The Young People of Sarangbang Embrace Beijing: Travelogue of EAI Sarangbang Students' Beijing Expedition

The first book from EAI Sarangbang has been published. "The Young People of Sarangbang Embrace Beijing: Travelogue of EAI Sarangbang Students' Beijing Expedition" contains the stories of learning, feeling, and experiencing by students who took the EAI Sarangbang course in the second semester of 2013 during their expedition trip to Beijing. Based on thorough preliminary research, students took turns acting as guides for the expedition, which included visits to the National Museum of China, the Beijing Capital Museum, the Forbidden City, Liulichang, the Old Summer Palace, the Summer Palace, and the Chairman Mao Memorial Hall. Just as Park Gyu-su's Sarangbang 140 years ago was a living educational space for young intellectuals of the enlightenment movement, EAI Sarangbang disseminates the vivid knowledge of this era that young people cannot learn in conventional education. This book is distributed free of charge as an e-book for all readers, including students and the general public.

Foreword

The young people of the East Asia Institute Sarangbang embarked on their first overseas expedition.

One hundred and forty years ago, the young people of the enlightenment movement, in Park Gyu-su's Sarangbang, studied Europe, which was emerging as a new civilizational standard, amidst the stifling atmosphere of rejecting the West as barbaric. They later embarked on an overseas tour. A century before that, the young people of the Northern Learning School, overcoming the prevailing trend of advocating for a northern expedition, took Park Ji-won as their teacher and studied Qing China, essential for rebuilding a genuine Joseon, not a counterfeit, late into the night before setting off on their journey to Yan jing.

The 21st-century world order is in a phase of civilizational reconstruction. East Asia stands at the forefront. The United States is fully pursuing its Asia-Pacific rebalancing policy, and China is intensifying its new diplomacy, including the concept of a new type of major power relations. Japan advocates for active peace, and Russia has put forth the concept of a new foreign policy. North Korea talks about the policy of parallel development of economy and nuclear weapons, and South Korea has unveiled its Northeast Asia Peace Initiative.

For one semester, the young people of the East Asia Institute Sarangbang underwent intellectual guerrilla training as architects of the East Asian order to devise a thousand-year plan that would satisfy all protagonists in the East Asian living space. They rapidly traversed the 3,000-year history of East Asia, encompassing the traditional world order, the modern international order, and the Cold War international order, leading to a complex world order.

As the final stage of their training, they embraced Beijing, the thousand-year capital of China. Though the time was short, they experienced the 3,000 years of the traditional world order firsthand, shared the shock of the modern international order, and dreamed of a complex East Asian order, moving beyond the Cold War international order.

As evangelists of dreams, the young people leave Sarangbang and venture into a wider world. As their first steps, they have prepared this account of their Beijing expedition. We would be grateful if you would read it with encouraging eyes, despite any shortcomings. I am proud of them, who ran joyfully together during the challenging semester and expedition period, and the efforts and trust of everyone at the East Asia Institute who supported Sarangbang's dream under difficult circumstances fill my heart with pride.

March 31, 2014 Manqing Ha Young-sun

Table of Contents

Foreword

Expedition Itinerary

Chapter 1: Speaking of China's Past, Present, and Future_National Museum of China | Ji Hye-su

Chapter 2: Encountering Three Thousand Years of History_Beijing Capital Museum | Kang Jin-hyuk

Chapter 3: The Four Seasons of the Forbidden City | Kang Hwa-hyun

Chapter 4: Liulichang, Beijing_Reading the Minds of Envoys to Yan jing through a Time Machine | Lee Gyu-won

Chapter 5: The Symbol of a Century of National Humiliation, the Old Summer Palace_Revisiting with the Eyes of a 21st Century Envoy to Yan jing | Kim Ji-eun

Chapter 6: Empress Dowager Cixi's Palace_A Newly Written Travelogue of the Summer Palace | Jeon Na-num

Chapter 7: The Two Faces of Mao Zedong | Woo Hee-won

Appendix

This book is freely available to the public as an e-book.