Major Traditional Archery Festival in Korea, May 2007

Here is information and the application form. The spirit of this event is that those who could support themselves to attend at their own expense would do so, so that more funds can be devoted to pay for traditional archers from developing economies who can't otherwise afford to come.

But there are no hard and fast rules: every application for sponsorship would be considered on its merits.

S

I would like to add that Mr. Woo has also been in contact with me and asked me to find archers from Hungary and Australia who would like to participate. Please refer to the information form and application. I would also encourage those of you who would like to participate to discuss your interest here.

Personally, my son and I will be part of the group representing Korean traditional archery.


T

I will be meeting with Mr. Woo and Colonel Kim Ki-hoon this coming Saturday to discuss plans for the festival. Col. Kim told me that for those archers who visit Korea, all expenses, with the exception of int'l air fare, will be covered (local transportation, food, and lodging).

Please let me know if there are any questions you would like me to ask Mr. Woo about the festival.


T

Thomas; The offer of hospitality is a very generous one. If one were to attend, what other points of interest could one see after the event? The archery museum? an archery range, maybe try shooting? Temples, architecture, history museums? I understand that this would not be included. Jack

Jumping the gun a bit on Thomas, there's a good museum at the Military Academy in Seoul; a small private museum and a craftsman arrow-maker at Paju. The National Museum in Seoul has interesting bronze age weapons, including arrowheads. There is a lot of beautiful countrydise. Sokcho, where the horseback martial arts people have their base, is well worth a visit.

S

Jack,

All that Stephen said is available, and much more.

Also, I've received some responses from people who are planning to attend. Maybe, if there are groups going from different countries (such as the U.S.), they might like to meet up and head over together. I encourage people to state their intentions on going in this thread so others can know.


T

Thomas; Well in that case, I will definitely go and am very much looking forward to seeing some of the country and meeting the people. I have also been asked to give a presentation; my subject will be Shamanic Archery Practices. Coincidently Traditionell Bogenschiessen Magazine has notified me that they are now prepared to publish part 1.

It would be nice to stay on several days and take in the sights. Some tips from you would maximise the occsion. Thanks, -j-

We have received expressions of interest from people to attend from:

China (Beijing)
China (Tibetans)
China (Xibo/Manchu)
Hong Kong
Japan
Korea
Bhutan
Turkey
England
Poland
USA
Mongolia

We understand that no-one would come from -
Iran
Russia

Please encourage other cultures to take part, if you know anyone.

Stephen

I am wondering what type of transportation made available in country and what type of lodging arangements and i figure that for the most part ithe food will work I consunme just about anything .I have heard the same ? from others. I would like to Know so that I can make the necessary arrangements ahead of time Bill

Bill Metcalfe wrote:

I am wondering what type of transportation made available in country and what type of lodging arangements and i figure that for the most part ithe food will work I consunme just about anything .I have heard the same ? from others. I would like to Know so that I can make the necessary arrangements ahead of time Bill

Bill,

I am not exactly sure about all of the above, but I can tell you that Koreans usually go out of their way to accommodate guests. Still, after I get back there in a week, I'll look into it.


T

I am looking forward to the upcoming event with great anticipation, but the invitation has been a little vague about how we are to travel. How much equipment and gear I bring will depend on the transportation while in country. Any information will help us plan for our trip. Thanks again Bill

I'm not sure whether you are one of the participants who will receive a sponsorship - that's up to the hosts. Anyway, the idea is that you must get yourself from your place of residence to Incheon International Airport, near Seoul in Korea. When you have made your arrangements, you inform the hosts, and they will then arrange your transport from the airport to the festival location and look after you from there on.

The Organizers have supplied this information:

(PROCEDURE FOR PARTICIPATION)
1. Please send us below information no later than 5th March 2007, by e-mail.
(1) Departure airport name
(2) Departure time (date and time)
(3) Arrival time in Incheon Airport Korea
(4) Flight company name and number
(5) Total round trip ticket fare
2. We will be ready to pick up you in the Incheon Airport .
3. Your flight ticket will be delivered to you in proper way by the organizer of the Festival.(delivering time will be known to you later)
4. Please call us or send e-mail if you have any questions.

