There is a person who planned a hobby festival to help the youth finding their hobbies. The hobby festival is a program to seek what people like through experiences as silver crafts, taking pictures, wood burning (Writing letters on the wood with a hot metal pen), making slimes, etc. The hobby festival, ‘Hobbydibobbidiboo’ was held in Cheongju Cultural Industry Promotion Foundation on October 13th and CBT met a festival planner, Im Se-eun. Let’s find out what does the hobby festival mean to her. -Ed.


1. Please introduce yourself and the hobby festival Hobbydibobbidiboo.

- Hello, I’m Im Se-eun, a member of Youth-Hakdang. Youth-Hakdang is a project for making Cheongju a more cultural city. The members, who want to become cultural planners, plan and hold community projects. The hobby festival Hobbydibobbidiboo is a program that offers opportunities for youths to discover new hobbies. Hobbydibobbidiboo is a combination of the words ‘hobby’ and ‘bibbidi-bobbidi-boo’, a magic spell that grants wishes.

2. Why did you choose this festival?

- A survey of youths showed that many of them want to learn and have a hobby. I realized through the survey that people have a hard time keeping hobbies because Korean companies have implemented a 52-hour workweek. That makes it hard for youths to find hobbies. Those are the reasons why I planned Hobbydibobbidiboo. I wanted to provide opportunities for the youths who don’t have enough time to find hobbies because of the overly competitive society.

3. What is your hobby? Also, how did you choose the different hobbies for the festival?

- My hobby is producing videos. When I was a high school student, I produced a video for performance assessment. While producing the video, I was impressed that the video could be improved through my editing. Since then, I have enjoyed producing videos. I investigated what kinds of hobbies people prefer through a survey. With the results of the survey, I chose several popular hobbies and made the hobby festival. I contacted the craft shops and clubs in Cheongju to introduce them to the potential hobbyists.



4. Did you have any troubles while planning the festival?

- I was worried about choosing the companies which would participate in our festival. I wrote proposals for participants and researched the companies’ information through SNS. Finally, I selected 16 companies after directly contacting and visiting them.

5. We know that people had to pay money to experience some booths. How many people visited booths and were they successful?

- Before the festival, we were worried about the expensive fees for some booths. Even though there were opinions that it was expensive, most of the participants were satisfied that they could experience a good program at a low price, and there was also the opinion that they wanted a 2nd Hobbydibobbidiboo.

6. Is there a different program that you want to plan in the future?

- I want to plan a Cheongju bicycle rental business. Unlike Busan and Daejeon, Cheongju has no place to borrow bicycles except Musimcheon River. Therefore, I wonder about making places where people can borrow and return bicycles. That could lead to citizens enjoying bicycles anywhere they want.

7. Please give the readers your impression of planning and organizing a hobby festival.

- I was worried that people wouldn’t show up until the day of the festival and that people would not be able to visit because the venue was remote. Fortunately, many people attended the festival on the day, and after the festival, I had a smile on my face even though it had been hard to organize the project that took seven months to plan. I finished the festival successfully. I was lucky to meet my good-natured Youth-Hakdang members. I’m thankful to them.

  If your life is hard, how about finding your hobby and overcoming your obstacles? The CBT hopes you find your hobby and get some relaxation from it.

By Kim Chae-hyeon l ch38@cbnu.ac.kr
By Bang ui-hwan l janas@cbnu.ac.kr
By Park Jeong-min l jm38@cbnu.ac.kr