My Seollal Experience in Korea - Traditions, Food and Customs

The Lunar New Year called Seollal is more important in Korea than January 1st. I wrote details about greetings and traditions in case it's unfamiliar. I like eating tteokguk and getting sebaetdon the most. 😄

Do Koreans Celebrate Two New Years?

There are two New Year's Days in Korea: one on the solar calendar, known as Sinjeong (신정), which feels like a regular Sunday, and another on the lunar calendar, called Seollal (설날), a major family holiday.

Korea's Lunar New Year: Seollal

Seollal (설날) falls on the first day of the lunar calendar, usually in early to mid-February. It's a three-day celebration marking the beginning of the new year.

Korean New Year Customs

In Seollal, Koreans honor their ancestors and share delicious traditional Korean food with family (Christian families don't do ancestral rites). Children bow to adults, a gesture called '세배' (sebae), and adults bless them and give them pocket money called '세뱃돈' (sebaetdon).

Korea's New Year's Tradition: Sebae & Sebaetdon

I bow (세배 sebae) to my parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents and wish them a lot of blessings for the new year. My parents bow to my grandparents. I don't have to bow to my siblings. Getting pocket money (세뱃돈 sebaetdon) after the bowing is one of the best things about Lunar New Year. You can give it how much you want, but it's almost like a duty.

⛔ Attention! Bow only once for the living and twice for those who have passed away.

Kids are always bragging about how much money they got after Lunar New Year. Speaking of kids and pocket money stories, when we were kids, Korean moms used to "manage" sebaetdon. Now, we ask for it back, they're saying it's gone. 🤣😭

When I was young, my uncle ran away once because he didn't want to give sebaetdon to 7 children. 🤣 Many adults feel pressured to give sebaetdon to every relative's kids, especially now that the 50,000 won bill is in circulation. It feels awkward to give either 10,000 or 30,000 won.

You can find out more about the newest and highest-value Korean bill, the 50,000 won note, and its behind-the-scenes story in this post📌:

What Is the Korean New Year Greeting?

Happy new year in Korean is '새해 복 많이 받으세요' (Sae-hae bok man-i ba-deu-se-yo), which wishes the other person a lot of blessings in the new year. You can use this greeting for both the solar and lunar New Year.

• 새해 (sae-hae): new year
• 복 (bok): blessings or luck
• 많이 (man-i): a lot of
• 받으세요 (ba-deu-se-yo): receive

Korean New Year Clothing: Hanbok

For ancestral rites and bowing to elders on Lunar New Year morning, Koreans traditionally wear neat, modest clothes or 'hanbok' (한복), the Korean traditional outfit. It is especially cute to see children dressed in hanbok.

It's okay to just wear regular clothes. When I see my family and relatives, the adults usually wear normal outfits. When I was young, I wanted to wear a hanbok, but my mom didn't let me because I might spill food on the clothes and get them dirty. She said it was better for me to wear everyday clothes. ☹️☹️☹️

Korean New Year Food: Tteokguk

In the morning of Lunar New Year, people eat rice cake soup called '떡국' (tteokguk). Koreans say eating tteokguk will make you older. In tteokguk, the 'tteok' refers to rice cakes, like the ones in tteokbokki, and the 'guk' refers to soup. You can make tteokmanduguk with beef, anchovies, or bone broth. If you add dumplings (만두 mandu), it becomes tteokmanduguk.

I think many Koreans may have asked their moms when they were kids, "If I eat two bowls of tteokguk, will I age two years?" In order to be older than my older brother, I tried to eat more bowls than him, but he also ate a lot, so the age gap didn't narrow. 🤷‍♀️

Tteokguk, a Lunar New Year dish that Koreans love

Korean New Year vs. Chinese New Year

Korea and China both celebrate the Lunar New Year. They celebrate with family, but they do it in different ways. Korean and Chinese Lunar New Year traditions are a bit different. They have different holidays, food, and clothes.

	Korean	Chinese
Date	Lunar January 1st	Lunar January 1st
Name	Seollal	Chunjie
Holidays	3 days	7 days
Food	Tteokguk	dumpling, Tangyuan
Clothing	Hanbok	Red clothing

Chinese New Year food - tangyuan

Wrap-up

If you spend Seollal with Koreans, you can bow to the elders and try to get pocket money too (you can pretend you don't know about it as a foreigner if you have to give it ✔️). I hope you stay healthy in the new year and have a great time in Korea. Happy New Year! Sae-hae bok man-i ba-deu-se-yo!