Chuseok(Moon Festival) in a hotel

Chuseok is one of the most important holidays in Korea. It is similar to Thanksgiving Day in America. Similarities between Chuseok and Thanksgiving day are giving thanks for the harvest and spending time with family. However, to married women in Korea, Chuseok is not just an innocenet family gathering. It means lots of housework and cooking.

Maybe more than half of married Korean women start suffering from 'Chuseok stress' even before the day comes. We have to prepare many meals for ancestor-memorial service as well as 3 meals a day for the family during the whole holiday. And after it's all over, we end up with loads of dishes to wash. I don't understand why women have to work? Why not men? It is very unfair. But I don't have the power to change the oldest and most unfair tradition in Korea.

Though, my main task was to wash dishes, I was worried because the number of dishes would be tremendous. Fortunately, this year my parents-in-law decided to go to a hotel in Seoul to rest. Hooray!:)

Here are some pictures of our peaceful holiday at a hotel.

There was a club lounge that served 3 meals a day and many drinks including tea, beer, wine, Champaign, Perrier,etc. In the picture, I am reading a album entitled 'Beautiful small villages in California' and am drinking Orange cream tea.

These are evening snacks, mostly great with wine.

This is an automatic wine machine. Just pull the nozzle to fill your glass wine.

This is outside the hotel.

The Chihuahua named Kong-al in the picture is a pet for my parents-in-law.

The hotel has many hardcover English albums.

We hung around Myung-dong, a trendy area in Seoul.

The swimming pool was free to use for club lounge guests.

We had a full day's rest at the hotel during Chuseok. Although sleeping in there is not as comfortable as sleeping at home, the hotel's already prepared meals gave me real rest, making this Chuseok very comfortable. I suggest husbands should spend a day with their wives at a hotel as a gift after Chuseok?