Cross-Cultural Exchange: Cheongju and Nagano

Endo Yui
Iwasaki Keiko
Maruyama Hiyoshi
Kobayashi Kaori
Takahashi Kiyo

Recently we often think the relationship between South Korea and Japan is becoming much closer.  Our memory of the 2002 World Cup Soccer Games co-hosted by these two countries is still fresh in our mind.  It was very fun to watch the heated games, toughest athletes, and feverish supporters.  Watching emotional performances on TV, we were so impressed to see both Korean and Japanese supporters got united supporting Korean team playing in the semi-final.  We saw such a scene for the first time and felt Korea was not far from Japan any more.  

The thing which made us interested in Korea is not just the World Cup Games.  According to the historic documents, exchanges between people in Korea and Nagano had already started about 2 or 3 century.  Recently some important traces, which showed the Korean people's residence, were found in some excavations in Nagano City.  We can guess both people cooperated each other in many ways with the neighboring people by crossing the sea.    In fact we can surely tell some cultural heritages and traditions in Nagano came from Korea.  For example, the worldwide famous temple, Zenkoji has close connections with Korea in its origin and myth.  
On the other hand, there is a sad history which should not be forgot by people forever.  It is the Matsushiro Headquarters of World War ll.  It reminds us the unforgettable tragedy caused by Japan about 60 years ago.  

In this website we would like to introduce these local history and culture related to Korea.  The subjects listed below are based on the information gained through our own research and interview to the local people.  In creating web articles, we could realize that Korea was just a close country and had the similar feelings as we did during the World Cup Soccer Games. Hopefully our articles would help Korean and Japanese friends to understand our history and culture and be interested more in each country and people.  We would like to build up the closer friendship with Korean friends like ancient people did in our grassroots exchanges.
  

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