A popular Korean tradition on New Year’s Day is to bow in front of your elders as a display of respect and appreciation. This act is called Sae Bae. Typically one says, “Sae hae bok, mahn hee bah duh sae yo,” which means something like, “May you receive lots of good, new fortune.” In return for bowing and showing some respect, you receive some money.
I remember having the best New Year’s Day get togethers growing up with a bunch of cousins and our grandparents living close by. Invariably throughout my childhood, we’d all meet up at someone’s home, and then literally line up by family to do sae bae in front of our grandparents. For a few seconds of paying respects, we’d listen to our grandparents offer up some words of wisdom and then reach out for the money. I think the going rate at the time was about $5.00. 
Sadly, with the passing of our grandparents, and with many of the older cousins and other family members leaving the area, the New Year’s Day get togethers stopped. I’m sure that many of the cousins still continued the sae bae tradition with their parents on New Year’s as my brother and I continued to do so with ours.
This year, though we had dduk guk at my parents’ house on New Year’s, we couldn’t do sae bae as the toddler’s schedule and temperament made it too difficult. So we returned the next day to do sae bae. My parents may have been pretty bummed that we didn’t do sae bae on New Year’s, but I’m quite sure that all was forgiven.
The toddler’s Han Bok, a traditional Korean garb worn on special occasions, has 3 layers to it. Honestly, we totally assumed that he wouldn’t want to wear it, but boy did he surprise us. In fact, he thoroughly enjoyed putting the Han Bok on, and it was such a treat for me to see wifey dressing the toddler successfully.
The next post will reveal whether the toddler felt like joining us in doing some sae bae.
Always Grateful,
~Hubby
