London Korean Links

Covering things Korean in London and beyond since 2006

2014 Travel Diary day 3: 사십구재

The 49th-day ceremony (사십구재) for Sena Lee, who died in Seoul on 22 April 2014, held at Anjeoksa, Sancheon-gun, at which family and friends said farewell to her. According to dharma master Tim Lerch,  Traditionally, the period of 49 days after someone dies is seen as a time for that person to check their consciousness and digest their … [Read More]

Happy 150th Birthday, James Scarth Gale

James Scarth Gale – missionary, translator, and one of the founders of the Royal Asiatic Society Korea Branch – was born 150 years ago on 19 February 1863. His birthday has been marked by an upgraded Wikipedia page, a special page with photos on Brother Anthony’s site, and a memorial service at Yeondong Church (which … [Read More]

2012 Travel Diary #19: Beopgyesa Temple and those Japanese feng-shui stakes

Beopgyesa Temple (법게사) is the highest in Sancheong County and at least the third-highest in Korea. The good people of Sancheong believe that Beopgyesa is the highest temple in South Korea, a claim which is supported by Beopgyesa’s entry on the Cultural Heritage Administration website, where the following text is to be found: “It is … [Read More]

Cute photos of a Buddha’s Birthday ceremony in Seoul

Some great pics of some young monks getting their head shaved for the first time this Buddha’s birthday at Jogye Temple, Seoul, in today’s Metro. Some of them don’t like it! Links: Children become Buddhist monks as tears flow during ceremony, Metro, 13 May 2012 Buddhist monks caught gambling, smoking and drinking at party, Telegraph, … [Read More]

Hi Dharma! at the International Buddhist Film Festival

Head-to-head with the excitement of the Terracotta Far East Film Festival comes the equally compelling International Buddhist Film Festival, showing at the Apollo Piccadilly April 11–15, 2012 (the same place the KCC is holding its big monthly screenings this year). There’s plenty of interesting Asian films showing (the full programme can be found here), and … [Read More]

Exhibition Visit: An Eternal Cycle at Mokspace

In a hectic London Korean exhibition calendar which often seems biased towards installations and video art, we should welcome an exhibition which features well executed paintings which you would happily hang on your wall. Mokspace’s current exhibition, An Eternal Cycle – Paradise and Purgatory, is doubly unusual in featuring Buddhist-inspired paintings. Such work is rarely … [Read More]

Buddha’s Voice – The Bell of King Seongdeok

People sometimes take a jaundiced view of Korea’s estimation of the importance of its cultural heritage. In the case of the Sacred Bell of King Seongdeok, however, it was foreigner, Dr. Otto Kummel, a director at the National Museum of Germany, who suggested that the museum’s description of the bell as ‘the best in Korea’, … [Read More]

Book review: Land of Scholars (Kang Jae-eun)

The Land of Scholars: Two Thousand Years of Korean Confucianism by Kang Jae-eun (translated from Japanese to Korean by Ha Woo-bong, then from Korean into English by Suzanne Lee) Homa & Sekey Books 2006; original Japanese version published in 2003. 515 pp Students of Korean history, and particularly of the Joseon dynasty, will inevitably at … [Read More]

Haeinsa celebrates 1,000 years of the Tripitaka Koreana

Haeinsa Temple is hosting its first contemporary art exhibition, involving 34 artists from 10 countries, to commemorate the millennial anniversary of the Tripitaka Koreana, which UNESCO has designated one of the “most important and most complete corpus of Buddhist doctrinal texts in the world.” The exhibition’s title — 通 | 통 | Tong — uses … [Read More]