The lions were great, after the lion who ate the rabbit gets sick a monk chants for him and an acupuncturist comes out with needles (metal chopsticks). There was a final bow and then they taught the lion dance to anyone who wanted to learn, I did and go to dance the backside of the lion (manipulating the tail). The costume wasn’t as heavy or uncomfortable as I had worried it would be.

Photo- actually from Andong, but this is one of the same lions!

Gagok, Bongsan and Coffee with Bukcheong Saja Noleum Performers

October 7th, 2010
I still feel horrible. But I really had to drag myself to Prof. Hilary Finchum-Sung’s class, or burn that connection (partially anyway), so I went. It was totally amazingly educational, of course. The class subject was vocal music and devoted half to court/upper class forms and half to folk forms, her TA is actually doing an MA in 가곡 gagok, the most aristocratic of all the singing styles, and something that was MUCH more interesting when just watching her sing than when going to some concert with it dragging on a bit too long and sandwiched between things I enjoy much more (like every single folk performance genre). She demonstrated very carefully and the background explanation made the difficulty of the genre clear. We tried singing a little 시조 shijo, which is a considerably simpler but also aristocratic singing style and just the difficulty in that was too much for non-musical me. At the end of the folk section we sang 진도 아리랑 Jindo Arirang and Hilary demonstrated a bit of a song she’d recently sung on TV with her daughter, and it was quite impressive, although she claims not to capture the perfect Korean flavor. [Youtube example of 가곡 which comes in distinctly male and female versions, if you listen to the whole thing you should know that this is only 3 lines of a poem! Each syllable can be stretched for many syllables in the song and no, Koreans do not understand the poem when they hear this. Apparently it is meditative to sing and practice and very much a part of the Confucian aesthetic. The female version is more impressive, I think.]

I staggered home, my head pounding, and Karjam nursed me, then I slept for an hour and a half and headed to 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum class. I would have skipped it, but I had an appointment with 지훈 Jihoon, my friend from 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum at 9 after he finished their practice, so I went ahead. It was fortunate that I decided to go because I arrived a bit early and had a chance to interview the new office manager (the fourth since I've been doing Bongsan Talchum) about why they'd hired him (he has an MBA) instead of someone with a traditional arts background. In short, they're going to expand into more fusion performances, or appearing in shows before or after fusion performances, and are readying teams who can present Bongsan Talchum in new and interesting ways. I have not formed my opinion yet. And while I was there two guys for 고성오광대's fusion team showed up! And the one guy knows me, so... it was a good day not to be absent. I only practiced the key parts of the dance, and skipped everything repetitive, extra strenuous and stuff I have down pat. 원 중 Won Jung called right before class started to tell me he thought he’d made a couple small mistakes (in his audition to a traditional performing arts program in university) but overall had done pretty well, then he came and we talked more, I will relay those details when I find out if he goes to the second round or not.

I went to Starbucks with Jihoon and another Bukcheong guy, 이 우 Yi U, it has been quite some time since I met a Korean with no consonants in their name. We talked politics of performance, which was quite useful to hear it from their (performing) perspective, especially since they are in another group. Came home. Writing this. Need to collapse.

Photo off my cell: the new very very bright Posco Building across the street from the training center.

First Weekend at the Andong Mask Dance Festival

September 24th, 2010
Karjam, Georgy, Jinhong and I had a great day. Mostly the menfolk went their way and Georgy and I hung out on our own, drinking coffee and browsing for 개랑한복 modernized hanbok with no luck. In the evening we met up with Aniko for excellent tea.





September 25th and 26th, 2010

Karjam and I arrived in Andong around 10:15 and quickly found our way to the 여인숙 Yeo’insuk where I always stay (primitive accommodations for sure- no shower, toilet barely flushes (if you splash water on it). Then the Singapore team started calling us. Although I was worried, they turned out to be really easy to deal with, not like Korean channels at all. They had us walk past them twice to show us at the festival, they interviewed us (and let me restate things) and then later when Karjam was getting ready they came and one guy talked to him in the changing room and their leader filmed the actual performance. Karjam’s performance went very well. He sang four songs, and his voice was really optimal (his voice can be screwed up very easily for a variety of reasons). Their sound system had some hiccups, but I filmed it all and I plan to put it on Youtube.

