The approach to Queen Munjeong's Tomb / Courtesy of David Tizzard

Autumn in Korea is magical. You can even smell it coming, walking the streets late at night. Barbeque joints, chicken houses, and all sorts of other cafes, bakeries, and places selling food and booze finally open their doors and windows, putting customers out in the road. People no longer run from building to building seeking either the sweet solace of an air conditioner or the safety of an umbrella. Now, instead, they dawdle. Loitering outside, catching the breeze, and drinking long into the night. A local joke has it that it's not just the horses that get fat in autumn, it's the people too. Love and mischief can be heard and seen everywhere. It feels like this is a season when not only are a lot of babies made, the divorce count and counselling rates probably jump up as well.

The festive attitude is supplemented by an array of different public holidays, giving people the excuse to have one more glass of beer, highball, or bottle of soju. Chuseok, Foundation Day, Korean Language Day, and Armed Forces Day all appear within a few weeks of each other giving most of us six days off work. It doesn't matter that few can now accurately recount the tale of Tangun Grandfather nor explain the charye ceremony that used to dominate households up and down the peninsula. The traditions, the myths and the culture have disappeared, and we are left with commodified replacements, encouraging us to spend vast amounts on fruit, spam, and trips to Japan and Vietnam. Yet this substitution is not frowned upon too much because we still get the day off. Some have even suggested that holidays like Foundation Day are still kept purely because the weather is so good this time of year.

The temperature fluctuates between warm and chilly, but it never hurts you like summer or winter. The cries of "nomu teowo" fade away. The shrieks of "aigo chuwo" are yet to be heard. The sky shines with a blue radiance and stark white clouds burst across the sky. Those white clouds are a nod to history. Because as the buildings, the fashion, the technology and the values has changed at lighting speed, the blue sky and the white clouds have been watching over this land for millennia.

The Color White

While you might imagine Korea to be a country of flashy colors and neon lights, traditional attire and clothing on the peninsula was white. Hanboks did not always have the bright pinks and yellows that you see walking around the palaces today. The focus on white made the Koreans distinct from their Asian neighbors. It gave them a sense of identity and togetherness. They were the "baeguiminjok" (white-clothed people). A strange color considering how easily it must have been stained or ruined in agricultural life.

Visitors from Japan, China and America remarked on the locals' propensity for wearing white though they often differed in their speculations as to why Koreans did so. Some have suggested that the words "sun" and "white" have the same etymology and thus wearing white was a reflection of Korean people's love of the sky and of light. Even the Koreans themselves sing the fact, with the lyrics of the military song "Hwinallineun Taegeukgi" declaring that Korean people are "The descendants of Tangun, clad in white."

White was also the color of the aristocracy, the Yangban. It was the color of the eggs from which the kings were born. Their skin was then naturally far whiter because they spent their time indoors, studying. The commoners and the slaves were subject to the weather all year round and became much darker in complexion. Thus, there is a sense of elitism to the love of whiteness. Sadly, all of this context gets lost on Insta and TikTok as people declare modern skin-whitening to be a form of racism seen through an entirely ethnocentric lens of modern American racism and devoid of Korean history.

Taerung

With all this wonderful weather and color blanketing the country, I took 41 students out to the local Royal Gardens that house the tomb of Queen Munjeong of Joseon (1501-1565). A formidable woman with strong Buddhist beliefs in a Confucian society, she held influence over the country for nearly two decades. An impressive feat and her resting place is testament to that fact.

Just a minute's walk down the road from our university it is on the very outskirts of the capital city. The approach is lined with tall vertical trees and not a convenience store, coffee shop, or pub in sight. The scarcity is intentional. And, unless you are paying attention, you might not realize it. You can normally find a whole host of shops everywhere around you in Seoul. Here, you struggle.

My Korean students enter the gardens for free. I pay for my international students because I am now well used to this "unique situation." I had told the attendants I was bringing 40-odd young people in a couple of days but the sight of them arriving still caused quite a stir. While we were inside, there were at most five other people. A huge natural landscape, with clean grass, benches, and beautiful architecture to sit amongst…and no-one there.

Before walking to the Queen's tomb, we looked in the museum. A large table had been laid out with a display of traditional foods lined up for ancestor worship, normally carried out during holidays. Around five-to-six of my students said they had just done something similar during Chuseok. Other Korean students sidled up to me quietly and asked me to explain it to them. They had never seen this before, they told me, because they are Christian and their family doesn't do these things. Were anyone there, I'm sure it would have been quite a striking sight to see a white guy explaining Korean traditional culture to young Korean students. Call it modernity, or something. The situation was made even more delightful when an international student said, "We do a very similar thing in India." The Koreans looked at her amazed. "Really?!" I laughed at them: "Asia's a big place, you know?"

Students sitting amongst nature / Courtesy of David Tizzard

Nature

Once we had walked the gardens and I had explained the Buddhist and Taoist influences in the geomancy and architecture, I gave my students a simple assignment. I asked them to just sit down and relax. Do nothing. Be present. Be with each other. Enjoy nature and, more importantly, be part of nature. This is a season where the weather is inviting. It doesn't burn or scold us. It doesn't freeze our fingers and nose-hairs. Instead, it refreshes us. Reminds us we're alive. And so, they all sat there. Without phones. Some picking at the grass. Some looking at the clouds. Some by themselves, still a bit weirded out by the idea of being around people. Others were chatting about Mac DeMarco's first couple of albums.

It was a strange feeling. Almost as if we had been transported back to a time when Korean people wore white and lived amongst nature. Circadian rhythms and religion working in tandem. We had bonded under the blue sky and white clouds. We had realized that there's more to education than sociological theories and PPT-fueled lectures in stuffy classrooms.

I woke the next day to emails from students saying that they had never imagined university life could be about sitting in a park. They didn't think it was possible that they would have Korean history and religion explained to them by a "white" guy. But they were happy and they wanted to do it again. One even suggested we go back and play "mugunghwa kkochi pieotseumnida" (red light, green light) in the park next week.

Next week, however, we don't have class because it is Armed Forces Day and another national holiday. More smells, drinking, and late night revelry for the people of the country. All of this makes you realize that Korea doesn't have to be so bballi-bballi (quick, quick). At least not in autumn when the skies are high and the horses (but hopefully not the professors) are fat.

David A. Tizzard has a doctorate in Korean Studies and lectures at Seoul Women's University and Hanyang University. He is a social-cultural commentator and musician who has lived in Korea for nearly two decades. He is also the host of the "Korea Deconstructed" podcast, which can be found online. He can be reached at datizzard@swu.ac.kr.