Superstitions in Korea

Although Korea has become an advanced technological country, many old-fashioned superstitions still remain. For example, many Korean thinks that eating brown seaweed soup on a test day brings failure in the test. They think brown seaweed is slippery and we can slip and fall out of the test, which means that we can fail in the test. Similarly, when a mirror or a cup is crushed to pieces in the morning, people tend to worry about the bad luck that will happen that day. In addition, it is true that most buildings in Korea do not have a fourth floor and many apartments do not have the fourth building. In Korea, the number 4 is considered as an unlucky number. Thus, many buildings have the letter “F” instead of 4th in their elevators. Finally, if someone’s name is written down with a red-colored pen, many think it can be related to his death, so people try to avoid writing one’s name in a red pen unless they hate him or her.

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