Magandan Gapi (Good Night)

Having arrived in LAX, on Saturday, December 24, at around 11:00pm, I caught a shuttle to Avis Car Rental, where I rented out a car, for the first time.  Having plugged my GPS in, and set the coordinates to the home of my old roommate, Mark Dailo, I set off, also for the first time, in a bright blue Ford Mustang, a "baller's car", I was soon to learn.  By the time I arrived at my destination, it was already 12:00am.  Everyone had gone to bed.  I called Mark to get him to open the door, which he sleepily did, before showing me where I would be sleeping, and then stumbling back into bed.  That night, I was to sleep in the living room, which was right in front of the front door, which just so happened to have a gap about one inch tall on the bottom.  I was tired, so I simply undressed, and got into bed. 

The night was cold.  In fact, it was so cold that I gave up sleeping in the middle of the night, and sat up, wondering how I could get warm.  My back, which was on the air mattress was colder than my front.  I realized that the air mattress I was sleeping on was losing the heat.  So, I decided to put one pillow (there were two given to me) under me.  It worked surprisingly well, and I was able to sleep soundly until the morning, aside from the random people laughing and coming in and out in the middle of the night.  (You read correctly.  No mistake.)

Magandan Omaga (Good Morning)

The morning was also cold, colder than I had remembered Anaheim being.  But, I was soon warmed up by the smiles of those giving me hospitality, and the great food Mark's mom made.  She made Philipino Sausages, which tasted good, similar to most other sausages I've eaten.  In addition, we ate over easy eggs on rice.  "Dinner for Breakfast" was how Mark called it.  

My intention was to visit Yorba Linda, where I had been serving in the training, and to see the young people there.  The plan was to go to the Lord's table, but I was hesitant.  I left with a bang, in a bad way, when I did, and I was not sure how I would be received.  But, I felt that I was obligated to go and see how they were doing, especially since it had been 2 years since I had last seen them.  I was warmly received, and I enjoyed the Lord's table meeting very much.  It was nice to see most of them there.  I was genuinely relieved.  

Afterwards, I went to the home of two of the young people: Abraham and Arthur, and hung out with them for the entire afternoon.  Arthur was the one who called my rental a baller's car, which in the night, didn't look so obvious, but during the day, was quite obvious.  We played a little Starcraft 2, talked, and played with their dog.  Watching people grow up is interesting.  They're different, but there's still something the same.  Their mom prepared some food for us, and so we ate (chow mien, an egg roll, etc.).  Shortly after, I bid them farewell, and returned to my hospitality, where earlier, I had said I would return for dinner.  There, I had some good ol' Philipino food.

Monday morning, I ate breakfast with David Chiu, at Spires, close to the training center, reliving old memories.  I wanted to visit the training center after, but David Chiu felt that he was inappropriately dressed, and so instead we just went back.  I helped him move out of his old hospitality, and into a new hospitality, and lost the key to my own hospitality somewhere along the way.  Afterwards, I rang up the young people in Yorba Linda, to see if they would be interested in having lunch together.  We settled on Souplantation, and met up there at 12:30.  As usual, Stanley and Morris were the only ones on time.  I was next, coming in 15 minutes late, and the others (Abraham, Arthur, and Alfred) shortly later.  Stanley and I talked about teaching, since he was a teacher.  It's easy being an easy teacher, and quite an uphill battle being a hard one.  Stanley wanted to be a hard teacher who rewarded hard work and achievement, and I respected that.  Morris's English had improved a lot over the two years I wasn't there, and he'd grown a lot too.  Alfred and Abraham were now college students in the middle of their studies, and Arthur was a little less goofy than before.

After lunch, Stanley took me to Super H-Mart, where we stocked up on our dinner - Korean rolls.  Later, I would learn that this was the Korean equivalent to fast food.  Then, we parted, and I went to the MCC, where the training was to start later that day.  I grabbed my packet, and talked with David Wu a little, before walking somewhere to change.  By the time I got back, the training was almost starting, and so I went and found my seat, and got ready for the training.  It was my intention that for the rest of the week, I would be focused on the training, and so I was happy that I got all my visiting done beforehand.

The training was wonderful.  It was on the book of Psalms, and it was eye-opening.  Some of the things which impressed me were: 

  Like the psalmist in Psalm 73, I had been in darkness, because I was looking at my surroundings, which disappointed me.  When he went into the sanctuary of God, then things became clear.  I felt that that week, I came into the sanctuary of God.  

  There are two ways to take God's word - the way of letters and the way of a person.  God's loving seekers treasure the law because it is a portrait of God, the one they love.  I also want to value God's word that highly.  

  If we allow the Lord to touch the root of bitterness, He will turn it into a fountain of springs.

The week passed by fast.  Through it all, I was happy to see so many familiar faces which I had not seen in a long time.  In the end, Saturday night, I, and two young people from my locality helped with break down, when we clean the whole building up, by stacking and moving the chairs.  It was a really fun time, when we simply praised the Lord, sang hymns, and worked.  At around 2:00am, Lord's day morning, I went home, and at 8:15am, I bid my hospitality good bye, and headed to the airport.

