Sunday, July 25, 2010

beniah: international superstar

obviously i am completely unbiased, but it seems the korean people really know a cute baby when they see one.

i often get asked if i'm like a "superstar" in kora because i'm tall, i'm american, have red hair and pretty much stick out. "do a lot of people stare at you?" i have been asked a number of times. the truth is no, especially not in the city. although i have had my share of moments, those just mostly took place in central and south america.

this trip to south korea was quite a bit different in this regard, we seemed to get lots of attention, lots of eyes and lots of comments. and of course when i say "we" i mean beniah. it was actually a little crazy, on no less than five separate occasions did random strangers, often two or three at a time, pull out their camera phones and take pictures of him. christe's mom would then very sweetly ask for 10,000 won or about 8 dollars.

on one evening christe was really craving a waffle, which is a dessert not a breakfast in korea. so we found a little cafe were three college girls happened to be working and ordered our waffle, which seemed to take a little longer than usual because the workers were very distracted. we sit down and almost immediately the manager rushes over with a cookie for b. after his first bite we turn to thank them again and all three girls were hunched over the counter, propped up on their elbows just staring at b with these big smiles, it was then the manager quickly realized she had forgotten to bring beniah some milk.

i guess beautiful people really do get free stuff.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

happy anniversary

more to come on our korea trip, but first...

feed my sheep

while visiting my mom in korea we headed to kangnun to see my extended family. dave had met most of my mom's side on our last trip to korea, but because we were not yet engaged he did not meet my grandmother. i thought this was a little silly, i mean he had traveled half way around the world to meet my mom..we had discussed marriage..but my mom insisted. so this trip became the "meet grandma" trip for both dave and beniah. and thanks to everyone around him saying make sure you do this, but don't do that.. dave was a little concerned, to which my mom replied, "you are already married and have a baby, she can't do anything now". it was great to sit around the table with tons of my family-something i had done when i was younger-but this time with my family in attendance. the lunch went well, dave and i bowed to my grandmother and grandfather's brother and everyone got to love on beniah. overall it was a great afternoon.
then my uncle took us up to a sheep farm and beniah had a blast feeding the sheep! at first beniah was a little hesitant..and then he went through 4 baskets of straw all on his own. next to us was a couple with a very scared young woman who couldn't bring herself to hand the straw to the sheep on her own. he boyfriend pointed at beniah and said "look, the BABY is doing it!"