Busy Saturday

This past weekend was really busy, but a lot of fun. On Friday night after work, I met Dallas and we walked and talked for not quite 2 hours. We went really far and talked about a lot of things - he had a mental list.

Then I went to bed because I had to get up early on Saturday morning to have lunch with my dance teacher's daughter. She met me at the academy a few weeks ago and asked if I would "play" with her one weekend. It's one of those times where it's hard to say no because they've been so nice to me there. Her name is Min Kyeung and she's third grade middle school students, which is basically a freshman in high school to us, so she's around 14-15. Her English is pretty decent and we talked for an hour while we ate pizza and salad. She said she had to pay (although I'm sure it was her parents) and made me take the pizza home. I wanted to get a picture of the box, which they wrapped with a bow, and the pizza, which was rib meat with acorn squash and sweet potato crust, but I made the mistake of telling Dallas it was there and he ate it all. Min Kyeung and I are meeting up again at some point in the future - after her final tests, so mid-July. She might also join our dance class during the summer, which will be weird, but fun.

After lunch, I went to the church where my friend Lance was getting married. Korean weddings are different from American ones. I've already talked about my boss's, but this one was slightly different from that, possible because it was in a church. First we saw Lance in the front room and took pictures with him. We gave our envelopes with money instead of gifts, but declined the buffet tickets because I had already eaten and Ilani was going out later. So they gave us $10 cash instead! Then we saw Grace, who was sitting on a stool in the church. We talked to Brandon and some other people for awhile and the service was supposed to last 20 minutes max. Brandon was the pastor and he spoke in English, which was then translated by another church member. Then we sang a song and it was sung simultaneously in Korean and English, so that was fun. Next, Grace's uncle, who is a pastor, got up was supposed to give a congratulatory messaged and instead started talking...and talking...and talking. Both of her parents and the wedding coordinator fell asleep at some point. Then her mom threw a note at the coordinator, who then had to bring it up to the uncle at the pulpit! Everyone was kind of giggling at that point. He finally finished after probably 30 minutes. Then Lance sang the Jason Mraz song "I'm Yours" because he had to do a performance of some kind. He did well, even though he was nervous about it. Then we took pictures and she tossed the bouquet. The one Korean single girl who braved the circle, caught it. We found out later that the other single girls didn't want to catch it because if you don't get engaged within 6 months, you won't ever get married. So only girls with serious boyfriends try to get it.

The get-away car

Parents walking in, followed by the wedding coordinator

Saying "I do"

Bowing to the parents at the end of the ceremony

Me and Lance. Check out his gloves. He was also wearing make-up to go full Korean.

All the single ladies after the service.

Us and Grace. All the pictures are awkward because either you're standing and your head is miles above hers, or you're hunched over. You can see both Ilani and I chose the hunch.

After the wedding, we went downstairs to the IEC room to play some board games to celebrate Ilani's birthday. We played 30 Seconds and kept switching up the teams as more people came, so my final team ended up coming in second. My friend Kylie joined us for the last half of the game and did pretty well. It's a hard game for non-native English speakers, so I felt a little bad for some of the players. A lot of people went to Samsung buffet after, but I didn't want to go because I don't really like it that much, but always end up eating too much. So Kylie and I went to a meat place and cooked, ate and talked for an hour or so. Then I went home and changed and on our way back to her house, we ran into my friend Caleb and talked to him for about 30 minutes. Then we went to Kylie's so she could change and walked to wine bar, where we met some other people. I stayed for about an hour and drank 2 glasses of red, so I was in a happy place.

I decided to leave at that point, because I knew if I stayed, it would be a long night. So I went to Dallas's and we organized some of his music and started making a playlist for me. Then we watched a bunch of youtube videos of K-pop songs and went to bed. Sunday was eventful enough for its own post (hopefully coming soon)!