Chrysanthemum festivals in Hampyeong, Yeongam counties open today.

From Newsis.

The 2010 Hampyeong Chrysanthemum Festival (2010 대한민국 국향대전) opens today, October 29th, and runs through November 14th at the Hampyeong Expo Park, the site of the annual Butterfly Festival. It's a short walk from the local bus terminal, in turn accessible via one of the 19 buses that make the 45-kilometer trip from Gwangju each day.


After a November 2008 snowfall.

It's one of 21 chrysanthemum festivals in the country, including one in Yeongam county.



The Yeongam Wangin Chrysanthemum Festival (왕인국화축제) is one of several items in the county making a connection between the region and Wani,

a semi-legendary scholar dispatched by the Kingdom of Baekje in southwestern Korea to the Japanese Islands during the reign of Emperor Ōjin, bringing with him the knowledge of Confucianism and the Chinese writing system.

Perhaps an inappropriate connection, at least as far as Wikipedia is concerned.

A new myth about Wangin was publicized in South Korea in 1970s. In 1972 the social activist Kim Changsu reported a series of essays titled "Korean spirit embodied in Japan," which appealed to South Koreans who felt oppressed by the legacy of Japanese colonization. In this framework, Wani was regarded as Korean without doubt. Upon being informed by a reader from Yeongam, Kim issued a statement identifying Yeongam as the birthplace of Wani in the next year. In spite of the weakness of the evidence, Wani's "relic site" was designated as Cultural Asset No. 20 of South Jeolla Province in 1976.

The development of Wani's "historical sites" was led by the governments of South Jeolla Province and Yeongam Country. The construction was carried out from 1985 to 1987, "restoring" the "birthplace", schools where Wani allegedly studied, and others. Yeongam Country started to fully exploit the old-looking new theme park as a tourist attraction because the introduction of local autonomy of 1990 forced the local government to look for its own source of revenue. For example, Youngam County began to host the annual "Wangin Culture Festival" in 1997 that was previously organized by local people under the name of "Cherry blossom festival".