차이나타운 | Chinatown: Nick's Birthday

Before we start, I guess TLDR: On the 11th of September, it was Nick's Birthday, and we celebrated by having some great food with a great family.

Nick is friends with his school's IT Technician, and they are the loveliest family, inviting us to dinner after moments of knowing him, and sharing their culture and language with us. We always have a great time together and spend a lot of time laughing, which is always good.

Aside from that, there's not much to say, really. We went to Chinatown, near Wolmido, and had a ton of incredible food - including 탕수육 (tangsuyuk), basically battered pork in a sweet yet very sour sauce - and went for a walk with the children. (I'll refer to them as T and H for a bit of safety)

They surprised Nick with a really great birthday cake, complete with 23 candles. Okay, 5, but that's because in Korea they're a lot more sensible with candle distribution on cakes. They have long ones to represent tens, and short ones to represent units. So much better than a cake collapsing under the combined weight of the crippling passage of time.

Or something.

Anyway, as is always the case with children and birthday cakes, there was some disagreement as to who should be blowing out the candles. I think T won several times.

N: "But it's MY cake!" T: "I don't care. I'm adorable."

The rivalry crackling behind those smiles is pretty intense.

We had a whole group photo afterwards, which I feel we don't get enough of at these events, and I ruined this wonderful one by blinking:

So here's one that's just as nice.

After eating enough to feed a small country we decided to walk it off. Nearby there's a famous little photo spot with some giant Chinese food you can take photos with.

The most aegyo siopao bun you've ever seen.

The walk got a little more intense because we decided to climb a mountain. I'm not sure it was the best idea but it was pretty at the time and we didn't have much choice once T had run about 2 miles ahead of us. Where does he get all that energy from??

King T, looking very much at home on his makeshift throne. (Or, as I've just noticed, floating a few feet above it.)

Understandably, the decorations in this area are all very distinctly Chinese style, and it's interesting to see the differences in architecture and decoration.

We stumbled upon a little performance going on, with a little girl singing Trot songs, some magicians, and a troupe of young Taekwondo students. It was all very fun (so much that I forgot to take any more photos) until H started trying to play with a dog that wasn't having any of this 'petting' lark, and a man looked like he was trying to steal him Pied Piper-like with his harmonica. Erm.

ANYWAY. Thank you very much 진호씨 and family. It's always a pleasure~