What's To Come

My future has been told.  

 

Or suggestions made regarding the coming years...  

Or predictions concerning what will be encountered...

Or guesses based on the information that was supplied.*  

 

Whichever you like.  I saw a Fortune Teller this past weekend (7/7) for the cultural experience it would provide.

Using just the date and time of my birth, she referenced a well loved, battered and frayed book and wrote down some markings (that didn't even appear to be Korean).  Using those, she drew connections from one element to the next, from another to the first, the first to the last, and all over the place.  

To me it looked like a mess of swirls and circles, but my translator kept nodding her head in agreement and offering the ever-so-encouraging "ohhhh"s and "aahhh"s.  So we must have been on the right track.

It was an interesting observance.  I don't know if I'd call it insightful or that my worries and concerns for the unknown that are to come in the future were answered, but it was interesting.

 

I wanted to take some pictures while she was consulting her charts and interpreting her findings, but it felt overly invasive to do.  She was reading into my life and future, offering answers on what was to come for me, and there I was with my camera going to capture her invading my personal life?!  An invasion of an invasion?!  No, I think not.

So I did not take pictures.  

But she did let me keep her "map".  

Good luck working it out.  

I have no idea how fortune telling works, if it is different in Korean culture than it is in Western culture, or any of the aspects that make it popular amongst its believers.  

But as I said I went for the experience, and for 30,000 won (~$26.00) it's another thing I can check off my Bucket List and it has given me some things to think about.

 

*She used the date and time that I was born, and from what I'm aware the only thing else she knew was that I work at Daepyung Elementary School on Yeongdo Island.