Family Eagerly Awaits Return of Weekend Museum Outings

INTERVIEW

By the Editorial Team With Park Haejee, Kim Hyoungkue, Kim Dongwoo, and Kim Taeeun, the family of four

Waiting for Gradual Return to Normal Life Park Haejee and her husband, Kim Hyoungkue, sighed in relief when they heard the news that the National Museum of Korea was reopening on a reservation basis May 6 after 72 days of closure. Struggling with the demands of work and raising their young children on top of coping with the COVID-19 situation, they have been waiting eagerly to return to normal everyday life. So the news of the museum’s reopening was as welcome as rain in a drought. At the beginning of this year Park and Kim had decided they would take their son, Kim Dongwoo (11), and daughter, Kim Taeeun (9), to the museum regularly to see the exhibitions as part of their education. They chose the museum as a place where the family could explore how Korean society had developed through the ages, from the Paleolithic period through the Medieval period and modern times, and inspect the artifacts that had been left behind.

One day in July, the whole family spent their weekend at the museum garden which was full of the summer scent

Working Wisely from Home

Their son dreams of being an entomologist. From a very young age he has been interested in insects, fish, and animals and likes to watch them. Recently, he planned to join the team of child journalists at Kids Dong-A Science but with external activities restricted by the COVID-19 pandemic he is observing wildlife through books and the YouTube channels like Jeongbeureu and Biology Illustrated TV. Their daughter’s interests are more diverse. But her favorite pastime is drawing and she often draws her future dream home or designs cars. She also likes to play the piano and cello and her dreams change every day according to her various talents. In the current, unprecedented situation the two children are carrying on a mix of online and in-school classes but the parents are worried about them missing out on the things they can learn from relations with friends and their teachers.

This why Kim, the father, is making an effort to spend more time with them. A film buff, he loves to see movies with the family on weekends. These days, when he is spending so much time at home, nothing makes him happier than eating snacks with the family as they watch the Star Wars series, piecing the whole story together. Afterwards, they all talk about the movie and spend more time bonding as they put Star Wars themed lego bricks together. Whenever the family returned home from the museum, they would talk over the exhibitions they saw, but for several months now they’ve not been able to do that.

Mother and son strolling through stone pagodas in the Outdoor Exhibition area

Seeking Quiet Havens Outdoors

After a couple of months at home the children began feeling antsy and a little depressed so the parents began to look for relatively uncrowded outdoor sites to visit. Park recalled a TV show on EBS featuring an elderly couple who had relocated to Gangwon-do because they were so fond of Seoraksan Mountain there and suggested a family trip to Sokcho. As they hiked the mountain trails and breathed deep as they smelled the earth and the scents of the grass and the trees, they realized once again how small human beings are in the midst of Mother Nature. Since then the family have spent their weekends taking day-trips out of Seoul.

With the continued spread of COVID-19, the NMK has closed temporarily for a second time. But on one weekend in July, the family of four longed to visit the museum again and so decided to go and relax in the museum’s outdoor garden. The two children said that the museum had a smell that made them feel good and were in high spirits as they remembered past visits to the Children’s Museum. The whole family were happy to be at the museum again. Like the jewel of the museum, the outdoor garden is filled with colorful flowers that brighten up the surroundings. The zinnia trees, which are the pride of the museum garden in summer, seem ready to burst into bloom. Sitting in the pavilion at the foot of Dragon Falls, the family could hear the gentle sounds of the birds, the insects, and falling water.

Playground for the Whole Family

As the children played happily in the outdoor garden, Kim asked them what they most wanted to see when the museum opened again. Both said the first thing they wanted to do was to go inside the Digital Immersive Galleries. They had heard on the news about the mammoth videos 15–20 minutes long that completely wrap around and astound visitors and were impatient to see them. Kim feels the same way. To see scenes from the paintings inside the display cases magnified many times and brought to life through media art would surely leave a lasting impression. The children were eager for a virtual reality experience of the museum’s storage and conservation science rooms, normally off limits to visitors, strolling around to inspect items not on display and even restoring objects with their own hands.

Meanwhile, Park saw a poster for an exhibition in the Calligraphy and Painting Gallery on the museum website and recalled the time she looked up one of her son’s favorite artists when she was helping him prepare for an online class. When her son said he liked Kim Hongdo she searched for photos of his works and hoped for an opportunity to see the paintings in real life. Like fate, the thematic exhibition is providing an opportunity to see a selection of genre paintings by Kim Hongdo from the Joseon Dynasty.

On display were seven works such as Korean Traditional Wrestling and A Dancing Boy, which show the pastimes enjoyed by the common people of Joseon. In autumn and winter all works will be changed each time, and Park is pleased to think that the family now has another excuse to come back to the museum. If the basic transmission potential of COVID-19 increases the NMK will inevitably have to repeat the pattern of temporary opening and closure, but Park’s family will continue their weekend outings to the museum as they planned at the beginning of the year, making a reservation beforehand for a day when the doors are open.

Father and daughter taking a breath in front of a Buddhist statue