MY GOODS｜Korean 2009 Planner—Second Diary Unboxing and Review

Since the end of last year, we’ve been collecting all kinds of notebook designs for our graduation project, which involves making a notebook. Naturally, that included finished products from both Taiwan and overseas. While looking for cover designs we could use as inspiration, the Korean Second Diary series we found on Gmarket became our whole group’s top choice for the notebook cover we coveted most. And weak-willed little me… the more I looked at it, the more I liked it. It’s a 2009 planner, too! How practical is that?

The only problem was all that Korean oo—I couldn’t understand it no matter how hard I stared, and Taiwanese online sellers didn’t seem interested in carrying this planner. I finally found a Chinese-language website selling Korean goods that had it, but a notebook priced at KRW 10,700—which, at an exchange rate of 38.5, is only about NT$278—was being sold for over NT$700!! Oh my god, do merchants really have to make that much money? The Korean won is so cheap right now, yet they’re still charging that much. Isn’t that just outrageously sneaky?! So I decided to boycott these evil sellers (hahaha) and look for a Korean proxy buyer on PTT’s proxy-shopping board instead.

Even after finding a proxy buyer, there were still lots of costs I couldn’t know in advance, such as shipping and whether the package would be hit with customs duties. I originally thought each one would inevitably come to more than NT$400, or possibly even NT$500 if I estimated conservatively.

As it turned out, I saved a fortune! In the end, I used a Korean proxy buyer whose PTT username is cuteDante. Each planner was KRW 10,700, and because we bought three at once, we got KRW 400 off each one. The current exchange rate was only TWD:KRW = 1:38.5, plus a 10% proxy-buying fee. We also joined a consolidated-shipping group organized by the buyer. Although we had to wait for everyone’s orders to arrive before they could all be shipped, not only was domestic shipping within Korea free, but the international EMS postage also became very cheap. Luckiest of all, the entire consolidated shipment escaped customs duties! Come on, guess how much each one cost in the end. (You have to estimate it from just one photo =　=)

Ba-da-boom!! The answer is…Only NT$370 each!!! Folks!! Tell me that isn’t a bargain! Compared with those rotten shopping sites charging NT$700 each, I could practically buy two!

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Enough talk (even though I’ve obviously already talked a ton). Let’s see what this adorable Second Diary planner actually looks like—and what exactly I love about it!

About 13 days passed between placing the order on January 10 and the proxy buyer shipping it on January 23. Considering that it was an international order and the consolidated-shipping group had to wait for everyone, that was actually pretty fast. But January 23 was the final Friday before Lunar New Year, so I was super worried it wouldn’t arrive before the holiday. After all, an entire month of the 2009 planner had already gone by!

But when I got home on the 24th, there really was no package… I was disappointed for quite a while. Then, completely unexpectedly, on the fourth day of Lunar New Year, I suddenly found a collection notice in the mailbox! And it was dated the 24th. Wahahaha, what a joke! I could clearly have picked it up on the 24th, but instead I waited all the way until 2/1. Still, starting in February isn’t so bad either, right? (Please make me feel better!)

These days, the main local post offices let you collect packages from the security desk outside business hours. That is seriously so thoughtful—it meant I could pick up my package on a Sunday. Once I had it in my hands, I was so excited, so full of anticipation, and so satisfied!

The proxy buyer wrote in the email, “I’ve finished repacking everything,” but no matter how I looked at it, it seemed as if the seller had shipped the package exactly as it was. Just look! Even the Korea Post sealing tape was still there. It was my first international parcel! I was so excited that I even had to document this part. (What a country bumpkin.)

Finally, time for the unboxing! Riiip, rustle, rustle… (I was obviously using a utility knife, so where did all those sound effects come from? =　=)

Wow! I could see our three adorable Second Diary planners!… Along with a mysterious stack of paper.

We each chose a different color. The mint one on the far left is mine, the hot pink one in the middle (hahaha, that’s my own random translation) belongs to Little Tiger, and the red one on the far right was ordered by Little Potato, Ah-Gui’s adorable girlfriend. The red is seriously gorgeous! The moment I saw it, I wanted the red one so badly. (I really wanted to secretly swap them and tell Ah-Gui the red one was out of stock!). I had originally been choosing between red and mint too, but Little Potato ordered red first, and I didn’t want us to have the same color. I can’t believe how much I regret it now!! Ha—but honestly, all three colors are gorgeous!

So this is the mysterious true identity of that stack of paper. The brown sheet is probably some kind of coupon for free online photo printing, but I have no idea what the blue house one says! Could it be some kind of real-estate prize-draw coupon? (Pfft! It clearly says ehome, so… online real estate?!)

This is one complete set. Doesn’t it feel as though it comes with loads of “accessories”? The whole thing is adorable and packed with goodies. But since the other two belong to other people, I can only open my mint one to show everyone!