(PREPARATIONS)
1.Please bring 1 bow and 5 arrows and equipments each team for exchanging with Korean traditional bow and arrow. (Stephen's note: it will not be a horn bow.)2.Please bring two national flags.(one is big size and the other is small).
3.Please bring traditional costumes and books about tradition.
4.Please send e-mail the announcement mention for your team when you enter the main stadium by 5th March 2007.
5.Please send e-mail your target range, size of target, shape and color by 5th March 2007.(if you bring the target, let us know)
6.We will provide you booth for the demonstrations of your equipments and traditional items. You can display and sell your stuff at there. (Stephen's note: they have not yet clarified about customs requirements or import duries.)
7.Please bring two photographs for making ID Card.
8.We will provide all accommodations and interal travel, and food.

Stephen's note: to not bring long knives, crossbows or swords into Korea. Do not bring un-processed animal products such as raw sinew or horn.

2007 WORLD TRADITIONAL ARCHERY FESTIVAL ORGANIZATION
National Association Of Archery For All
(e-mail address : [email protected])

Here is a note from the director of the organizing committee:

All transportation in Korea will be buses (big scale).

Those buses have large capacity for baggage.



So, all participants may carry as much equipments as they want.



All of teams will be given at least one booth for exhibition or demonstration.

Thanks for the post about busses it will be very helpful in the planning. Bill

Thanks for the post about busses it will be very helpful in the planning. Bill

What is the format of this Festival? Is it a horseback competition, a demonstration type event? And how would the Koreans like to use our archery gifts? to shoot, to display, as prototypes? -j-

Jack,

There will be exhibitions (both display and demonstration) during most of the festival, plus there will be a major seminar/discussion on May 14th; Col. Kim is still busy arranging the presentation schedule.

Exactly how the archery gifts will be used, I am not sure, but most likely for study and display, from what I understand.


T

I have uploaded three registration forms for the festival:

http://www.koreanarchery.org/AppFormA.doc Full Support

http://www.koreanarchery.org/AppFormB.doc Self Support

http://www.koreanarchery.org/AppFormC.doc Companion registration

It is important to fill out one of them and return it right away, as the organizing committee needs to finalize their attendees' list.

If you have any questions, please let me know.


T

hello
One question for start, what does "long knives" mean, how is max long?
The Polish national dress withaut the sabre look like incomplete :mrgreen:

Andrzej

No swords or sabres :) Nothing bigger than a pen-knife.

S

Hi Folks! I just got back from a meeting of the festival organizing committee late last night. I have info to give about the festival and will be getting it sorted and put together sometime today. I just wanted to let everyone know that things are moving right along. More soon!


Thomas

I hope i and see more picture or movie about it

Jiao,

There will certainly be plenty of pictures and I believe there are plans for videotaping much of the festivities, etc.


T

A more detailed translation of festival activities is underway, but I'll translate a few things discussed at our meeting yesterday.

The first day (May 12) will pretty much be for getting everyone settled into the country and festival area. As far as guests, there are about ninety people coming from twenty-two different countries. As they enter the country, people will be at the airport to greet them and take them to where they need to be. Until 6:00 p.m., the concentration of efforts will be to making sure people entering the country are taken care of.

After 6:00 p.m., there will be dinner time, an orientation and a demonstration of international traditional bow making (I'll get more details on this later) until 10:00 p.m. After that will be a break for the evening.

The next day (May 13) will begin with breakfast and then heading to the stadium where archery activities will take place (around 9:00 a.m.). From 9:30-12:00 will be the opening ceremony and demonstration (I believe it will be a combination of different martial arts, folk performances and traditional weaponry of Korea, including such things as the rocket arrow cart). That will be followed by a group of Korean traditional archers giving a demonstration. During that same time period (12:00-12:30) there will be a drawing for prizes.

From 12:30-4:00 p.m., international archers will be demonstrating their skills. From 4:10-5:10, there will be a friendly international combined shoot. The details are still being worked out, but there will be different sized targets at various distances (probably 30m, 60m, 90m, 120m). From 5:10-5:30 will be a second drawing for prizes. Also, at this time, until about 6:30 p.m., attendees will travel from the stadium to the National Youth Center (http://www.nyc.or.kr), where our symposium will be held and also where attendees will be staying. Also, we will visit the Institute for Traditional Korean Culture Studies, where there will be a welcoming ceremony for everyone that will last until about 9:30 p.m. After that, there will be some various activities and time for people to spend time together and also get some rest.

The next day (May 14), will be a busy one, for sure. After breakfast (~9:00 a.m.), until 4:00 p.m., there will be an international friendly shoot at a Korean archery club (Cheonan Jung). At the same time (but going on until 5:30 p.m.), the first session of presentations and discussions will be held (more info on those to follow). The second session will be held from 7:30 p.m. until 9:30 p.m. Also, from 7:20-9:30 p.m., there will be a farewell campfire at the National Youth Center (Outside, of course :shock: ). Things will conclude after all that is done.