Photo: Karjam was placed so that he was looking almost directly into the sun (which was low as you can see from the shadow). He spent a lot of time with his eyes closed.

Bongsan Talchum, Eunyul Talchum and Bukcheong Saja Noleum:
Photo: The photographers stake out the front row and yell at anyone who gets between them and their subject.

The first performances we went to were the combined showing of 봉산탈춤 Bongsan Talchum, 은율탈춤 Eunyul Talchum and 북청사자놀음 Bukcheong Saja Noleum. The line to buy tickets was out of control, but we made it in and found a somewhat decent seat. The three groups performed continuously in the order I’ve written above, then at the end all three groups showed their lion dances at more or less the same time. The Bongsan lion is a two man affair, Bukcheong has two lions of two men each and Eunyul has a three man (six-legged) lion. Honestly the combined showing is a really bad idea in my opinion. If you want to show them back to back, that’s cool, but the entire performance was an hour and a half, instead of each group getting 50 minutes or an hour to perform, they each had just half an hour. Also it was a huge missed opportunity. A knowledgeable announcer could have been explaining how the different mask dances are similar and pointing out how they are different, not easy visual observations like the number of legs on the lion, but how the 통소 tongso music that accompanies the Bukcheong group is distinctively indicative of its origins in the far north of the Korean peninsula with some explanation of how the tongso is rarely used in Korean folk music (more often in court music) but its close relative the dongxiao is very common in the Manchurian part of China, or something like that. It’s the only mask dance drama to use this instrument—I think the audience would find it interesting to learn more about the musical differences. Or the differences in mask construction, or the differences in the scenes (and number of scenes) including even an explanation of the differential sense of humor. If a good announcer had been explaining all of that I think that the audience would have walked away with a much more comprehensive understanding of what they had just seen. I suspect that the audience couldn’t tell when one mask dance ended and the next started if the large banners with the names of the groups had not been present (and did they even notice? If they did, could they read 한자 hanja (Chinese characters used in Korean) to know what the name of the group was? The announcer is up in a booth behind the seating, on a PA system that is hard to hear, it all sort of blends together, and I honestly believe that almost no one paid attention to the announcing which did exist (which was none during the show, and only basic info such as the name of the groups and their number (“intangible cultural asset number 15”). During the show I did get to see lots of people I know, but curiously of the people I know well from Bukcheong Saja Noleum I was only able to spot one, 지훈 Jihoon, who both danced with a small boy on his shoulders and danced the back half of a lion.
Photos: Above Bongsan Talchum is so photogenic.Below, Eunyul Talchum

Photos below: Bukcheong Saja Noleum




Photos: The Bukcheong lions eat a rabbit and lick their lips. They also get indigestion in a full length performance.


After this show I was again accosted by TV cameras, and this also happened later in the day, organized by the people from Andong City. I gave several newspaper interviews as well. The City of Andong gave me a 양반 Yangban (character from Hahoi Byeolshin’gut Talnoli) mask bolo tie, a 1/3 size Yangban mask on a black background to hang on my wall and tickets to the main stage as well as tent restaurant meal vouchers. They are very sweet. Among my favorite people I got to see again was Ogata Keiko, a Japanese woman married to a Korean fellow, she works for the Andong Department of Tourism (and I think he does, too).

Hahoi Byeolshin’gut Talnoli:
The other Korean domestic mask dance performance I saw for the day was 하회별신굿탈놀이, Hahoi Byeolshin’gut Talnoli. The mask dance drama is from just outside 안동 Andong, and is the reason why the city found it appropriate to start a mask dance festival. The performance was included several highlights of their show, which is so often performed for tourists (at a sort of folk village outside Andong called 안동하회마울 Andong Hahoi Village) as to be incredibly pat, but of course in the time slot they couldn’t perform the entire full length performance. I have never seen their full length performance, and would definitely like to if it’s ever possible, I’m curious as to what else there is. The announcing was the same as for the other shows, almost inaudible although clearly in Japanese, English and Korean.




