Photo by Lee, SeonJa, SeYoung, Ah, Te Ra, Park, YongSung, Choi, Sung-Hee, and Seogwipo News
To revive the community in Gangjeong, some people have started to farm the rice in Gangjoeng, which used to be the traditional farming here and thus Gangjeong used to be called as “Il-Gangjeong”(the best village). Because of the rice farming is not lucrative anymore, for long time the rice farming has been given up here. Nowadays, some peace activists living in Gangjeong have re-started the rice farming here, and in the process, they tried to get help from the village elders, neighbors…and since they are harvesting now, they made festival to celebrate together and share the harvest with people here. We can see from people’s face that the sharing of the rice gives people such a big joyfulness. Nothing special to recover the Gangjeong community. It is just smile together, play together, being painful together.
In the harvest festival, Gangjeong elementary school students joined and helped together. The rice farming is not lucrative anymore but the sharing culture is more worthy than money. This scenery is the beauty of people in Gangjeong.
“People who cherish the nature of Jeju can be the real Jeju people: people who throw away the nature of Jeju for money, they are the outsiders.”
Filters: Art