Lotus Lantern Festival Parade (Seoul)

Festival program with historical notes and a (rather Buddhist) acknowledgement of the Sewol ferry disaster.

We visited friends Jessica and Andre Kok in Seoul this weekend, and they reserved "foreigner seats" for the annual Lotus Lantern Festival Parade.   The festival itself is a several-day event that celebrates the birth of Buddha. Now I have been to a whole lot of parades: I participated as part of the marching band throughout middle and high school; observed a few Chicago parades; brought my lawn chair to watch the annual Sioux Center Summer Celebration parade, where kids gobbled up the tossed candy from the passing tractors, cars, and floats; attended the annual Tulip Festival when my kids marched in the band.  So, as an experienced parader, I pretty much knew what to expect.

Except, as usual in Korea, I was mostly wrong.

First was the free, reserved, street-side seating for foreigners, which is a wonderful perk.  Friendly Koreans in bright pink silk clothes (yes, both men and women) cleaned off our plastic lawn chairs, distributed English (!) festival programs, gave out do-it-yourself lanterns and votive candles, and even came around with lighters as dusk fell.

I love, love that no colors are off-limits for men in Korea.

Jessica successfully put together her lantern.

The parade was at least two hours long but without a single horse, car, truck, tractor, or bike; and no promotional floats (besides a couple of Buddhist schools). This was indeed a parade like I had never seen. It consisted of hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of people of every age walking past in groups while holding aloft a great variety of softly-lit paper and silk lanterns that had symbolic meaning. Without the entertaining music and dancers (canceled in light of the Sewol ferry disaster), the parade was relatively quiet--perhaps even solemn--which seemed rather fitting for a religious festival.   The ubiquitous yellow ribbons on wrists and lanterns were a constant reminder of the ferry disaster.


Many groups passed of different ages and genders; even a group of people in wheelchairs were pushed past.  My favorite part? The women's swishing hanboks (traditional silk gowns) and their soft chanting were mesmerizing; the closest comparison I have is the sound of the Orange City marching band's wooden clogs in the Tulip Festival parade.  If you've been there, you know what I mean by that almost-haunting sound.


A few human-propelled floats punctuated the walking groups, featuring enormous paper lanterns that symbolized aspects of Buddhism. Most of these large floats were led by ranks of brown-robed, bald Buddhists of every age and gender, who chanted together as they walked.



I can't easily describe the feeling of being there, watching so many people pass in the growing dark, lit only by their carried lanterns that symbolized their deeply-held beliefs.  So, here are a few pictures to give you a small sense of what we saw.

Giant, fire-breathing dragons; elephant mama and child (Buddhism began in India, but I don't know the specific connection to elephants).

The swastika is the traditional symbol of buddhism (centuries before the Nazis got hold of it);
many lions and dragons were features in the parade.

One of the Four Guardsmen (left); "lotus boy" on a lion and elephant.  Not sure what the specific significance is.

Groups included both devout ajummas in traditional gowns and giddy ajummas in regular clothes.

Children also carried an array of lanterns. 

It was not all seriousness, though.  Some inexplicable moments broke the reverie of the swishing, chanting buddhist river.  I was delighted that many monks wore sneakers under their austere robes, as did many ajummas under their expensive gowns. Some parade members took selfies as they marched along; others darted to the sidelines, waving at and photographing the foreign kids (one of the Kok's blondies got 1000 won from an admiring man).  A series of awful, pink "Lotus Boy" lanterns made the foreigners laugh, as did a cartoonish "mascot" buddha near the end of the parade.

Strangenesses even amidst the very foreign religious procession.

Walking back to the Kok's apartment after the long parade, carrying our free lanterns plus some others that the kids were given or we found along the way, I reflected on religion in Korea vs. the US.  About 25% of Koreans are Buddhist and about the same percentage are Christian.  In the US, 75% of adults self-identify as Christian, and Buddhism together with Judaism, Islam and Hinduism make up just 4%. But I don't see Christians in the US having these kinds of public celebrations, either somber or celebratory.  Instead, we seem to duck our heads, hiding behind church doors and Christmas trees, perhaps fearing to offend.  I felt strangely proud of Korean Buddhists, and perhaps more than a little envious of their modern commitment to a religious tradition that precedes Christ by hundreds of years.