Photos: Would you buy a bull's ball sack from this man?

New Friends:
One very funny thing happened for the day. After Karjam’s show finished a guy appeared who looked very Tibetan. It turned out he was Desang, a cultural exchange fellow with the Andong City government from Bhutan (and ethnically Tibetan). He’s a mask dancer and singer, and is learning Korean and translating (how? His English is weak and his Korean really non-existent) documents for the city. They immediately hit it off. Desang is basically able to understand Karjam’s Tibetan, although he cannot speak it. And though the Andong people are very nice, they may not know how to help him with some of his problems. For example, we almost immediately found that he had been using a computer less than two months and essentially had no idea what he was doing. His computer was chock-full of viruses. I spent about two hours (until almost midnight) cleaning off unnecessary programs and installing anti-viruses and setting up a bookmarks bar with the places he actually wants to visit (Karjam taught him how to use Youtube).

Desang is not the only fellow, there is one from Thailand and one from Indonesia. The one from Indonesia, Iwan, we met quite soon after going to the office. I know my background, but of course Iwan doesn’t, I’m just some random white woman right, so imagine this conversation from his perspective.
“Where in Indonesia are you from?”
“Yogyakarta”
“Oh, I know some people from Yogyakarta, maybe you know them?”
(Just imagine how this sounds. I’ve had people honestly ask if I know their random Korean-American relative who lives in Seattle. They actually think I might. Yogyakarta is HUGE.)
Like the very polite and sedate man that he is Iwan answered “Oh, really?”
“Yes, my friends are all in traditional arts, they work at ISI and SMKI.”
At this point, of course, Iwan’s face lights up a bit, realizing I’m not full of it.
“Well, my women friends are Heni and Uni Yutta.” I start to explain, and within minutes we have realized we have at least Heni, Uni, Rossa, Sunardi and Eko and Professor Judy Mitoma in common. What are the odds that an Indonesian and an American meet in Korea and have multiple friends and acquaintances in common?

Photo: Karjam and I tried to recreate the first photo of us when we first met. We'll try again on our actual anniversary (9/30).


Goseong Ogwangdae (Sunday 9/26/2010):
Karjam and I got up late, but still made it to the performance of 고성오광대 Goseong Ogwangdae before it began and got a good seat (between one of the two people feeding video to the big screens in the hall and one of Professor 전경욱 Jeon Gyeonguk’s assistants). Goseong is one of the three mask dance dramas that my research focuses on, and I was very gratified when they danced in and I got multiple nods and mini-waves and winks (many of the performers, when they enter, are not in masks, they line up, standing, along the back and play music, periodically leaving to change clothing and re-emerge as a mask dancer). The show was amazing, professor Jeon’s assistant thought so, too. They engaged with the audience over and over, pulling people out and interacting with them, sitting with the audience and particularly picking on one foreign guy (who went along with the jokes). They performed all five scenes (I don’t think it was too abridged), ending with the funeral procession of the grandmother (I go out and hang 10,000 won (just under 10 dollars) on the bier ropes as though it were a real funeral). They then invited everyone onto stage to dance together and I joined in, with Karjam and introduced him to some of the performers. After the show I talked to them, including the 회장님 director (and human treasure) 이윤석 Yi Yunseok, obtaining an invitation to come visit them as often as possible, which is what I was after. I also gave my new contact information to the office manager.

Photos: I couldn't pick, there are so many good ones. The Yangban uses a small child from the audience to keep Bibi away from him, here is covers the child's eyes to shield her from the scary Bibi. Check out how old and worn the masks are.






We left the festival grounds shortly thereafter, taking the 1:30 bus (the only one with seats between 1 and 3 pm) back to Seoul and our comfortable little home.