The city of Incheon has spent a very long time putting the Global Fair and Festival together, and it shows – an almost overwhelming mengarie of sight and sound, and far too much to see in one day. Take that as both a good thing and bad, since even with a full day (about 9 hours) of trying to see everything it’s not possible.

What is it?, you ask. To the Incheon government, it is a massive effort intended to put Incheon on the map (literally and figuratively speaking) of Korea. It’s reputation as the city of the airport seems underwhelming – but being reminded that it’s the third-largest city in the country and planning more projects than almost the entire Southern Hemisphere seems to be a step in the right direction. Bear in mind this city has plans to open a university this year, a ‘landmark city’ in the future, host the Asian games in 2014 (think the Olympics for all of Asia), and so on. At 80 days long and comprising much of Incheon’s Central Park area, it makes even the Hi Seoul Festival look small.

On the ‘reasons to go’ list, there are many: a digital art fair. A flower garden. A robot zoo. Displays of international culture and tastes of cuisine. An exhibition of royal court cuisine. A Virtual Marine Life Exploratorium. A theater. An amusement park. Photos. A huge fountain display. Concerts. Performances. A global city pavilion. A ‘Green Growth Hall’. A hip-hop performance stage. An Anciety City Hall building. A freakin’ Teddy Bear Pavilion. No more infomercial speech – let’s get to the pictures – and there’s lots of them.

Assuming you’re making your way to Incheon via the subway, you’ll come across plenty of signage and directions starting at the Bupyeong station (you’ll need to transfer to Incheon’s subway line to get to the recently-opened Central Park station). The Songdo Free Economic Zone is the center of attention, although there’s plenty else to see nearby.

While the event is extremely foreigner-friendly, I counted exactly 11 foreigners – amidst hundreds of thousands of Koreans – during a nine-hour trip on the opening Saturday. English signs were everywhere; Korean volunteers offered far more help than I needed, and in very good English.

Buying tickets is a fairly simple affair – like almost any amusement park, you’ll pay one admission price for the day (18,000 won for adults, or 118,000 for what I’m guessing is like a ‘season pass’ – attend as many of the 80 days as you like). Once through the gate, all the attractions are yours for the viewing; food, drinks, and souvenirs are extra but not entirely overpriced.

An exhibit featuring Incheon International Airport – inside are some touchscreens giving you some information about the airport itself. While it might have been nice to include something practical like flight times, that didn’t seem quite necessary.

A number of well-composed (and presumably well-Photoshopped) photos dotted the main walkway:

Although the green theme was inescapable, the pictures were still quite interesting.

Without knowing it, I had stumbled onto the parade route:

While the costumes and floats were all first-rate, I couldn’t help but be reminded of Lotte World’s similar parade from awhile back. Perhaps it was the cheery, bouncy soundtrack that endlessly repeated until the floats finally went out of earshot.

An exhibit featuring… I’m not sure what. At least the first one had some Real African Drummers to go with the way-too-fake tepees.

OK, now we’re talking! Although no countries were named that I heard of, the audience could infer that showing off foreigners from all corners of the world was the goal. Look carefully – they’re on leashes for safety purposes.

Later on a couple of the dancers from this particular float came down and shared a dance with some kids they picked from the audience:

Needless to say it was quite the photo op. What, you missed the little kids?

Next up on the map was the Green Growth Hall. Not really sure what to expect here, except that it presumably be about as green and environmentally friendly as could be, right?

Well… hard to tell… This was one of the only areas of the entire festival that failed the English test, for the record. Perhaps they thought foreigners wouldn’t find this area interesting?

A large box of old and presumably about-to-be-recycled cell phones. Now, if only there were some idea of how one could donate their old cell phone to the effort…

A very complex look at a water filtration system.

I really have no idea how dozens of CRT monitors, turned all the various ways, would be considered appropriate at a ‘Green Growth’ event.

A virtual reality type of game – I took pictures rather than wait in a fairly long (but fast-moving) line.

Speaking of lines, the line to this particular building was long every time I went past. All the lines move fairly quickly, but entrance is started and stopped to prevent crowding.

One highlight of the event were the fountains near the center of the area:

He looked quite happy to be making water go everywhere.

Although not the next chronologically, the World culture area certainly was deserving of some attention:

The Bali Ubud market – quite a few rings and other wonderful things to go around.

Just outside the Teddy Bear Pavilion – while it certainly sounds intriguing, the line was not one I wanted to wait in.

A Kathmandu souvenir house – what more could you want?

A wonderful quartet just outside one of several restaurants / bars in the area.

Although most of the places featured some things for sale around the world, most of the staff was Korean.

Classic sculptures spiced things up – and reminded me that I’m not in America.

Many food options to choose from, mostly around this price (7,000 won = $5.72 USD), give or take a couple thousand won. Not pictured are most of the smaller restaurants that had either buffets or fancier menus.

The option for the crowd that just wanted some basic Korean food – a huge Korean food court, similiar to those in malls or other facilities (order your food, get a receipt with a number, look for your number, get your food from the specific station).

In the same area was some various cultural events – again, not labeled or described specifically in the brochure:

A real, honest-to-God calliope. You just don’t see – or hear – these things very often. They drew a crowd with their marionette-like performance.

Not quite the standard old-person wear, but worth a picture nonetheless.

Moving on to an amphitheatre type stage, we have some tribal song and dance:

Perhaps from a small island in the Pacific Ocean, but again – no specifics, so it’s hard to know for certain. They sang in their native language, which left a steady stream of Koreans headed for the exit (low attention span or difficulty enjoying something in a language they don’t understand?)

This guy seemed happy, however – as did a few of the women taking a look at what’s under the flap.

A ‘Forest Fairy Road’, complete with several varieties of squash. Yep. Squash. Watch where you walk or you’ll go head-first into a big one (not that I did that personally or anything…)

The Ancient City Hall building – the stream of people waiting to get in is not in the picture, but was quite long.

In the same area was a chance for the kids to get their hands dirty – well, at least a little. The gentleman didn’t seem to take many chances in letting the kids work the clay.

Belly dancers on the stage – not a lot of people watching, but then again it’s the middle of the day, and in the middle of a huge area with lots to see.

The facade hiding the European Culture House – supposedly a chance to see life in Europe from some time ago.

Say cheese – or kimchi! Now hold it, hold it… No idea how long the exposure time was on this model, but people couldn’t hold a smile for the long time it might have taken.

A proper sitting room, perhaps? The light here was rather dim, thus a little unintentional blur.

Some beautiful Bulgarian dolls – surprisingly without a glass box or anything to protect them from kids’ hands or accidents.

There’s plenty more that happened today – check out part 2 and part 3 of the Incheon Global Fair and Festival just as soon as I can finish uploading photos and putting together the post.