▲ Lotus Flower Festival

In July and August when lotus flowers blossom on marshes, red lotuses, white lotuses, golden lotuses, water lilies swell in lovely and splendid poise around Gungnamji Pond, Buyeo-gun, Chungcheongnam-do. Why don't we present a feast of new tastes to the picky palate with steamed rice wrapped in a lotus leaf as we already had the luxury of pleasing view of lotus flowers at their peak?
 

Gungnamji Pond, a Representative Attraction Symbolizing Lotus Flowers
Enough to be called a museum on the road,Buyeo has an abundance of remains and relics everywhere. Gungnamji, among them, was the first man-made pond in Korea,  belonging to a detached palace of the royal palace, and it is commonly known to be a romantic place to have a love story, which adds to its tourist draw.
 
Gungnamji is a place where the story of King Mu in year 634, who was Seodong, occurred. It was built in order to comfort the homesickness of Princess Seonhwa, who had just come to marry him from Silla. Gungnamjiwas made by digging around the southern part of the palace and drawing water from 10 kilometers away. In the middle of the pond, there is PoryongPavilion and a timber bridge which leads to the pavilion.
 
Seodong and Princess Seonhwa, who were lovers, must have whispered love on a floating boat among the lotus flowers in full blossom in Gungnamji after marriage, having become King Mu and his queen.

Gungnamji, where the romance of 1,400 years ago of King Mu and Princess Seonhwa is nestled, is renowned for its beauty all year round. It boasts of even its most superb view in summer when a colony of lotus flowers widely spread reach its zenith.
 

Steamed Rice Wrapped in a Lotus Leaf, Peerless for its Unique and Mellow Fragrance
Another way to enjoy the lotus flowers, in addition to viewing the lovely and splendid lotus flowers around Gungnamji Pond,is to taste the various dishes that use lotus leaves. Among them is the steamed rice wrapped in a lotus leaf. In China, lotus leaves were known as the food of the everyoung, so leaves, flowers, fruits, and roots were all used to make medicine or in cooking.

From old times, people from Buyeo picked lotus leaves scattered everywhere in Gungnamjifor dishes with steamed rice wrapped in a lotus leaf.
 
Steamed rice wrapped in a lotus leaf is a dish cooked with all sorts of grains in addition to the rice, and as much as there are various materials, a lot of work is required to make it. It is cooked by boiling rice with materials like pine nuts, walnuts, jujube, and chestnuts, and then wrapping the rice in lotus leaves and steaming them.
 
Then lastly,the rice must settle in its own steam. Letting the settling can be felt naturally when you taste the steamed rice deeply permeated with the lotus leaf fragrance. You will face the steaming repository of nutrients when you strip one layer of lotus leaf that has been wrapped. As you chew the glutinous deluxe rice slowly, steam rolls up. The appetite is stimulated as the unique fragrance of lotus leaves mixed with various materials fills the mouth with a mellow fragrance.

 
July 17-20 BuyeoSeodong Lotus Flower Festival
The 11th BuyeoSeodong Lotus Flower Festival will take place from July 17 to 20, 2014 around the Gungnamji Pond, which was created as Seodong Park.

The BuyeoSeodong Lotus Flower Festival, which started in 2003, is held with the theme of love and romance in Gungnamji, where the birth tale of King Mu of Baekje is nestled, and in SeodongPark, where fragrance of ten million lotus flowers is full to the brim between July and August every year.

You can fully enjoy the unique charm of the BuyeoSeodong Lotus Flower Festival, which hasthe soft fragrance of lotus flowers nicely in blossom on the surface of the water and the natural beauty.