Finally, one of our D-Days!
The Museum’s annual anniversary celebration falls on May 5, which is Children’s Day in Korea. Pretty much all workers and students have a day off, which means that this day is often the busiest for museums and recreational facilities. We are certainly no exceptions, as Tuesday was also our grand opening for the new mural (photo attached).
The mural grand opening involved organizing food and beverages (Korean tteok, or rice cakes, and a homemade kumquat soda), a music performance (classical flutes), a fully guided docent tour of the museum, rerouting traffic into the small alley leading into the museum, and the video I had been creating for the past three weeks. With around 70 RSVPs for the event, we certainly were not expecting over 150 people to show up. Herding the crowds around the murals, leading them up to our museum, and ensuring that the children running around didn’t get hit by cars or by taller adults was certainly a monumental task for our small team of 7-8 museum staff.
As the event wound to a close, the finale neared–the first showing of my video. Told at the last minute to give a speech (a very stressful 10 minutes of preparation), I thanked my museum coworkers, the event participants, and the Laidlaw foundation for the opportunity to work with the museum for this cause. Because of the uncertainty I had of showing this video as someone who has only produced videos for class projects or clubs before, the reaction truly shocked me. People laughed at the comical videos of students running around after each other, remembered the long, hot days at the sight of sweat dripping down the staffs’ faces, and fell into a contemplative silence watching the longer interviews of participants discussing what the mural means to them.
A simple five minute video was now played on repeat as the event progressed and as the visitors continued to trickle in throughout the day. Based on the initial reception, the museum director and curator even made the decision to keep the video as a special exhibit for a full week after the event’s conclusion. Because the video is copyrighted by the museum and may be used as a part of further exhibits, I cannot share this in my blog post, but I will be sure to update my post if it becomes available in the future!
After our ceremony ended, the staff ordered in fried chicken and downed the rest of the kumquat soda, all exhausted but satisfied.