City of Love or City of Songs About Love?

There has been a human settlement on the banks of the Yeocheon River in this corner of Jeollabuk-do even before the Baekje Period and since King Gyeongdeok named it Namwon in 757 A.D., it has retained its name for almost 1,300 years. No mean feat and given its position in the history and culture of the country, I can’t understand why it isn’t given more prominence by KNTO. While it doesn’t have the architectural attractions of Gyeongju, I feel it still deserves at least one page on the KNTO website instead of simply a page dedicated to its annual Chunhyang Festival ( held in early May).

Whatever buildings of historic significance were probably decimated during the Imjin War when the town was besieged in 1597. Imagine 56,000 Japanese surrounding this town occupied by only 3,300 Korean and Chinese soldiers and 6000 women and children. Almost the entire population was wiped out in this invasion and Gwanghallu was also totally destroyed and had to be reconstructed much later. I suppose so little of the old town remained to warrant a museum dedicated to the memory of pre-invasion Namwon. All that's there to remind us of its past is one stone monument, one tomb and one small section of the wall surrounding Namwon Castle.

The Namwon Tourism Promotion Commission seems to have decided that romance is the way to go in selling the city as a tourist destination. Namwon has declared itself “the City of Love” on its promotional brochures but at the same time, sells itself as the birthplace of some of its most famous pansori compositions such as Chunhyang-jeon, Heungbu-jeon ( on brotherly love) and Song of Byeon-Gang-Soe ( on erotic love). Trouble is, there isn’t enough translation work done to make the exhibits in the National Center for Traditional Performing Arts accessible to those who can’t understand Korean.

There were booths where I could stand and listen to extracts of pansori performances but I didn’t understand what I was hearing and there wasn’t much in terms of explanation or elaboration. Perhaps there isn’t enough interest among tourists to warrant the expense and effort to offer lengthy descriptions in English. There were also free pansori performances offered on certain evenings ( third Tuesday between April and June, 7 pm) and afternoons ( second and fourth Saturdays) but unfortunately for me, I was at the place at the wrong day and time.

Click here for the official website of Namwon.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namwon
http://asiaenglish.visitkorea.or.kr/ena/SI/SI_EN_3_1_1_1.jsp?cid=860612
http://asiaenglish.visitkorea.or.kr/ena/SI/SI_EN_3_2_1.jsp?cid=697200
http://en.namwon.go.kr/en/sub2/index.jsp?page_gubun=page1_4
Tourist brochure produced by the Namwon Tourism Promotion Commission ( 2007)