새로미 who?

Regular visitors to my patch of Seoul know I am a sucker for a photo op with a mascot. I have shots with dozens of characters, from sports mascots 턱돌이 (Mr. Stone Jaw) to the Doosan Bear to the FC Seoul 도깨비 (goblin), from a perfume atomizer bottle to a loaf of bread to a frosty mug of Kloud beer, from Pororo to Crong, from … well, you get the idea. So, yesterday, I snagged this beauty:


(S)he is wearing a chest badge of the official Gangseo-gu (my district of the city) logo, and is therefore, I assumed, the gu mascot. A trip to the website (https://www.gangseo.seoul.kr/site/english_new/contents/gangseo/symbol.htm) informed me that the character's name is 새로미, Saeromi, "representing a friendly and warm-hearted image, is a forever friend of the people of Gangseo, and represents perennial glad tidings."

But not quite. As you can see from the image there, Saeromi is a male bird (?) of some description.


And, wearing a skirt and a hair bow, my new friend is clearly a chick. I don't know if they are siblings, a married couple, or just friends.

Furthermore, I wondered, exactly what kind of bird is Saeromi? Not enough bill to be a duck, which was my first thought. Her plumage is mostly black, suggesting a crow, but one with a white face. Looking further down the webpage, I saw that the official bird of Gangseo is the magpie. I would say mystery solved, but magpies don't have white faces either … On the other hand, while magpies symbolize trickery, meaningless chatter and bad luck in the West, Asians see them as bringers of good fortune.

Indeed, ggachi figures prominently in Korean minhwa folk art and folktales with the tiger, horangi (together ggachi and horangi, 까치와호랑이):


Stay tuned.