So, we are off work today because of Children's Day. Unrelatedly, it's also Buddha's birthday, although the big celebration for that was last weekend, for some reason. Which I'm not complaining about, because Mike and I got to hang out at the festivities before he left. Yes, he left. He is currently in PEI, frolicking around Tim Horton's and breathing clean air and actually recognizing all the vegetables in a supermarket that doesn't employ an auctioneer with a megaphone to holler at people from the produce section.
Bastard.
So, the Buddha's birthday festivities were really awesome. (I will try to post some pictures later, when typepad doesn't hate me. ) I even ENJOYED the parade, which is notable since I mostly despise parades, as Mr. Armendariz can attest, since he's my partner in the Parade Abolition Project. (Which, incidentally, needs a new acronym.) But this one was at night, and it had lots of huge, incredible, lighted paper lantern floats and was just fascinating to watch, if not just with a sort of horrified prescience, since some of them shot FIRE from their mouths. These are PAPER LANTERNS, people. Do the chemistry.
Incidentally, there was also a parade of Buddhists outside my apartment a little while ago, which was kind of neat, since I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood. Well, quiet by Seoul standards, meaning it's flooded with neon and traffic all night, but the grocery store is closed by 10.
Don't worry, none of that explanation made sense to me either.
So anyways. Today, on this lovely Friday off, I:
- finished a book
- started a new book
- took myself out for a lovely brunch to the cutest restaurant ever, where I was treated so nicely and not stared at and where no one tried to teach me how to eat or anything.
Did I mention that foreigners here are routinely accosted by people attempting to show us how to eat? Yeah, it's all sorts of fun.
(Also, Mike, I wish we had found this place before you left because it's 3625 times better than the Kimbap Mall/Heaven, and just as cheap.)
- watched The Squid and The Whale (you should click that site just to hear Dean Wareham's acoustic "Hey You")
- vacuumed and cleaned my room; disposed of approximately 34 pounds of accumulated terrifying yellow dust
- talked to Jim
- bought veggies and dish liquid
- cooked dinner for myself and my roommate and watched some of Match Point, which I think I enjoyed more the second time, and no, not just because of Scarlett Johannsen's rack, Mike.<br>
Now, since it's Friday night, I am going to:
- drink a beer
- watch the new epsiode of Veronica Mars
- miss Mike, since he has been a part of both the above activities for the past ten months
Children's Day is awesome. We should have one of these fuckers every week, for reals.
