The “2010 Great Baekje World Festival” came to an end with 3,698,000 visitors, 239.9 billion won of economic effects, and 11.9 billion won of revenue.

With participants from 28 countries around the world, the festival ran a total of 92 programs including “Sama Story”, reexamined the splendid Baekje culture, and promoted the excellence of the Baekje Cultural Land, Baekje relics, and Baekje culture to foreign visitors. Its closing ceremony took place on October 17, 2010.

▲ The Baekje torch march to mark the opening of the Baekje Cultural Festival and the reproduction of a Baekje king at Sabi Palace.

 

Factors in Success

 

There are several factors involved in the success of the festival; first, it's a participatory festival. The countless volunteers served many roles including cleaning, traffic control, and giving a warm welcome to visitors, taking an active part in every aspect of the festival. The programs that required the participation of residents were vitalized including the Woongjin Castle Parade, which was so successful that it was put in the Guinness Book, reenactment of the Hwangsanbeol Battle, and Gijishi Tub of War. Secondly, the organizing committee ran the programs based on history. The wonderful programs were based on the high quality infrastructure of the Baekje Cultural Land and the stage for water performance included “Water Performances” and “Flower of Sabi” based on Baekje history and the “Parade of Exchanging Kingdoms” and “Reenactment of Hwangsanbeol Battle” that symbolized the Baekje spirit.

The Chungcheongnam Provincial Office commented that “We will continue to hold the festival in Gongju and Buyeo for ten days every early October and take advantage of it to hold ongoing international conferences to reexamine the superior quality of Baekje culture and the original Baekje history, to develop Baekje cultural content and products, and build the tourism infrastructure.”

 

 

Participation of Various Foreign Groups

 

The 2010 Great Baekje World Festival, which promoted Chungnam to the world for a month starting on September 17, 2010, particularly highlighted the Province's diplomatic skills.

According to a staff member from the provincial office, about 1,500 of 74 organizations in 11 countries participated in the festival, including the heads of five of the 20 local governments in exchange with the Province, the presidents of the provincial committee, and former and incumbent provincial governors during the festival.

 

At the festival, they had one-on-one or multi-party talks with Mr. Hee-Jung An, governor of Chungnam Province. Thanks to their active diplomatic activities, the festival became a venue for active cultural exchanges as well.

The prestigious figures who visited Great Baekje World Festival from overseas during the event include Ikuo Kabashima, the current governor of Kumamoto Prefecture, Shogo Arai, the current governor of Nara Prefecture, Heita Kawakatsu, the current governor of Shizuoka Prefecture, Duang Quac Xuan, the governor of Long An Province of Vietnam, and SOU Phirin, the governor of Siem Reap of Cambodia along with Issei Sawada, the former governor of Kumamoto Prefecture, Aleksandr, the president of Amur Oblast Concil of Russia, Nissimova, the deputy governor, Peter Lewis, president of the Southern Australia Council, Kuznetsov, the deputy governor of Leningrad Oblast of Russia, and Abe Akie, the wife of former Japanese prime minister Abe.

 

The Impressive Hall of World's Historic Cities

 

The only indoor exhibition hall at the 2010 Great Baekje World Festival, the Hall of the World's Historic Cities provided the overall insight into the myths and artifacts of the participating cities and thus a different kind of fun. At the hall, public servants and experts of the 12 participating cities were present, introducing their countries and cities and promoting their cultures.

Vietnam gathered rounds of applause from visitors with the calligraphy of the incumbent head of the Royal Museum; Leningrad, Amur, Russia presented embroidered costumes and an event involving making dolls with rags and enjoyed huge popularity among visitors; Turkey ran a program of marbling (a technique involving making marble patterns on a piece of paper); Azerbaijan drew portraits of children; Tashkent of Uzbekistan offered visitors a chance to put on traditional costumes and take a picture; Siem Reap of Cambodia was devoted to the promotion of Angkor Wat, a world-famous cultural asset; and Pakistan‘s crafts booth was crowded with curious visitors.

 

 

International Conference on Baekje Culture

 

Under the theme of “Following the Traces of Baekje, Kingdom of Exchanges,” an international conference was held at the Baekje Educational and Culture Center at Kongju National University for three days from September 30 to October 2, 2010. The conference was crowded by many scholars with great interest in the history and culture of Baekje starting from the first day.

The conference focused on the cultural exchanges and status of Baekje in ancient East Asia, and many renowned scholars home and abroad presented their research findings from different perspectives.

 

After participating in the conference, a student from Kongju National University said, “I used to think Baekje was a small kingdom at the margin of Korea. Today's conference changed my thoughts completely. I hope there will be many more international conferences on Baekje so that it can be promoted to many more people.”

 

There Were 52 Night Programs of the Total 150 Programs

 

One of characteristics of the festival this year was the operation of diverse night programs.

Of the total 150 programs at the festival, 52 were put on at night, including the two representative water performances, Great Baekje, the Kingdom of Exchanges Parade, and reenactment of the Battle of Hwangsanbeol. In addition, creative mask dance shows and Baekje recitals were also put on at night to present a fantastic Baekje night to the spectators.

 

Perfect Reenactment of an Ancient Battle During Baekje Era

 

There was a huge ancient battle during Baekje 1,400 years ago, and it was reenacted at the festival.

