The Korean peninsula is located in Northeast Asia, jutting out into the sea. To its west is China and to its east is Japan. Both China and Japan have sought to lay claim over Korea, but Korea has resisted fiercely. One way it has established its independent identity is through a creation myth that binds all Korean people. 

The Koreans believe that the youngest son of the sky-god came to Korea to civilise humans. His other brothers went to China in the east, India in the south and Europe in the west. He came with a retinue of heavenly beings who brought with them all things that civilise humans: agriculture, fishing, herding, weaving, medicine, education. A tiger and a bear met the prince of heaven and asked him to turn them into humans. The prince of heaven told them to eat garlic and some herbs and stay away from the sun for a hundred days. The tiger failed to do this and so remained a tiger. The bear turned into a beautiful woman who bore the prince of heaven a son under a sandalwood tree atop a mountain. This son named Dangun, whose father came from heaven and whose mother was a bear, became the first king of Korea.