Day 3 in Korea

January 10th was my third day in Korea. The weather was once again nice and sunny.

That day Miwa wanted to do something that she often does in Korea: have her own picture taken. Before we had gone to Korea, Miwa showed me a book of costume photos she'd had professionally taken several years ago. She wanted to go back to the same studio and have photos taken again. In the book there were seven photos: two in a wedding dress, one in a black dress, one in kids clothes, one in chinese clothes and two in traditional Korean clothes. Miwa asked me if I wanted to have photos taken too. At first I thought No. I mean, a wedding dress? I'd rather not . . .. But then I started thinking about the traditional Korean clothes, and I thought that I could put up with having my picture taken in a wedding dress if I could also have a picture of me in the Korean dress.

The studio we went to was a professional studio, if a little shabby. The makeup artist came to our hotel in a taxi to pick us up. It was a shiny black expensive taxi with leather seats, and we didn't have to pay for it. The studio was on the other side of the Han River, and took a little while to get to. When we got there, we went down to the basement-level studio and met the photographer. He was a middle-aged casually dressed fellow who, unlike the makeup artist, could speak Japanese. He had quite a forceful personality on him (like most Koreans do; compared to the Japanese, at least) and he tried to talk us into having our photos printed large and presented in a large hardback-sized book. But we had, quite on purpose, only brought enough money for the smaller paperback-sized albums. It is a good idea to split your money up like that in Korea. If people get really insistent you can say "Look inside my wallet. I really don't have enough money for that." That shuts them up.

We changed into robes and had our makeup done while the photographer was in the actual studio surfing the net on his rather expensive-looking computer with a huge TV-sized flatscreen monitor. Even though the studio was looking a little worse for wear, it seems as if he is making a decent amount of money. Then the costume changing began. We did not have much choice in clothes (the makeup artist chose everything), and no choice in scenery. First was the two Korean outfit pictures. I managed to avoid being put on a hot-pink top and instead chose a nice teal coloured one. There was only one other time that morning that I managed to make my own choice of clothes, and that was for the last photo.

After the Korean clothes came the black evening dress. There was no hairpiece to match my hair colour, so my hair looks rather weird in that photo. Then came the two wedding dress photos (bleh . . .) and then the 'casual clothes' photo. The makeup artist was going to stick us in clown wigs, but luckily I was sitting near the wig drawer. I reached in and pulled out a slightly more flattering wig (although it was pink) and managed to change her mind. Bizzarely, the pink wig suited me, just a little (I will post the pictures later).

Last was the 'summer clothes' photo. At first I was given a pink floral sleeveless figure-hugging top to put on, but I wanted to wear a something Chinese, and I knew from seeing Miwa's old photos that the last photo can be Chinese-themed if the customer desires. And as I did desire so, I went hunting through the Chinese wardrobe for something I could fit into. Miwa also chose a Chinese themed top. She got to wear two fake bundles of hair on her head and look very cute, but because the fake Chinese hair was only available in black I could not wear it. Actually, I went in with my own hair, which unfortunately was looking rather messy after being stuffed into wigs and such for several hours.

When we were all done, Miwa went to see one of her friends. Because she had no idea what she and her friend would be doing, I decided to go my own way. I took a taxi back to Meongdong (for the third time - it was the only place I shopped in Seoul) and did a little more shopping. I went back and bought a belt I had seen the day before, but did not have enough money on me at the time to buy. Then I scoured every floor of Migliore looking for a t-shirt with something in the Korean alphabet written on it. Maybe I would have had some success if it had actually been, y'know, summer.

I forgot to take a watch with me to Korea, and I didn't have my cellphone with me so I had no idea what the time was. After what seemed like hours of window-shopping and eating street vendor food (sausage on a stick and crab-meat in spicy pancake on a stick) I thought that it was about time to go back to the hotel. Another thing that convinced me it was time to go back was that I still had all the makeup from the photo studio on my face and I felt like an idiot. So I took a taxi back and when I got back to my room, found that it was 3.20pm. I had thought it was at least an hour later than that.

I didn't really have enough money to take a taxi somewhere else, so I just stayed in. I sorted out my suitcase for the trip home, I went down to the lobby and spent an hour on the internet (which was complimentary). I got all the silly makeup off my face. Then I spent an hour making the globe puzzle I had bought the day before. After having a long shower and double checking my suitcase, it was late enough for me to concievably think of it as bed-time. About that time Miwa came back drunk and pottered around having showers and stuff, but I got an early night.