The next day will mainly be for sending people off, although there will also be a trip to a local museum available for those who are interested.

Please remember that my descriptions above are not complete, but just to give you an idea as to what will be happening. It will be a very busy event for sure!

Now for the sessions:

Session 1--

I will be chairing the morning presentation; Col. Ki-hoon Kim will chair the first afternoon session; Prof. Jin-hee Choi (former KMA prof) will chair the second afternoon session.

In the morning, the first presentation will be by Hilary Greenland (Traditional archery and bowmaking in Europe); the second presentation will be by Steve Allely (Traditional archery and bowmaking in the USA); the third presentation will be by Roland Bohr (Indigenous archery in North America).

For the first afternoon session, there will be five presentations:

1. Shamanic Archery Practices in Central Asia (Jack Farrell)
2. Traditional Archery and Bowmaking in Bhutan (Tsewang Nidup)
3. Traditional Archery and Bowmaking in China (Xu Kaicai)
4. Traditional Archery in Japan (Sato, Akira)
5. Traditional Archery and Bowmaking in Korea (Jeong, Jinmyong)

This will be followed by a panel discussion

The second afternoon session will have three presentations:

1. Traditional Archery in Inner and Outer Mongolia (Yi Degang)
2. Xibo Minority's Traditional Archery in China (Feng, Hui)
3. Japanese Traditional Archery in North America (Jaap and Kay Koppedrayer)

This will be followed by a panel discussion.

The second (evening) session will be presided over by Stephen Selby, who will also give a keynote address. I don't have an exact list of the speakers, but there will be about six to eight who will come from host and visiting countries.

Everything above comes from my poor translation skills, so any errors are totally mine.

If there are questions, I'll try to answer them.


Thomas

Here is a web album I made showing some of the venues:

http://www.koreanarchery.org/2007koreafestival/

In case anyone is interested here are the approximate coordinates for the National Youth Center (for looking on Google Earth or your GPS):

36?47'30.85"N
127?13'33.07"E

Stadium:

36?48'44.81"N
127? 9'46.02"E

I have a couple other coordinates at home; I'll add them later.


T

Thomas Duvernay wrote:

Jiao,

There will certainly be plenty of pictures and I believe there are plans for videotaping much of the festivities, etc.


T

the best , the DV show the archer left ,right,back, front, make a slowy movie of differ archary

Hail everyone; I am in Soeul, the festival ended today and I can
hardly express how much fun we all had. Met many of the folks who post here, folks from all over the world. The Koreans were truly more hospitable than one could think possible. But of course, the heart of the festival was the shooting. Don't ask me how I did with the Comanche horse bow which I presented to the Koreans. I was drafted to the "USA" team only days before the event, No excuses though.

Shooting at four different ranges was truely difficult. I only had access to a 120 m course for six practice arrows before leaving for Asia. Some others obviously did not have that. It was obvious that many of us are shooting arrows too heavy for our bows. I hope sincerely that I can return with a more perfected set of equipment designed for the difficult course.

We shot four arrows at a 3d deer target at 20m, four at a Japanese three-ring target at 60m, four at the Mongolian hide spools on the ground at 75 m, and five arrows at the modified (soft) Korean target at 120 m, seventeen arrows total.

The results are something like this, others can clarify the details;

A Korean from California placed first, A Hungarian placed second in the play-off and the current champion of the Mongolian Nadam placed third.

Everyone who brought a bow to trade got a Korean bow, arrows and case in exchange. Will get back later as things begin to settle.Jack.

As Jack said, the festival is now concluded. It was really nice meeting people who for years I only knew through Internet. Here is a short summary I wrote up:

Well, the festival here in Korea has concluded and I would call it a success. As with any event--especially one of this size and being the first one ever--there were glitches here and there, but nothing major.
There were people from about twenty-two different countries, representing a number of archery traditions. Even so, I never once heard anyone criticize another. Archers from cultures that were traditionally opposed to each other ate, discussed, laughed, and shot with one another; everyone spoke the common language of archery. Nobody ever tried to claim their bow and culture was better than the rest; in fact, some very impressive archers (Bhutan) shot with bows that were no more than two slats of bamboo lashed together.

The festival was divided into two sections: academic and shooting. The one thing mildly disappointing to some was that on Monday, our seminar day, both shooting and presentations were going on simultaneously; many presenters would have loved to have been out shooting and many people shooting would have loved to have been listening to presentations. However, those who were at either one enjoyed being there. The presentations were literally world-class--look at http://archery.news-paper.co.kr/news_vi ... _id=62&hd= for a list of the topics and presenters (English is towards the bottom). Watching the different cultures shoot was truly eye-opening and wonderful to behold.

