Ripchun (the first day of spring) and usu (the first rainfall of the year) fall on February.

   Ripchun, the first division of the 24 seasonal divisions, which means that spring has started, usually falls on the beginning of the January of the lunar calendar and it falls on February 4 or 5 of the solar calendar in general.

   Since the early times, our people did up indoors and outdoors neat and tidy for greeting the ripchun and they used to write the wishes of that year or greetings of the new spring and stick on their main doors and closets. And also, they prepared dishes in which the fragrance of spring can be scented using spring onions grown in a storage pit, wild mustard, angelica and the like.

   Distinctive feature in the customs of ripchun relevant to farming is that the ceremonies related with cattle were performed a lot.

   In some regions, they made a round of the village with a wooden ox and in some regions they put farming tools upon a wooden ox and made a feint of tilling. Also in some regions, they tilled the field partly with a draught ox.

   Usu means the first rainfall of the year that brings all things back to life and it generally falls on February 19 or 20 of the solar calendar.

   There is a saying “On usu and kyongchip (the end of the hibernation), River Taedong thaws.” and when it enters this season the temperature of the other regions except northern highland in our country rises above 0℃ and thawing of snow begins. So farmers stored snow water in each and every puddles and they hurried up the preparation of farming in this season.

   Also, at this time, our people used to play various folk games like yut-game, tug of war, seesaw and kite-flying.