Why Carl Sagan would have liked afternoon tea at Gyeongbok Palace (경복궁)
what is the stardust way of relaxing?
“The carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
These are the words I would imagine someone with a shrewd eye and a poetic heart to utter. Someone who would enjoy the solitude of nature, contemplating it from a distance but with a curiosity that burrows deep into the essence of life.
These words were postulated by such a man: Carl Sagan.
Carl is the type of guy I can envision looking quite at home inside a hanok building. It doesn’t matter that he’s not Korean. Or that he’s America’s most famous showman of science. Carl possesses a gentle inquisitiveness that would lead him to lucid truths even within a foreign setting. How else would he have “brought the galaxy”—to borrow the words of a fellow fan—to Americans?
Just two weeks ago, I was invited to attend a traditional tea ceremony at Saenggwabang (생과방)—a hanok within Gyeonbokgung (경복궁) where the Joseon king and queen formerly consumed royal sweets—by a friend. Every summer, the Cultural Heritage Administration (CHA) offers the public a chance to re-enact Joseon royal lifestyle for a limited time. It would be an understatement to say that Saenggwabang is popular. Tickets for the tea ceremony sell out within seconds (this is why you need friends). The French version of this event would be to indulge in cake at the Palace of Versailles à la Marie Antoinette. I can already see the lines for that.
When I sat criss-cross on the daecheong maru (대청마루)—the largest space within Saenggwabang that connects all the adjacent rooms—I saw that our view overlooked the courtyard. Rectangularly shaped and framed on all four sides by choema (eaves) that extend discreetly towards the sky, the courtyard feels almost like a waterless pond. The sky runs across the choema opening like film, a continuous strip of blue that leaves no reflections below. An audio recording of traditional Korean string instruments played in the background, setting a ruminative tone for that morning. To both my left and right, people sat in pairs and spoke in low voices.
I could see why the Joseon king and queen would want to munch on some sweets here. Perhaps together. Often alone. At the same time, I was struck by how humbling the experience was. It’s not often that the words “royalty” and “humble” get paired together. But it’s precisely this humbling effect that makes me feel Carl would have liked tea and sweets at Saenggwabang.
Inviting nature into the house
We rarely reflect on how we exist as a part of nature. Rather, we tend to think of nature as being an “other” that lies beyond the walls and windows of our offices, apartments, houses. We segregate ourselves from nature through boundaries that we arbitrarily erect in spaces that we want to claim for ourselves. Close the door so that bugs won’t come in. Let’s sit near this window so that we can see the plum tree growing in the distance. It’s almost like as it we’ve forgotten where we came from. We’ve grown oblivious to the fact that no matter how hard we distinguish ourselves from other life forms, we still share the same planet.
This idea of “sharing” resurfaces at Saenggwabang. The entire hanok is literally opened up from the inside out to receive guests and nature; all the doors of the hanok are either folded to the side or hung up on the ceiling, thus baring the insides of the royal compartment. The division between “inside” and “outside” is rendered liminal by this opening, which is subtly referential in its reveal. Saenggwabang becomes part of the wind, sunlight, energy that courses through it—it joins the continuum of nature.
Saenggwabang becomes part of the wind, sunlight, energy that courses through it—it joins the continuum of nature.
It doesn’t matter where you sit. You can feel the breeze coming in from all directions. Nature is, quite literally, brought into the house. In this moment, the lines demarcating nature and civilization are dismantled and you realize how small you are. Sure the butterfly effect exists, but we don’t normally think of ourselves as butterflies do we? Gazing out onto the courtyard, looking up at the cheoma-framed sky, in between sips of tea transports you to a self-reflective state where the noise of mundanity is muffled out. The silence that envelops you is akin to the pensive breath-holding that would happen when observing the earth as a “pale blue dot” from within the dark, indifferent cosmos.
If I were the marketer of a New York based wellness startup, I might be quick to label this scene as a definitive “detox” moment. It ticks all the boxes: relaxing, quality me-time appropriate, at one with nature, etc. But I feel Saenggwabang’s self-effacing nature distances it from the gamut of wellness packages designed for consumption. From a Carl Sagan-standpoint, the beauty of the Saenggwabang experience lies in peacefully reconciling with the fact that you are not the center of the world. There is nothing to consume here. While you would physically intake royal sweets, these are just additive elements that anchor you to the current corporeal realm. We wouldn’t want you to drift too far off into the cosmos would we?
From a Carl Sagan-standpoint, the beauty of the Saenggwabang experience lies in peacefully reconciling with the fact that you are not the center of the world.
Throwing open the doors of Saenggwabang, quite literally, amounts to bringing nature into the realm of civilized order—a realm that has been, for the most part, sequestered from nature ever since humans discovered their knack for architecture. The creation of an inhabitable space is, in essence, an imposition of human-centric order onto the environment. However, this order cannot exist (yet) outside the planet that we are very much a part of. Funnily enough, this fact gets overlooked as we drift farther and farther away from our primitive beginnings. Perhaps this is why the cosmos gifts us with purveyors like Carl and grants us the privilege of preserving and experiencing architectural wonders such as Saenggwabang.
Solace lies in breaks
The crux of what Carl and Saenggwabang are trying to relay to us could be disheartening. You are just a speck in the galaxy. Strangely though, people derive comfort from this humbling fact. That people gravitate towards Carl and Saenggwabang intimates that both brands deliver comfort. The mechanism behind this comfort is going to be the main branding takeaway for today’s post.
People seek out Carl and Saenggwabang because both brands give them permission to take a break. Huh? Permission? Before you go down the whole “I wield agency over my life” rabbit hole, I want to clarify that just because you have agency doesn’t mean that you have the mental capacity to de-plug yourself from life’s daily iterations. Admitting that you need to take time off to recalibrate requires courage. And sometimes that courage comes from an external source who reassures you that it’s okay to gently press the pause button.
People seek out Carl and Saenggwabang because both brands give them permission to take a break.
Tuning into an old recording of Carl or gazing out from Saenggwabang offers people a break from the noise of life. They mute the chaos that surrounds you, ensconcing you in a solitude that offers solace. This silence is comforting as it allows you to re-center yourself by taking a step back. From the larger standpoint of the cosmos, the choices you make aren’t that significant. While some folks may be disappointed to learn that they aren’t making a big enough impact (isn’t this what we all write on our resumes?), most become washed over with a sense of relief. In today’s hyper competitive society, where every decision entails an inevitable opportunity cost, people tend to overthink and over-scrutinize the most minute details of their lives. Everything becomes magnified in importance. Am I going to come across as being overly ambitious if I offer to take on a leading role this upcoming project? Will Andrew think I’m weird if I ask him to watch Memento on our next date? Is my cat going to judge me if I pair tuna tartare with kimchi? Perhaps this is beneficial in the short term. But I can’t imagine such a lifestyle being—here comes the buzz word—sustainable.
In a world where we have brands like Nike, which goads us towards growth across all facets of life, it makes sense to have brands like Carl and Saenggwabang who re-anchor our sense of existence. They espouse healthy doses of detachment that, somewhat counterintuitively, result in a clarity that allows us to more accurately process our lives. We may not be at the center of the world, but we can all mull over what it means to be a part of the larger cosmos. This break—this deviation in lens— is what revitalizes us, humbles us, and serves as a testament to the warmth humans can generate in an otherwise cold universe that is naturally void of solace.