Today, I’m going to talk about the Boston Book Festival. I went there with the idea of introducing myself and pitching my work to people. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but I decided to give it a try. And somehow, what started as a book festival turned into a completely different kind of adventure.
First of all, if you ever have the chance to go to the Boston Book Festival, go. It is absolutely worth it. You don’t really need to bring anything except maybe some money, and honestly, you don’t even need to plan on eating beforehand. Why? Because there is food everywhere. And a surprising amount of it is free.
The moment I arrived, I spotted a booth giving out cheese balls. I don’t know why, but they looked incredibly good. So naturally, I grabbed one. Then I started a conversation with the person at the booth and tried pitching my work. Unfortunately, after a while, I got a pretty firm no. Well, that’s life. Time to move on. But before leaving, I grabbed another cheese ball. Actually, I grabbed three in total. You have to keep your energy up when you’re doing business.
That’s when I came up with a brilliant idea:How many calories could I possibly get at the Boston Book Festival without spending a single dollar?
The cheese balls probably gave me around 20 calories. Not a bad start. Then I discovered some French toast. They were giving out tiny samples, and apparently, you could buy a whole piece for $1.99. But I wasn’t interested in spending money. I was on a mission. So I took a sample, which probably added another five calories. Not much, but every calorie counts.
I continued walking around, pitching my work and looking at books. I found one about surviving natural disasters, which was pretty interesting. But then something caught my attention. A booth that looked like something dreams were made of. Seriously, if you were hungry, this booth was basically paradise. They had fried bread covered in hot, melted cheese. I started another conversation, and somehow, I ended up with two cups of this amazing food. That was another 220 calories right there. Boom! Now we were getting somewhere.
Of course, I was still trying to do my actual job. I talked to another person and got another firm no. Then I moved to the next booth and got a maybe. A maybe! That’s progress. At this booth, there was also a prize wheel. Apparently, you were supposed to answer trivia questions before spinning it. At first, I wasn’t particularly interested, but my dad encouraged me to try.
The question I got was, “What city does Spider-Man live in?”
Seriously? New York City. That was probably one of the easiest questions they could have asked. So I answered it and won a prize. Unfortunately, the prize wasn’t exactly what I expected. It was this extremely heavy piece of metal, something like a metal stand. I mean, seriously, why was this thing so heavy? I could practically use it as a workout weight. And the worst part? It wasn’t even edible. Zero calories. Completely useless for my challenge.
Anyway, I continued exploring. By this point, I was getting pretty thirsty from eating all that food, so I was extremely excited when I discovered some free mini Gatorades. Finally, something to drink! I grabbed one and added another 140 calories to my imaginary calorie scoreboard. At this point, I had practically collected a small meal without paying for anything.
But the adventure wasn’t over.
At another book booth, I was offered a choice between a stuffed animal and a tiny gummy sushi making kit. Now, normally, I would have loved to win a stuffed animal. But when I saw the gummy sushi, I knew exactly what I wanted. I chose the sushi kit. Actually, I ended up getting three of them. And guess what? Each one had around 220 calories. Jackpot.
The gummy sushi was supposed to be something you could make yourself. You poured powder into different sections, added water, and somehow turned everything into little pieces of candy sushi. At first, mine looked absolutely terrible. I had no idea what I was doing. But after experimenting for a while, I started getting the hang of it.
The first batch didn’t look particularly impressive. There was barely anything there. So I opened another packet. Still not much. But then I realized something important: two nothings could somehow become one something. And if you added even more nothing, eventually you might end up with something that actually looked like food.
By the time I finished, I had created what looked like a fancy little sushi meal, the kind you might expect to pay $14 for. It even came with a tiny green gel that was supposed to look like wasabi. Except, obviously, it wasn’t real wasabi. It was candy. I took a little bite, and then I ate the entire thing.
Now we were talking about some serious calories. By my calculations, I had collected around 800 calories’ worth of free food throughout the festival, although the realistic number might have been closer to 500 or 700. Either way, that’s basically a meal. And I didn’t spend a single dollar on it.
But here’s the interesting part. I probably wouldn’t have gotten half of these things if I hadn’t gone around talking to people and pitching my work. Some people said no. Some said maybe. Some were happy to talk. And somewhere along the way, I got free food, gummy sushi, a ridiculously heavy metal stand, and a pretty interesting experience.
So what did I learn from the Boston Book Festival?
Well, first of all, never underestimate the power of free samples. Second, talking to strangers isn’t nearly as scary as it seems once you get started. And third, sometimes you go somewhere expecting to promote your work, but somehow end up conducting a scientific investigation into how many calories you can eat for free.
Eight hundred calories, zero dollars, and a whole lot of conversations.
I’d call that a pretty successful day.
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