Illustration © Kaitlynn Copithorne
We’re fast approaching the Harvest Moon, which this year falls on 29th September. This date holds particular significance for my husband and I as a couple, but it’s also an important festival in the South Korean calendar, where it is called Chuseok, meaning Autumn Eve. The festival is thought to derive from Korean Mugyo or Musok, Korean shamanic practices, which venerated local deities and ancestors. The Harvest Moon is the biggest full moon of the year and appears on the 15th day of the lunar month – and the associated festival celebrates a time of harvest and abundance. Festivities may sound familiar to those who celebrate other harvest festivals including Mabon (a Neo-Pagan festival on the 23rd September, celebrating the Autumn Equinox) and Japan’s Shinto Autumn Equinox Day (also on the 23rd). Chuseok provides an opportunity to celebrate the present by reflecting on the past.
Visit your ancestral hometown, in-person or through writing
Honouring the new yield of crops means reflecting on the year that culminated in this moment. Autumn is a time of nostalgia and reflection and Chuseok is also a time for revisiting the past. Around Chuseok, families in South Korea tend to visit their hometowns – or ancestral hometowns. Each family in the country inherits a book called a Jokbo, which traditionally showed the lineage of all men in a family, but now has been updated to include women, too. From this book, my husband was able to ascertain that his family originates in the ancient capital of the Silla kingdom, Gyeongju. We went to visit the ancient burial mounds – which resembled those Anglo-Saxon barrows I had seen in Europe, in places such as Winterbourne, Dorset – and found the one where his ancestor from over 1000 years ago, a king of the Silla Kingdom, lay to rest. Descending from royalty in South Korea is not unusual – almost two million people belong to this particular clan of Kim – but it is still remarkable to be able to look back at one thousand years of family history and find a connection to the distant past.
This Harvest Moon, we might think about our own origins, whether our childhood homes, or our family roots. We can literally return to a place, or book a trip and visit places important in our family history. Last autumn, we visited Bavaria to trace my mother’s side of the family history – but also to learn more about my prehistoric, Indo-European roots in a valley strewn with caves. It was in the latter that I found more of a sense of collective belonging and meaning, a story I will save for another day.
The idea of returning might be more of a journalling or creative writing prompt. If autumn gives a sense of arrival and completion, it also asks of us questions such as: where did we come from, how did the past shape us, and where are we going now?
2. Make offerings to ancestors
Looking to the past also means thinking about those who came before us. Charye is a Korean ancestral rite that involves the preparation of traditional food – including bibimbap, rice cake soup (also eaten at the Lunar New Year), rice liquor such as soju, rice cakes and soup – to be left at ancestor shrines. The table must be set in a particular way according to family tradition. Preparing the food and carrying out a ritual offering, it is hoped that the ancestors will bless the family for the coming year. You might build a shrine to your ancestors, permanent or temporary, as in the Mexican Day of the Dead alters. You could also practise writing a letter to your ancestors – known or distant – reflecting on how far you and your family have come. Ancestor veneration reminds us of our role in a story far greater than our own. For various reasons, many of us have complicated relationships with our known family that might make ancestor veneration difficult. It might help, instead, to broaden our definition of family to the other friends, animals and loved ones to which we are, at some point in the distant past, connected.
3. Make songpyeon
Korean families eat similar foods to those left to their ancestors on this day. Try making songpyeon, rice cakes shaped like half moons and infused with mugwort or berry juice, stuffed with nutritious ingredients such as chestnut, cinnamon, red beans, mung beans or black sesame. Here is a recipe to make your own. One theory for their shape is that Korean ancestors believed a full moon could only wane, while a half moon can wax and grow – symbolic of coming abundance and prosperity. According to one story, someone who makes beautifully shaped rice cakes will meet a good spouse or give birth to a beautiful baby.
4. Eat Seasonal foods
Asian pears are juicy, crisp and delicious, and typically eaten at this time of year. You can eat what is local and seasonal to you. Here in Britain, apples, pears and blackberries are plentiful at this time of year. Make apple crumble and serve with vegan custard. Forage for mushrooms and herbs. Make pickles, jams, compotes and ferments to last over the colder months. The Korean Vegan by Joanne Lee Molinaro features plenty of recipes for fermented foods, including kimchi and jans, fermented sauces. Traditional Korean cuisine derives from Buddhist mountain cuisine – be inspired by Jeon Kwang’s mindful philosophy towards food and life in volume 3 of Netflix’s The Chef’s Table.
5. Play traditional games (and divine the future)
Come Chuseok and Seollal (Korean Lunar New Year), many families play Yut Nori – a game involving sticks thought to date back to the 7th century. Learn about how to play it here. In the same way that tarot in Europe derived from a playing card game, Yut nori has also been used historically for fortune telling – similar to the throwing of yarrow sticks in I Ching divination. Yut nori sticks are typically made of chestnut or birch, but you can use fallen branches from trees local to you.
6. Learn about Korean folk customs
The probable Shamanic roots of this tradition are most evident, perhaps, in folk customs such as Talchum (mask dance) and ganggangsullae (ancient circle dance). The folk music is drum-heavy and repetitive – the type that encourages a trance state. Though derived from shamanic rituals, in the royal court, and today, these practices have become popular forms of folk entertainment. Typical themes include exorcism rites and parodies of human weaknesses.
7. Walk in nature
Autumn is widely considered the best season in South Korea owing to the milder weather and beautiful colours that paint the woods and mountains yellow, auburn and amber. Take a walk in the forest, mountains or hills, paying attention to the changing scenery, looking for mushrooms, berries and wild herbs. You can use Seek app to identify common plants, but always take care with eating wild food – ensure you know for certain what something is and how to prepare it to prevent toxicity. At this time of year, we love to make elderberry compote or syrup, a delicious hedgerow medicine, rich in vitamin C.
Elderberry syrup recipe
You’ll need:
-Approx 500g (or 2 1/2 cups) of elderberry heads
-400g of light brown sugar
-Juice from one lemon, plus its zest
-1 teaspoon cinnamon or a cinnamon stick
-1 inch fresh minced ginger (optional)
How to prepare
Remove berries from the cyanide-containing stems.
Wash the berries in a sieve.
Add the berries to a pot, covering them with water.
Simmer gently for 15 minutes or until the berries have softened.
Leave to cool and then strain the mixture through a fine sieve.
Pour the strained mixture back into the cleaned saucepan along with the sugar and lemon juice. Cook for 5–10 minutes, or until you have a syrup.
Store the syrup in a sterilised bottle or jar for up to a month. Consume as a cordial with water and ice, in cocktails or mocktails, or with desserts.
8. Practise gratitude
Chuseok is often described as “Korean Thanksgiving” and is about practising gratitude for abundance and family. Like other harvest festivals, Chuseok reminds us of the cycles of nature of which we are part, and the beauty of a year of growing that come harvest produces fruit and grain. Coinciding with the full moon, it speaks to a sense of completion. Among family and friends or in your journal, reflect on what you’re thankful for having reaped in the past year: perhaps it’s a finished project, a new friendship, the birth of a child, or a newly gained skill. Whatever it is, by practising gratitude we remember the value of working towards something, and the importance of doing it all over again after the colder months of going inwards. With each new cycle, we can spiral towards a better present.