Lantern Festival

This was the second year of Seoul's annual lantern festival. The lanterns are set up on pedestals in Cheonggyecheon stream, which has an interesting story itself. They were set up in the center of the stream for about a mile. There is a nice walking path along both sides of the the stream, and they had it set up so that each side was one way. Having lived in Korea for a while now, I have to say this was a surprisingly efficient endeavor.

The lanterns were beautiful and very finely crafted; I'm pretty sure they were made of rice paper. Of course, most of them had a Korean theme, but there was an international section with mostly Japanese and Chinese displays. They did have the Statue of Liberty and Superman representing for the US though!

This is a display of Namdaemun, literally south great gate, the south gate for ancient Seoul. (Namdaemun is also the name of the market where we went midnight shopping in a previous post because, as you guessed, it is next to Namdaemun gate and has been for centuries.)

Lanterns you could purchase to float downstream. They only went about 100 yards before they had a trap set up to catch them.

Lanterns hanging in the trees. These were my favorite displays!

Walking down the path.