Week 3: A trip to Gyeongju

As we approached the halfway point of our Global Seminar (something most of us are trying not to think about), we got to explore a new city in South Korea: Gyeongju. This is one of the older cities in South Korea as it used to be the capital of the ancient Silla dynasty. It was very interesting to come from such a modern city like Seoul to a city with so much ancient history. We took a bus to Gyeongju which took about 5 hours, but we got to stop and see so many cool temples along the way. 

Our first stop on this temple tour was Buseoksa Temple, where we got to learn about some of the older folk tales of Korea. These stories detailed how the King of the Silla dynasty came to be, represented in paintings like this where a girl turned into a dragon to protect this monk across the sea. 

Next, we got to see Donghwasa temple, which was made by the same man that made the previous temple we saw. The difference being that this one was made for his parents in their current lives and the previous one for his parents in their past lives. It was very interesting to compare and contrast these temples and see how the idea of reincarnation appeared in both of these spaces.

Once we got to Gyeongju, we visited the Bulguksa temple which still contained staircases and statues from the 7th century. Seeing these types of religious relics from many hundreds of years ago was so impressive as the Buddha statues were still in such great condition. Simply being in this space felt special as so many people from so many different eras of the world had been in the same spot as I was looking at the same things. 

Our last stop before departing from Gyeongju was visiting Donggung Palace and Wolji Pond, which was especially gorgeous at night. This was a palace for a prince that is now a very popular date spot for beautiful photos. It was a great way to close out our short but impactful visit to the ancient capital city of Korea. 

We are now heading into week four of our seminar and are going to look more into the technological side of Seoul and how that impacts religion. I am super excited to get to see another side of Seoul and cannot wait to see what more adventures are to come in the second half of our trip!

Ellie Grossman