Ta-da-da-daaa!!! (Did you imagine the right sound effect?) This is everything included in the complete Second Diary planner set. Isn’t it fantastic?
The main item is, of course, one planner. The accessories include a card holder, two calendar cards, and two sheets of stickers.

Every accessory has a different purpose! Keep reading to find out more… hehe.

You’re probably wondering what the calendar cards are for! One special feature of this Second Diary planner’s cover is that it has a waterproof book jacket made from cute, colorful PVC. The jacket also has a card slot, so you can swap out the card inside. These calendar cards have all 12 months printed on the front and back. Honestly, though, I think using those cards looks a bit stiff and boring… so I’m definitely going to find or print some cute pictures to put in there instead!

These two adorable sticker sheets also serve different purposes. The stickers on the right are simply illustrations you can stick inside the notebook, and since they’re only outlines, you can color them yourself. The sheet on the left is mainly practical, with card stickers and tab stickers.

In the examples on the shopping site, they put the card sticker on Korea’s version of Taiwan’s EasyCard and then slipped it into the card holder. When I first got the stickers, I kept thinking the card sticker looked huge and would stick out past our EasyCards. But when I actually compared them, they were exactly the same size! So Korea’s transit cards are the same size as Taiwan’s EasyCards!

The back of the card holder even has an adorable embossed bus design. It feels so well made!

The tab stickers go on the planner to divide the different sections. On the divider page for each section, they’ve thoughtfully printed tiny guide lines right along the outer edge, so you can line up the tab sticker and stick it on directly without making it crooked or constantly measuring. The exact slot where the sticker goes is even marked with an orange line. Seriously, so thoughtful! Japanese and Korean notebooks don’t just feel high quality—their designs are also incredibly considerate and practical.

Next, let’s take a look at the planner itself.

The book jacket on the back cover also has a second pocket designed to hold papers, tickets, business cards, and so on. You could put those two sticker sheets from earlier in the back pocket too!

It’s actually quite a thick planner. You do have to carry this whole thing whenever you go out, but considering how much is packed into its pages, I really don’t mind.

Inside, it has:
2009 and 2010 calendars — 2 pages
Yearly plans — 2 pages
Monthly plans — 32 pages (16 months in total)
Weekly plans — 134 pages (16 months in total)
Free Note — 40 pages
Line Note — 40 pages
Ticket Note — 36 pages (introduced below)
Check Note — 20 pages (introduced below)
Personal information — 1 page

Note: The monthly and weekly planning pages don’t have preset months or dates. Instead, each page has the numbers 1–12 printed on it, and you simply circle the month you need. So even though I didn’t start using mine until February, it didn’t feel wasteful!

This is the Ticket Note, my favorite type of feature page. It gives you a place to record activities such as trips, movies, or exhibitions. You can stick photos, ticket stubs, and so on inside the dotted frame, then write down details and impressions below and even give the activity a heart rating. And, very thoughtfully, the little boxes across the top of the page are already labeled Movie, DVD, Musical, Concert, Exhibition, and Etc. Just check or circle one to show the theme of that page. So convenient!

The Check Note is similar to the Ticket Note, and it’s another feature I love. At the top of each page, there are also several themes: Phone/Address, Check List, Cash List, and Website. You decide for yourself how to use the table. For example, if you see information about an exhibition, you can write it under Check List so you don’t miss any events you’re interested in. Or, if you want to track your spending, you can use a page as a Cash List. Wooooow!

● The paper color in this photo is closer to how it looks in real life. The paper has a slight yellow tint rather than being pure white.

These are sample photos I downloaded from the shopping site. They’ve decorated everything so adorably, and it all looks so, so wonderful. What an effective marketing trick—it tempted me so badly, hahaha. I even went out and bought one of those rainbow pens I hadn’t seen in ages just for this! (The kind with 11 interchangeable colors in one pen—it’s convenient to carry!)

This photo also came from the shopping site. These are all the colors available for the Second Diary planner. They’re all bright and beautiful. You rarely see such lively PVC covers in Taiwan, and all the colors look absolutely gorgeous together.

We had originally planned to make ours like this too, but after asking a factory, we found that custom-ordering these colored materials would be far too expensive for such a small quantity. What a shame. It looks as though Taiwan’s stationery industry still has a long way to go… There are so few genuinely innovative designs!

Japanese and Korean stationery is hugely popular online right now. Even things like washi tape are seriously tempting me. Just looking at the dazzling array of stationery designs on their shopping sites—including so many products with unusual functions and fresh ideas—is enough to get anyone ridiculously excited and make you want to buy everything. And now that I’ve actually bought one, I’m genuinely delighted with the real thing. It looks as though I’m about to become obsessed with Japanese and Korean stationery too!!

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