Andong Maskdance Festival

On Sunday we decided to leave the security of the city limits for the first time. We had heard about a traditional mask festival that was being held in a nearby town. We were not entirely sure how to get there, but after catching two trains, a taxi and a bus we made it to Andong in surprisingly good time.

The festival comprised the usually stalls, dried seaweed, ginseng, leather goods, etc. As well as various craft centers where you could purchase puppets and make your own masks. Entertainment included Korean rappers, girls wrestling (don’t get excited guys) and traditional music.

We hadn’t been in Andong for very long when we began to notice that we were getting quite a lot of attention from the Korean festival goers. Even more than usual. We noticed that people were actually taking photographs of us! This rose to celebrity like levels when we started to get involved with one of the traditional activities.


It is a Korean tradition to write a prayer on a strip of paper and hang it on a piece of twine. We don’t know any prayers but we figured we would do our best to write our name. We weren’t to know that this would create a frenzy of Korean Kodak enthusiasts who began to push and shove to get the best vantage spot to take the ultimate snap of what was obviously a very exciting moment for them.

I went first and a few people had began to take out their arm length cameras, but by the time Cindy’s turn came around they were telling her where to stand, what to do and how to do it. One lady even told her to ‘Stop laughing’(which as we all know is very hard for Cindy).

It was actually hard for me to get a picture of Cindy, although I had already decided that the media gallery was far more interesting than what Cindy was doing anyway... The frenzy eventually subsided and we all went on our way, although for the rest of the day we often noted large camera lenses pointing in our direction.

The other part of the festival was traditional maskdance performances. We were enjoying the dancing and the costumes and happily taking pictures of the show. There was around a thousand people sitting in the amphitheater and for some reason... I must have stood out. One of the dancers stepped into the audience saying ‘Sir-a, Sir-a’, took my hand, lead me out onto the dance floor and put a giant mask on my head. I then danced my way around the stage, past the media gallery and back to my seat.

All in all, an exciting day for Korea’s newest celebrity couple....