So I went to the Seoul National University neighborhood to a location across the street from the Gwanak-gu District Office ("across the street" needs to be unpacked as the district office is on a corner, so you have at least two choices for "across the street") where several print shops could be found. I immediately saw one of the two printers Charles had mentioned and went in there. The dour lady who greeted me told me she wouldn't print at my requested paper size of A5 (half the size of an A4 sheet) unless I requested several hundred copies. Well, fuck that: I merely wanted a short run of 50 copies. She said my only other option was to print on A4, which would be too large. She suggested no other options (although I think, in his email to me, Charles said this print shop could have done B5-size copies), and she didn't seem to need or want my business, so I bowed and left.
As an aside, I've noticed that Koreans have a very strange relationship with Western concepts like capitalism and customer service. Some Koreans are extremely can-do, pragmatic, and willing to work with you if the end result is your business. I don't say that cynically; I actually like dealing with people who want to work with me. Other Koreans, though, seem to have no notion of customer service or of the need for friendliness and even compromise in situations that are nebulous (e.g., any situation in which prices can be negotiated, not situations where prices are clearly marked). These Koreans come off as petty dictators—"my way or the highway" types who are so confident or arrogant that they really don't care whether you give them your business. Maybe they've gotten this way because they get so much business that they can afford to be picky. All I know is that the off-putting attitude looks bad, and it's not the way to get my money. The lady at this print shop was one of those people: she'd rather win an argument and lose business than amicably compromise and gain business. So I took my business out the door and went slightly up the hill and onto a narrow side street.
I ended up at a place called System Pro Printing. Only one lone woman was in attendance, but she proved to be very friendly and, best of all, willing to work with me. Of course, there were limits. As with the previous printer, she also balked at the idea of printing an A5-size book, but unlike the previous printer, she suggested the B5 size. I found B5 to be a bit large for my purposes, but she gamely printed out my book on B5 paper and gave me a look. My book was on file as a PDF that had been formatted to fit an A5 page, so on B5, the empty margins around the text looked huge. I asked the lady about maybe enlarging the print size to make the margins narrower and more proportionate. She did so, and while the text was now large enough to appear almost childish, it fit better on the page, and the margins made sense.
Next, we talked a bit about my cover and spine. She said she'd have to play with the spine graphic a bit to get it right, but printing words onto the spine wouldn't be a problem. She told me she'd text me the entire cover graphic in a couple days, and that if I wanted a short run of 50 copies of the book, I could have them on Tuesday. I had to give her a down payment of W50,000 tonight; the total cost, in the end, will be close to W300,000 (about $250, US) because each book will be nearly W6,000 (a bit over $5) to print out. By that standard, getting a hard copy of my book from Amazon is arguably cheaper, although if you add in the shipping cost, the per-book price might end up being about the same.
Lastly, I showed her an old copy of my book Water from a Skull and talked to her about cover quality, noting that the Korean printer had done the standard "perfect binding" but had added a weird, transparent layer to give the cover its glossy finish. The problem was that, over time, that glossy layer would peel away on some of my books, which made me very unhappy. The lady reassured me her covers wouldn't be like that: the glossy finish was already part of the cover stock she'd be using, and the print on the cover itself would be smooth, not rough to the fingertips. Mollified, I made my down payment, nodded when she reminded me she'd be texting later about the cover graphic, and left after saying I'd see her again on Tuesday.
It belatedly occurred to me that my boss had suggested just having the 50 books delivered (via Korean taekbae service), and that's something I'll ask the lady about when she texts me. Delivery would save me an expensive round trip across town via taxi.
Upshot: books in hand by Tuesday evening or sometime on Wednesday. It's really happening. I've got a hard copy of Think Like a Teacher coming from Amazon as well, so it'll be interesting to compare. The Amazon version has nothing on the spine because Amazon's printing requirements proved to be too persnickety for such a thin book.
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