Day 26: if2017 with Wonjun

I stayed up too late yesterday (it's becoming the rule rather than the exception now) and just wanted a lazy day at home but around noon I started feeling hungry and decided to go down and buy some bread to take back to the dorm. I didn't do my hair or make-up or anything and just threw on the dress that I wore the day before.

As I was about to leave, Wonjun messaged me, asking if we'd eaten yet or if we wanted to go for lunch together. Celine didn't want to join me on my bread adventures at first but changed her mind and came along.

We walked to a few places but a lot of the restaurants were closed today. Probably because it was Sunday. Finally we found a place that served cold noodles (냉면), bibimbap, and a hybrid between those two.
I've come to realize that if my first meal of the day is too spicy, I'll end up with either a stomach ache or nausea. I didn't feel like cold noodles and haven't really had troubles with bibimbap being too spicy before. But of course today was the day that that should happen. There was much less rice than I feel like I usually get and so the spicy part was too spicy and I ended up with stomach pain ㅠㅠ

When Wonjun first asked me if we wanted to go for lunch, he said he'd pay. And he did before Celine and I could stop him or even realize it. 정말 고마워 원준이야 :)

We are still trying to explain to him how it's uncommon to pay for your friends when you go out in Denmark.

Since we'd already walked down to Sinchon, Celine wanted to look for a setting spray. She didn't find what she was looking for but right beside that store was an international market that had aaaaaall sorts of candy and snacks from around the world.

Wonjun asked us to look for something from Denmark and bam! Butter cookies!

We'd never seen this brand before, though, and ended up not buying them. Instead, I spotted some Rittersport chocolate and told Wonjun about all the different flavours and how it used to be my favorite chocolate.

While Celine was deciding on some Japanese candy, I spotted these tiny chocolate balls, wrapped to look like soccerballs and baseballs, that I remember my parents getting my siblings and I in Germany when our family used to drive to Italy for vacation. I felt so happy and nostalgic to see them again! Wonjun spotted it and bought some for all of us.

That day, some sort of festival for already established smaller companies/sellers was going on in Sinchon. What started out as simply checking out a few stands turned into a touring of the festival and stopping at almost every booth to take pictures, turn their wheels of fortune, and getting free stuff. According to Wonjun, it sounded like an abundance of free stuff is pretty common for this kind of event.

Wonjun insisted we took pictures in front of the giant sign. He held the button down for too long, taking a bunch of pictures only a few seconds apart, allowing me to make this gif.

It amazes me how Sinchon managed to change so drastically in just a couple of hours. The people setting up all this are so efficient! The other day I walked past a big hole in the ground and when I returned to the same spot in the evening, it was completely gone !

We came to a booth with Lego!! These three people were absolutely wonderful. Especially the woman is the middle was so joyful and talkative. It really made my day.

Here you could get a free coffee (iced americano I think) and a lego postcard if you took a picture of you holding their sign and posting it on social medias. This was a thing for a lot of stands; spread the word and get something in return. Celine got some cool Indiana Jones and Starwars themed cards from here.

There was also an area with what looked like indie game developer stands. We didn't get to look at those, sadly.

There was a stand that gave you candyfloss if you filled out an online survey for them! Wonjun helped us since it was all in Korean.

The festival spanned the entire main street from one end to the other.

Wonjun usually tried to hide his face when I take pictures but I totally caught him. Ha!

We came to a stand that had those fake tattoos that you apply with water. They're highly popular in Korea. Wonjun spoke to the guy there, pulled me over, and before I knew it, I had a leaf off-centered on my forehead.

I hadn't put make-up on that day or prepared myself mentally to go out and socialize (I'd done the opposite that day, actually) and now I felt that everyone was staring at me.

He and Celine laughed about it once in a while if we locked eyes and Wonjun thought I was angry at him. In reality, the reason why my face was red was pure embarrassment. Once they got busy looking at one of the stands, I took my chance to scratch if off and instead walk around with a slightly red spot on my forehead.

I don't know why that giant inflatable head was there. But I needed a picture.

Oh yea!! The palm trees we'd seen the other night were put used for this lounge area at the end of the road.

Wonjun had planned to study for a couple of hours before staying up at midnight to watch Manchester United play. On our way back through campus, he showed us two of the libraries here.

When we finally reached our dorm, I felt exhausted. I was happy that we got to spend time at the festival but all I'd told myself this morning was that it was going to be a lazy day and that I'd get to go back to my bed after buying bread. The adventures today exceeded my plans so much. I was not ready.

I'll finish this post with a picture of today's freebies and the two chocolate balls that Wonjun got me. We joked that the lip balm we all won from spinning a wheel of fortune was probably of really low quality but here, days later, I prefer this one over the one I brought with me to Korea. It's got a great cherry smell as well ^^