Project Chungguk: Day 6

I fangirled so many things today and, surprisingly, very few of them were actually fandom-related. I did fangirl a boy, but he wasn't even famous! I know you're intrigued now, aren't you?

My mom woke me up this morning at 7:30 with a phone call about reserving a youth hostel in Seoul. After we sorted that out, Michelle and I got up and got ready to face a day of tourism in matching outfits. We both wore newly bought clothes that were yellow (yellow! so cheerful!) and jeans - me in long pants, her in shorts. A student working in the department of the college where all the professors know my mom was going to accompany us today, and we speculated that maybe it would be a Super Junior fan.

He showed up and we thought, "Oh, suddenly far less likely than we imagined." But we warmed to each other and, yes, I fangirled him. He's so cute. And I mean this in the geeky cute-like-JJ Lin-is-cute way. He was 25/6 and was very happy to speak to us about, well, anything. We wanted to know if all Chinese college boys fell into the geek stereotype and asked him if he played computer games - oh that got him embarrassed. It was adorable. He admitted that he used to but he was breaking himself of the habit now, really! Counterstrike, World of Warcraft, Starcraft...aw, sweetie, you walking stereotype.

Honestly, though, he was really cute and he totally laughed at us the entire day, but in a fond and not a patronizing manner. We went to the Ming Tombs and toured underground before heading to the Great Wall. Michelle and I both failed and our cameras both ran out of battery, so he volunteered his camera and services for the day. We had some ridiculous poses that he only shook his head and laughed at before posing - we were practicing for Korea, see. I had the worst urge to run around calling him "oppa" for a while, but I got over it.

On the Great Wall, we climbed all the way to the highest point (in the Beijing area, anyway) and there were many pictures! He posed for some too and it was really, really cute. I think I'm going to keep saying that because it was. We were talking music and politics and history and it was such a nice day. Chinese boy (really named Wang Bing) was a sweetheart and I'm really glad he accompanied us.

Then we were treated to dinner by his professor, a friend of my mom's, Professor Kong. A couple of other random people came along as well, including Awesome Chinese Boy and his nuna and dongsaeng (in Chinese: si jie and si mei). The younger girl? SHE WAS AN ELF. WE MET AN ELF YOU GUYS. We met an ELF and the first thing I did was alienate her.

We were asking about where we could buy posters in China (so much harder than you might think) and one of the other men, a forty-something friend of my mom's, Professor Chen, offered to look around for us if we wrote down the names of who we were looking for. (So cute! Middle-aged men offering to go fangirl-shopping for us!) I managed a few before my Chinese utterly failed me, but the girl spoke up (Li Ling, I think her name was), and said, "You like Super Junior? Me too! I'm a huge fan. I'm an ELF." Then she offered to write down all the names of SuJu and DBSK and random celebrities we were interested in, it was so amazing. AMAZING, I tell you. Then she asked us if there were any SuJu members we didn't like or weren't interested in getting merchandise/posters for and we said, "Yesung," and she went ":O No wai! He's my favorite!" And then Michelle and I died a little inside. What are the chances, what are the chances?

Another part of the night I loved was the alcohol culture of China: we drank beer freely (oh Chinese beer, doesn't leave me tipsy at all) and everyone constantly toasted other people and challenged them to finish their drinks and aww. Awesome Chinese boy fanboyed his professor so much, it made me happy. He was constantly pouring beer for everyone, eldest to youngest, very respectful, and always watching out about getting food for other people. You know how Chinese people are always putting food in other people's bowls, encouraging them to eat? Yeah, he did that, only in an adorably respectful way. And he remembered random facts about life and such that Michelle and I told him throughout the day! If I had a gold star, I'd totally give it to him.

China, so amazing. It made me so happy today, which made up a lot for yesterday. We didn't end up in Tianjin, by the way, because we did some research the night before and we realized that the autograph session was limited to GS Club members (no, I have no idea wtf that is) and that said members had to call in a few days ago to secure a spot. Ohhh, so bitter, you have no idea. So we stayed in Beijing and wandered around looking for a store that sold music so we could buy SJM proper - CD or poster would've been nice. Tragically, Beijing is sadly lacking. We finally found a bookshop, but it sold only Rain and Tohoshinki. Michelle did randomly find a beautiful Jaejoong (oh, so pretty) photobook at a newsstand though, and I bought another magazine with pretty people in it. Overall, though, yesterday was mostly disappointing and full of insane amounts of walking. Eight hours, roughly. Even climbing the Great Wall today was a lot less painful - granted, I was in sneakers rather than flip-flops today.

Not sure what else to say. Tomorrow we want to go to the zoo and also wander around Beijing in hopes of running into SJM. No idea why they're going to be in Beijing tomorrow but how exciting! Even if we don't see them, we will be in the same city! It will be so close. Oh how I pine.

Sunday we may go KTV (karaoke) with Awesome Chinese Boy and some other people around our age. It will be kind of amazing, especially considering how few Chinese songs we know. I'm sure they'll have English songs though. Maybe Japanese or Korean? We shall see!

I'm going to go now before I die of lung cancer from sitting in this smoky internet cafe next to someone who keeps breathing smoke into my face. Thanks, but no thanks. I do not fangirl you, Not Awesome Chinese Boy. Fail. No gold star. Exit right, please and thank you.