Reenactment of the Battle of Hwangsanbeol was put on the special stage at Nonsancheon Plaza Park, Chungnam on October 2 (Saturday) and 3 (Sunday), 2010. A big cast of renowned actors was on the stage to present the ultimate completion level of the performance in conjunction with the best production team and thorough historical research and consultation.

▲ Hwangsanbeol Battle perfectly repro-duced an ancient battle with a large cast and special effects.

They also employed an impressive special effects system to maximize visual effects including a smoke screen, gunpowder, fog machine, line rockets, and other special systems in addition to the video and broadcasting systems. About 1,000 cast members including the cavalrymen for the battle scenes and about 30 horses were engaged in the reenactment. About 400 million won was spent for the two-day performance, which lasted for 110 minutes.

 

 

Interesting Statistics of the Large-scale History and Culture Festival

 

- A total of 3,690,000 visitors visited the large-scale festival. Of them, 1,570,000 were paid visitors, and 2,120,000 were free visitors. An average of 120,000 visited the festival per day, and there were 201,000 foreign visitors at the festival as well.

▲ Great Baekje World Festival presented performances from various countries as the exhibition venue of performing arts where the audience could enjoy the world's unique cultures at one place.

- The number of total visiting cars was 495,000, of which 473,000 were compact cars and 22,000 were large cars. On weekends passenger cars were concentrated at the festival in large numbers and the eight reserve parking lots at the Baekje Cultural Land were all full, which was a new record.

 

- About 15,000 volunteers worked for the festival including 59 interpreters of three languages, 154 sign language and cleaning volunteers in Gongju and 287 in Buyeo. About 500 volunteers performed their roles a day.

- About 2,700,000 copies of all sorts of promotional materials including the event brochures were made and sent out. Of them, 1,000,000 were placed all around the festival venues, and 1,700,000 were posted by mail. The sheer number was a record in the history of Chungnam's festivals.

 

 

“I Am Happy to Learn How Beautiful Old Baekje Culture Is”

 

A Japanese volunteer, Hattori Eiji spent his own money to do translations at the festival.

“I am the first one to marvel at the beautiful culture and art of Baekje,” said he. “I am most delighted to explain and promote this wonderful festival to Japanese tourists.”

Hattori Eiji (65, Kani city, Gifu prefecture) came from Japan to Gongju, Chungnam just for the volunteer work. He's one of the volunteers in charge of Japanese interpretation at the Hall of World's Historic Cities. He visited the homepage of the Korean Tourism Bureau in 2009, decided to volunteer as an interpreter at Great Baekje World Festival, submitted his application to the organizing committee, and finally joined the other volunteers at this year's festival.

 

“The Baekje stories I tell Japanese tourists are just part of what I have learned and felt about Baekje here,” said he. “Frankly, I am most pleased to learn about Baekje, something I knew nothing about in Japan.” He added, “I learned that Baekje and Japan had many exchanges in the past and hope that more exchanges will happen between Korea and Japan in the future. Working all day standing, I feel a little bit tired. But I hope more Japanese tourists will visit the festival. I will work harder to present what I learned about Baekje culture in a more accurate, honest, and detailed manner.”

 

Baekje Culture in the Eyes of a European Visitor

 

“The history and culture festival in Buyeo, which has a very sad and beautiful legend like that of Lorelei, will remain in my memory forever.”

Many visitors from East Asia including Japan and China and even from Europe visited the festival driven by their deep interest in Baekje and marveled at its beauty.

A German delegation of 35 figures including high-rank officials at the German Department of Defense, presidents of investment companies, and entrepreneurs as well as the president of a graduate school visited the main event venue at the Baekje Cultural Land in Gyuam-myeon, Buyeo-gun, Chungnam on the morning of October 23, 2010.

 

One of them who was running a clinic at Osnabruck, Germany exclaimed, “The ancient palace has been rebuilt very beautifully, feels real, and is impressive in size.” The delegation also crossed flotage bridge at the Gudre ferry of Baekmagang River and was moved by the beauty of Geumgang River.

 

 

Japan, Expressing Gratitude for the Introduction of Baekje Buddhism 1,500 Years Ago.

A Buddhist Offering Ceremony was Held by Korean and Japanese Buddhism.

 

On October 13, 2010, a Japanese Buddhism delegation of 100 people held a Buddhist offering ceremony to appreciate the introduction of Baekje Buddhism in Japan at Neungsa of the Baekje Cultural Land in commemoration of the day King Seong of Baekje transmitted Baekje Buddhism to Japan.

It was in 522 that King Seong ordered his officials to send a golden Buddhist statue and several copies of Scripture to Japan according to the Nihon Shoki. The transmission of Buddhism by Baekje has received high evaluations from historians in that it provided spiritual ideology to the arrangement of ancient kingdoms in Japan.

A source at Chungnam Provincial Office said, “The Buddhist offering ceremony held jointly between the Korean and Japanese Buddhist community is significant as the opportunity to reinforce the cooperating relationships between the two nations to promote Korean and Japanese Buddhist culture at the 2010 Great Baekje World Festival. They made a huge contribution to civil diplomacy between the two countries by exploring the Buso Mountain Fortress, where Buddhism was transmitted, on a Hwangpo sail boat and holding an exchange meeting between Korean and Japanese Buddhism at Jijangjeong Buddhist Temple in Nonsan.”