#6. Designing A Place A Day - Day 7 A Street Vendor

For day 7 I designed a street vendor and his.. err...what is it called... stand.

I have both nostalgic and bad memories about visiting street vendors.

Bad things first: I had major stomachaches every time I bought food from vendors when I was in Toronto.

(Maybe I happened to buy something "odd" or I was reactive to some of the ingredients, I dunno :P)

But what I wanted in my story was the nostalgic side of it.

When I was living in Seoul, I liked to go to a town called Insa-dong (인사동) with my family. It is famous for shops selling various Asian antique items (usually art, which also included contemporary art). Some part of the town really emitted the "traditional" aura, and that was the part I liked the most.

(You can see amazing photographs of this amazing town here: http://blog.daum.net/tomatoagi/5532395)

My parents often bought me there some Korean taffy (엿?) from a taffy seller dressed in traditional Korean costume. I was not particularly fond of sweet things (and they are sweet), but I really liked getting stuffs there. It was usually in the evening that my families went there, so I could see the glimmers of colorful lights in the darkening sky. The vapors from nearby food stands and vents in the ground shadowed and revealed the whole scene in turns. It was mysterious to me. 

Old (뽕짝..) songs were played from somewhere. Sellers sung (or shouted) cadent phrases to invite customers. The big, old-fashioned scissors that the taffy seller used to cut taffy (and to attract customers) made weird sounds--between snapping and clanging, I think. Plus there were sounds of crowds chatting from everywhere. A number of cars that for some reason wanted to get into the street made honking noises. Together they numbed my ears and other senses. 

But I was having fun. I was nibbling taffy along with my siblings, my parents by our sides.

I didn't get to eat taffy that often. My family didn't go out together (to such a place) that often.

It was a treat, and it was like experiencing a different reality.

Maybe my memories are more or less constructed over the years based on my impression. :P

But the town was really imprinted in my memory.

God, wasn't I babbling too much. Going back to the street vendor!

Again I Tumbled, Googled, and Flickered, and gathered what I found out in Springpad.

(by the way, I like the newly-upgraded version of Springpad! I wonder if I can clip articles efficiently, too)

I also found out about this particular vending cart(?). 

It's a stand on a three-wheeled bicycle. I liked it. http://www.cuomo.kr/ 

The above website says that it is a new street culture from Europe.

I am not so sure about that. While I was searching for inspiration I found things like this in China, Southeast Asia, and South Asia as well... but anyway!

So I created a vending bicycle (?) for my story.

Its stand looks like a traditional Korean (or East Asian...), with a lot of fuzzy antique decorations around it -- bells, lanterns, umbrella, amulets, accessories, baskets, etc.

Link

And the owner himself does not look so........er... ordinary. 

"Out-of-space geeky charlatan" was my concept when I created this character.

His looks are as geeky as the stuffs he sells. He sells literally anything. He (more or less) steals goods from other stores in the town and sell them in outrageous prices. He also sells weird amulets, strange beverages, and.. bones. Sometimes he is witnessed selling high heels.

The beverage he sells here.

You can see more about this weird beverage here: 

http://projectmacy365.blogspot.ca/2012/03/doodle-day-day-2-3-profs-office-killer.html

Actually I created this character for another project few years ago, but since I gave up on that project for various reasons, I am glad that I can resurrect(?) him here. He is called "Kkengkkeng-i granpa."(깽깽이 할아버지) Kkengkkeng in Korea is somewhat like "yap yap" in English. It is the name of a dog who is very yappy and skinny. And the man is his owner.

The story I am working on right now (http://blog.naver.com/haejinsung) is a fantasy drama about eight people whose souls were suddenly switched. So I needed a few "mysterious" figures and places in my story. The guy and his stand above is one of them.

Maybe you have seen someone like this in streets. Maybe you have seen him and forgot about him.
Maybe he enchanted you to forget seeing him. Maybe he chooses to appear only certain time and place in front of certain people.
He is a mystery to me, a different reality rooted in this reality. Clouded in vapors, making clanging noises, humming strange tunes. Like my childhood memory of Insa-dong at night. :)