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| People cook barbecue like prehistoric times at Amsa-dong Prehistoric Settlement Site during last year's Prehistoric Culture Festival in Gangdong-gu, eastern Seoul. This year's festival is being held from Oct. 12 to 14./ Courtesy of Gangdong-gu Office. |
By Jung Hae-myoung
The 23rd Prehistoric Culture Festival of Gangdong will be held at Amsa-dong Prehistoric Settlement Site in the eastern Seoul district from Friday to Sunday.
Founded in 1996, the festival receives more than 350,000 visitors every year, as "prehistoric Seoul" is an unusual concept for many festival-goers.
Visitors will be able to imagine the life of prehistoric humans by trying to make dugout huts and earthenware, starting a fire without modern tools and cooking food over a bonfire.
The festival will open with a lighting ceremony followed by performances of folk art groups and Korean folk singers.
On the second day, a traditional performance called "Hosang-nori," designated as an intangible cultural heritage of Seoul, will be performed at 3:30 p.m.
The climax of the festival is a parade starting at 5:30 p.m. on the day on the 1.8-kilometer section from Cheonho Park to the Amsa-dong site. Some 1,600 residents with prehistoric costumes will march along with full-sized models of mammoths, dinosaurs and archaeopteryx.
A dance party will be held after the parade with DJ Koo.
Programs on the last day of festival will be mainly concerts, by a folk music group, JYP Entertainment's rookie band Stray Kids, and Kang Go-eun, one of the winners from the Korean music competition show "Hidden Singer."
The festival has gained international exposure after it won Pinnacle Awards multiple times, which are given to exemplary festivals by the International Festivals and Events Association, since 2014.
"Gangdong residents will be able to find the community spirit and discover their region's identity during the festival period," said Lee Jung-hun, district head.
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