Members decided to now form the World Traditional Archery Association (WTAA), which will help to revitalize traditional archery and sustain it so that future generations can also enjoy it.

There is much more to say about it, but I will close for now with a link to pictures I took during the festival. They are currently unedited and uncaptioned, but they should give a little flavor for what went on. Other forum members can jump in and talk about their experiences.

http://www.koreanarchery.org/WTAF/

Thomas

I moved my post from the bamboo arrow post to here for continuity. Sorry for the error.

Ok here is the skinny on yesterday's adventure. Mr Ahn, who had been designated as a discussant on my presentation at the festival conference invited me to a tour of the Korean Military Academy Museum, of which he is a curator. Then we proceded to the post archery range where ranking officers practiced. After lunch and private tour we were asked if we would like to visit the Important Intangible Cultural Heritage arrowmaker and his personal museum. Did not take too long to decide.

My Yoo jr. is a fifth generation fletcher. We were also invited to his workshop where he was working on arrows from a bundle of hundreds of shafts. Lots of his tools were antiques and he did not really know which ones had been made by great or great-great grandfathers. He trims feathers with scissors and finishes with a hand held burning tool. We sat on the floor, ate cakes and drank excellent tea whild discussing archery for hours.

I forgot to mention that our entourage also included my roommate at the conference, Steve Allely, artist of five Jim Hamm books and neighbor of Dr Grayson, and Bill Metcalf, a Quirky but talented flintknapper from Texas.

In all I will return a changed person with the warmest of feelings for the Korean people.

I also have to tell you that European types are somewhat unusual in this modern country. School children in the hotel computer center mob us and I have named them our "mice" after their attention to us.

Now we prepare other adventures so more later, y'all. -j-

Hello again from the computer room at the hotel in Korea. My "mice" have returned to school and a new adventure begins today. But let me tell you about yesterday. Roland Bohr and his lovely wife had previously offered to take us to see Kim Park Young, Important Intangible Culture Heritage Bowmaker , and loe and behold we were able to make a last minute appointment. So off we went.

His practice range is on a prominent hilltop overlooking his city near Soeul. The government built him a workshop at the range to promote his craft. People were shooting with both hornbows and synthetic.

In the new and modern range building was his comfortable workshop, strewn with antique, handmade and one of a kind tools, racks with bows being worked on and a drying box used to dry out the last of moisture in a bow. This box varied between 24 and 32 degrees and was dehumidified.

If I got it right he would let his horn dry ten days before working it and wood core. Sinew was allowed to dry one day between layers and 30 days thereafter with a final 10 days in the box. Again the box is not heated but dehumidified. He works up about 100 bows a year, all at the same time. September is the approximate month for gluing horn, Oct and Nov for rasping the final shape, and Dec and Jan for sinewing.

He has a book with lots of pictures that is available locally. He will tell you anything he knows, allow photos, no secrets whatever. He has also helped fellow atarnites so I can only hope that those who he has instructed will reciprocate generously.

We watched the shooting for a while longer noting the wind sock at the target, before descending the steep hill back to the subway. I must also mention that Rolands lovely wife speaks the local lingua handily and it would be futile to try to visit without such a translator.

See you next time -j-

Jack,

All I can say is :D


T

Hopefully this post belongs here, and that atarn is not tired of me monopolising this post.

My interest was peaked yesterday when I met the associate director of the Silk Road museum, a private museum in Seoul. So today I climbed a very steep hill to a new 4 story building with contemporary interior; so tastefully done. Five dollars admission and up on the second floor is a case with three bows, a quiver and scads of arrows. Never mind the cannons, guns, porcelain, jewelery etc, etc.

Two bows are Xinjaing, 200 BC-200 AD+or- Nine arrows accompany these.

One bow, quiver and seven arrows are Yuan from Inner Mongolia.

Two arrows with carved out wood points appear Scythian, came with a bronze helmet.

I was allowed to photograph as well as make drawings, which are relatively complete.

The museum owners are also intending to open a new museum of Erotica ( if I have that right), in a month or so, which I was promised would have more bows and arrows. These are artifact type folks so, hopefully all is Ok.

Both Silk Road bows have lateral as well as diagonal sinewing to the limbs.

All will be revealed ASAP. -j-

Did you already post these here Jack?

Alam; Look at the date of the posts! -j-

yes, my mistake :oops: