Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Last weekend with Jeff in ROK

So for Jeff's last weekend in Korea, instead of going anywhere special or doing anything, we... cleaned his apartment. I've mentioned before that Jeff has a large apartment. Imagine it all filled with crap because that's pretty much how it went down.

I took the usual 6am bus to Daejeon to get the 9am bus to P-taek. I called Jeff and woke him up to make sure he would come to get me at the correct time. When I called again, he answered, "Dunkin Donuts. If I have to get you, we're going to Dunkin Donuts". That was fine with me. I had 2 large suitcases (one with my clothes to wash and one full of stuff to send home) so I didn't want to walk all over the place carrying them and made him pick me up on the side of the road. This usually isn't a problem, but created an issue in getting across the street to the train station (location of DD). So, we ended up going to McDonald's instead. Jeff made a panic order for coffee instead of soda so I gracefully switched mine with his. Mistake. Korean regular McDonald's coffee is crap. So now I was craving a latte.

When ended up going to another McDonalds and reordering breakfast. The latte sucked too, which is weird since I've had one in Jinju that was good. I guess P-taek McDonald's coffee is what sucks. We also did a little shopping and Jeff wanted to buy some walking pants for cousin camping but couldn't find a good pair.

We went back to his apartment and I took a nap. Then we cleaned. I probably did about 8 loads of laundry over the weekend. Even though he has drawers, he piles his clothes on the floor so often it's hard to determine the dirty pile from the clean pile. So all was washed. Then we sorted keep, give away and trash (it was like Clean Sweep!). He had already sorted a lot of stuff by the time I got there and we were mainly doing last minute stuff like cleaning out kitchen cabinets etc.

That night we ordered a pizza and watched some stories. Then we watched football - yay!
Jeff also played some Catan and I watched/advised. I also made him play some of my family feud games that nobody had played. My favorite answer of his was to the question "Name something fruit flavored" and he said "fruit" (because candy was already said).

We slept in for awhile on Sunday and then tried to sort out the phone issues. Jeff was nice enough to let me use his phone while we were here together. But, they wouldn't let us transfer the card or the name or the address to me. They also won't let you cancel the phone over the phone, it has to be in person. So, my phone was canceled later in the week - it was a much more drawn out complication, but it's even more boring than what I've already said.

Jeff did some things on post, including dropping off canned goods and alcohol at his office, grocery shopping and a checking the mail. By the time he came back, we needed to get read to go to his boss's house for dinner. His boss's family was nice enough to host a cook-out. Mrs. Edens made shrimp and grits (the grits were awesome; I passed on the shrimp), veggies, salad, steak, chicken, potato salad and pumpkin cookies. They also had appetizers and she made me a bourbon slush which was awesome. We ate a lot and talked for awhile.

After dinner they had a little ceremony but I forgot my camera (I think someone took some  on a iphone) where Jeff got 2 awards for service (or something like that) and some really nice bar glasses from the general. I hung out with their daughter (I think she's around 9) and she showed me her smencils - they are pencils that smell. We stayed until around 10:30 then went back to Jeff's and did some last minute cleaning, packing, laundry and watched more football. We also played a super fun game (sarcasm) invented by Jeff that I call "scenarios to fear Holly". Basically, it went like this:

"Imagine you're in traffic and Holly is driving and she is texting and someone cuts her off and she has a fork in her hand. Would you be scared of your sister?" The scenarios got more and more bizarre as the night went on (read: the more G&Ts that were consumed). This then developed into Jeff wanting to show me how he could break my arm. I did not enjoy that game, but luckily, no bones were broken.

The movers came on Monday afternoon and he dropped me off early Monday morning so I could get back in time for school. We didn't really have a teary goodbye and I think part of that was because I know at least I would have burst into tears if we said anything remotely sentimental.

I don't generally get mushy on here, but saying goodbye was very hard for me. I don't know when the next time will be when I will actually get to see my brother in person. I know that's kind of true for everyone (proverbial buses are universal), but he (along with my sister) is such a big part of who I am and not being able to call him again just to ask stupid questions, is killing me a little bit. Needless to say, Korean people were staring at me on the bus for the next 3 hours as my eyes welled up. I wasn't sobbing, but they could still tell something was wrong. It didn't stop an old lady from handing me her box of crap so I could hold it while she got on the bus, but they stared more than usual.

I'm glad he made it home safely, and I know he was ready to be home, and I'm happy for all of you that you get to spend time together, but really, I'm not. I want him back here. Y'all can come too.

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