Chuseok: How Important?

What are the advantages or good effects of having celebrations of family get-together to a person? 

In our country, we do not have this kind of special event since Filipinos do it every Christmas season where the whole family gather together or reunite to celebrate the occasion. It is very known to me that countries like USA and South Korea have this traditional holiday they call “Thanksgiving Day”, which is considered also as a family gathering or reunion with their love ones and relatives. Modern Koreans call it Chuseok (추석), the Korean Thanksgiving Day. It is originally known as Hangawi (한가위, from archaic Korean for "the ides of August"), is a major harvest festival and a three-day holiday in Korea celebrated on the 15th day of the 8th month of the lunar calendar. According to an internet post, like many other harvest festivals, it is held around the Autumn Equinox. Koreans visit their ancestral hometowns and share a feast of Korean traditional food such as songpyeon and rice wines such as sindoju and dongdongju as a celebration of the good harvest. Chuseok is the time of the year when Seoul is empty and everything is calm and tranquil in the city.

songpyeon

The difference of this thanksgiving celebration with regular family gathering seasons is that they respect and give thanks for all the blessings they are getting from the agricultural resources in their country. Eloquently, on Chuseok, there is a mass exodus of Koreans as they return to their hometowns to pay respects to the spirits of their ancestors. Koreans celebrate their Chuseok this year on September 11 - 13. People perform ancestral worship rituals early in the morning. They also often visit the tombs of their immediate ancestors to trim plants and clean the area around the tomb, and offer food, drink, and crops to their ancestors, which Filipinos do during the 1st day of November. Harvest crops are attributed to the blessing of ancestors. 

In my opinion, it is important that a busy person should have a time to get back to his family if working away from them as to make bonding. Family time is one of those things that a person should give more attention. With today’s busy lifestyle, many parents and grandparents want to spend more "quality" time with their children or grandchildren. But what is quality time? "Quality time" is time spent doing an activity that is meaningful to the parent and child. It is time when family members really get to know each other. Quality time is spent focusing attention on the other person and sharing thoughts and feelings.

Spending time with our children can be fun and educational for us and for them. Much of the child's basic learning takes place in the many informal situations that occur daily in the life of the family. These informal/formal occasions for learning include all the times the family members are together doing ordinary things, such as getting dressed, talking over the day’s happenings, dealing with problems, interacting with people outside the family, taking baths, eating, and so forth. 

The activity does need not be costly, but rather one that satisfies both the parent and the child. 

Jumping Board Game: Korea

Children need to know they are loved unconditionally. The cry of children today is, "Love me for who I am, not what I do. Love me for being who I am, even when I am naughty, not winning, placing, and showing". That does not mean that you have to approve of everything the child does. What it does mean however, is that even though the child misbehaves, we still love and accept the child and provide support, this points for the parents whose children are away from them to work or study. 

Children learn about families from the time they spend in their own families. They learn about birth and caring for another person when a new baby comes home from the hospital. They learn about loss when a family member dies. They learn about marriage and relationships by watching their mothers and fathers interact. By living in a family, children learn to share, how to stand up for their own rights, and how to love another person. 

We help children develop positive self-esteem by communicating the value we feel for the child. Words of encouragement and love help provide children with the courage to try new things without worrying excessively about not being able to do them. 

Children learn about trust at home from their parents. They learn trust from being trusted. When we trust the child to accomplish a task on his or her own, the child learns that he or she can do the task.

In summary, it is best for a person to take a vacation, take all effort to go back to his hometown and spend quality time with their family as it get them to know their family’s clan members more. Also, it is so relaxing seeing good nature spots and breath fresh air you can only enjoy in the province.