 

I arrived at the terminal 15 minutes before boarding, which was just enough time for me to call my mom, to let her know that thus far, things had gone smoothly.  Once the plane took off, I would not know when I would be able to use my phone again.  The first thing that struck me was that every flight attendant for Korean Air was beautiful, whether naturally or... unnaturally, I don't know.  Yet, there was dissatisfaction in the air.  My brother would describe it as "angst".  As I would learn on the flight, being a flight attendant on Korean airlines was somewhat of a status symbol.  It was a very competitive position, and only the most qualified are chosen.  All of them looked beautiful in face and figure, were thin, gentle, good-tempered, and could manage English more or less.  The passenger next to me told me that it was common for a flight attendant to marry a famous baseball player, or other affluent figures.  That was a heavy dose of pragmatism for me.  I felt a bit bashful after that, knowing that these flight attendants serving me were so esteemed.

Anio Haseo (Hello, Good Bye)

13 hours later, I arrived in Korea, at 5:30pm, the following day.  I found my two friends, Ediya and Jomer conversing with each other.  2 years had changed Ediya a lot outwardly.  He was now thin, well-dressed, and pretty.  Mind you, in Korea, perms, facial cream, tight pants, long hair and plastic surgery were all acceptable for men.  On the other hand, Jomer had put on a fair amount of weight in the last two years.  At any rate, I coolly approached them unnoticed, and greeted them with a warm handshake, but none of the hugging business that girls would do.  I was glad to see them, more so for Ediya, because I had not seen him in so long, but also for Jomer, since we are still good buddies.  

We got right down to business and met up with two of Jomer's friends who were also visiting Korea from Taiwan.  We ended up having dinner together (some good ol' Korean style fire pot kind of deal consisting of ramen, noodles, and a whole bunch of stuff mixed in a Kimchi sauce), and afterwards, we had some tea or coffee (I had a "ice cream", which was more like a shake).  Finally, we finished off the evening with some Korean beer (Cass, it was).  It was the first time I drank for real (I had tasted a Heinekein before, but it was just a few gulps before I couldn't take it anymore).  Anyways, it was disgusting, but not as disgusting as Heinekein.  I was able to drink maybe two cups, with Ediya's encouragement.  I did it because Ediya took the lead in downing that stuff.  That's the way I roll, I suppose.  I won't do it if people just tell me to do it.  But I will do it if people do it first, and be a pattern for me to follow.  We finished off 5 bottles total, with Ediya taking the brunt of it, and the rest of us taking small, girly sips.  Ediya took the opportunity to introduce to us the Korean culture, which as it turns out, is quite intricate.

Yo Ghi Oh (Hey there)

The following rules apply to alcoholic drinks:

You never pour for yourself.  You always wait for someone to pour for you.  When pouring, you always use your right hand (if you are right-handed), and both hands show respect (with your other hand resting on your chest, if not on the bottle.  When you are being poured to, you should hold your cup out, with two hands to show respect, or one if you are friends.  The first cheers is ceremonial, which is always done before anyone starts drinking.  Whenever things get awkward, it's time for a cheers.  

As the night advanced, we decided to call it a night, and so we headed to Ediya's apartment, only to be rudely confronted by the fact that the buses had shut down for the night.  Ediya swiftly switched to plan B, and took us to a PC room for the night, where I dozed while he and Jomer played computer games until 5:00am, when the first train would come and take us to Ediya's place in Chuncheon.  At about 4:00am, we wrapped things up, and headed for the train.

Hua Jang Shil Au Di Ae Oh (Where is the restroom?)

Having arrived at my new hospitality at 6:00am, we arranged our stuff just enough to pass out until the afternoon.  The rest of the week consisted of eating (eggs and spam in slices of bread, Korean ramen Jomer-style and Ediya-style, Chicken ribs, Chicken, Pork, Beef, Gabi, and Korean fast food rolls), drinking (Hite beer, a fruity, mixed drink, Soju, rice wine, and an Ediya rice wine bomb, Cider [Lotte-made Sprite, which the flight attendant did not know about on the flight back], Pocari Sweat, banana milk, Seoul milk, Jeju water, tea, and a Caramel Maciatto), visiting places (Seoul, Myuan-dan, and other tourist-y places), haggle-buying (at good morning city [igmcity.com]), and doing other random nonsense (waiting in line to get into a packed club, only to be rejected, spending two nights in a "motel", skiing, setting Jomer up on buses and trains to see who would sit next to him, searching for and buying things with a pretty face on them, eating snowflakes while waiting for Ediya to finish a cigarette, buying and eating Takiyaki while making "ugu~" noises, etc.).  

Yo Ja (Girl)

Dear reader, if you have seen Korean dramas, then you may be under the impression that Korea is full of pretty girls.  And, you would be right. At least for me, I saw many people, who I thought were pretty.  Jomer and Ediya have their own opinions and.... tastes...  Unfortunately, though, plastic surgery is a booming industry in Korea, and one can never be sure whether what he sees is real or fake.  This brings a very interesting question to the surface.  The whole time I was there, things seemed very superficial.  It was all smiles and pretty faces, but it seemed that some of these very people were very sad inside.  Korea is a very competitive place, and it is hard to survive.  Ediya told me that it was common for students to earn only 3 to 4 dollars an hour.  

Nee Ja (Boy)

So, Lord's day morning, we went to the airport, and bid our farewells.  We expressed our gratitude for Ediya showing us around Korea.  When we told him how we knew that he tried hard to take us around, it seemed that a layer of ice melted.  It always seems that this is how it goes.  By the time we learn to treasure the moment, there's not much of it left.  

Hajina Ippo

So, after Jomer left, I still had two hours.  Ediya and I spent these two hours just chatting.  When the time came, I got in line for the passenger screening, and Ediya went to his girlfriend's place to crash.  Thus, I boarded the airplane, and headed home.  I took a shower, and slept for a long long time.  

Places I've been so far:

Taiwan, Brazil, Korea.