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Museum hosts a New Year’s celebration

Published: 26 Jan. 2006, 22:21

The streets of Seoul are deserted during the Lunar New Year holiday, and most of the stores and restaurants are shut down. The Seoul Museum of History is the place to go for the next three days.
The museum will present free Korean traditional performances on Sunday featuring old Lunar New Year customs.
The event includes nasadang nori (nori means game) and yut nori, as well as seesawing, rolling steel hoops and group rope jumping. A mask performance and puppet shows will also take place, with comic sketches and characters dressed in female outfits.
Namsadang is a traditional male troupe of strolling actors who sing, dance, act and do stunts such as walking a tight rope, spinning earthenware bowls and tumbling.
The history and culture of the Namsadang troupe recently caught the eyes of the public due to the recent hit film “King and the Clown,” a tragic story of a king who falls in love with a Namsadang troupe.
Yut nori is a traditional game, in which four Yut sticks are tossed in the air, scores are calculated and pins are moved on a square board. A team who has its pins returns to the starting point on the board.
There will be giant yut sticks and a board for visitors to play with.
Visitors can also bake sweet potatoes the old-fashioned way.

by Limb Jae-un

The event begins at 11 a.m. and ends at 5 p.m. The Namsadang performance starts at 3 p.m. Seoul Museum of History is located in Jongno district and can be reached from exit 4 at Seodaemun station on line No. 5. The museum currently holds an exhibition of artifacts from the head family of the Jinseong Lee clan in Andong. The museum opens at 10 a.m. and closes at 6 p.m.