Happy Lunar New Year

a.k.a "Searching Korea for my future ex-wife"

You may or may not be aware, but Korea is close to China. Given this fact, it seems only natural that "Chinese New Year" is celebrated here. What does this mean for a waegookin such as myself? It means I get a do-over in the New Year's Eve department. I must say, this one was a bit better, if not a bit hazier, and a whole lot more immoral.

I will not go into the most sordid details, let's just say the end of the night I believe I had asked a barmaid to marry me. She, unfortunately, rejected my proposal, or at least I think she did. She kinda smiled, said 'Mo-la-yo, I don't know, I don't know', smiled again and walked away.

You have to wary when you party with the 'Sacheon Legend'. I am a legend in my own right, just not the 'Sacheon Legend'. Like the 'Highlander', there can be only one.

The extended weekend started off so well. How did it all go so horribly wrong? I do now feel compelled to say that if there are any children in the room, please ask them to leave. This gets a bit PG-13. You should see the director's cut.

There is an old saying in Korea, 'Things were going fine, and then they slipped off to Samcheonpo'. You might gather from my previous posts, Samcheonpo for Koreans might as well be the end of the world. Colloquially, slipping of to Samcheonpo means something like losing your train of thought. Someone was speaking well, and then they are just lost. Well, the inverse of the statement might ring more true for me. Things weren't going so well, and then I went to Samcheonpo, and my situation has greatly improved. But it depends on who you ask. Two Sacheon English teachers came down and quite literally slipped off into Samcheonpo with me. I only think they regretted the doings the next morning, as I had. No deep regrets, though, I'm sure.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. My writing professor once told me that a good story has a beginning, middle, and an end. Sound advice had I taken it. My stories tend to have at least two out of the three, and possibly not in that order. So let's go to the beginning. Being the savvy financial planner that I am, find myself with with a very unimpressive debit card balance, a week and a half remaining before I am paid again. I would like to say it is not my fault, but it is. To my defense, almost half of this month's salary went to booking a plane ticket to D.C. in March, and the other half I sent to my American bank to do the responsible thing and pay off some debt. Having no real savings to speak of, this puts me in a bit off a bind. So going away for the long holiday was completely out of the question. No matter, I will make my own fun here in Samcheonpo, my quiet little burg, as I am slowly finding out, may have a seedier hidden side to it.

One of only other foreigners here in town had went away to Japan for the holiday, and he enlisted the services of a newly-arrived Sacheon English teacher to feed and walk his dog in his absence. Why, seeing that I live in the same town, had he not asked me dog sit is beyond me. I felt a bit slighted, thinking that he thought me irresponsible and not fit to watch his dog, until I realized that he is probably right. I more responsible Ryan would most likely not even be in Korea in first place, but rather back at home doing the responsible thing by going back to school and maybe having myself that wife and two-and-a-half kids and the house and the mortgage in the suburbs and those great things that that those responsible people are so proud off and rave about to us irresponsible people until it makes us sick and we skip the country. Where was I going with this? Okay, so the dog sitter is in town, and though I had only met here once, I have since found her to be a lovely girl and good company. I thinks she knows as well that my designs on her are purely friendly and we have a mutual understanding in that regard. 99.8% of western men I would reckon do not come here with the intention of hooking up with another foreigner, and I am to be included in that large majority. I am absolutely in lust with Korean women, which inevitably leads me to do very stupid things the rest of the weekend in pursuit of that lust. But that is neither here nor there. Whatever that means.

So Monday started out innocently enough. We, the dog watcher and I, met here on Monday, and yours truly being the de facto Samcheonpo representative, I took it upon myself to show her some of the sights, the harbor and the fish market being some of my favorites. I think her intention was to get lunch, but instead we snacked on some Korean junkfood from a vendor down by the harbor to keep us until the 'Sacheon legend' came down for dinner. I introduced her to the joys and perils of ho-ta (sp?), sort of a sweet pancake with a surprise in the center, scalding hot melted brown sugar. She, as is to be expected with such a treat, ended up wearing the bulk of it. I, being the gentleman that I am, tried my hardest not to laugh. Poor deluded girl still fancies me normal. 'It's great to meet someone normal here in Korea' were her exact words. I did my best these past few days to dissuade her from this opinion.

We met the Sacheon Legend himself around 5pm, and being that it was a holiday, we set out to find a restaurant that was open. Between the Legend and I, we had a somewhat decent idea of good places to go in Samcheonpo. The first places we went were closed, and when we tried the western bar with the huge carved Native American statue at the entrance. Some people were inside, but nevertheless for some odd reason we were turned away. This would not be the only time that night in which the stoic Indian would attempt to prevent us from enjoying ourselves.

Across from my school, Wu-shu Grand Master's high school chingu had opened a very nice restaurant just the week before, and I have been itching for a reason to check it out. I called Grand Master to see if he wanted to meet us, and maybe since his friend owned the place we could get the hook-up. He enjoys western girls, a lot, so I meant to introduce him to the dog sitter (or maybe dog nanny, she's British). Later I would receive a somewhat concerned phone call from her regarding Grand Master, so chalk that introduction up as one of my possible regrets.

Did I mention Grand Master is married, with two very small children? I don't think that concerns him, or the mothers of his Wu-shu students for that matter, with whom he seems to be on very 'familiar' relations. But alas, I have said a little too much about his indiscretions. Who am I to judge? He really is a nice guy, but sadly a bit of a dog. He does not make it to dinner with us that night, but he does play a bit of a role the next day's events in this story of mine. I did receive some very apologetic albeit undecipherable text messages later that night. Lunar New Year has a large focus on family, and apparently he was bowing to his dead ancestors somewhere.

I don't know why I forgot to mention that Ho Seak, my old sparring partner, is back in town, especially since he is sitting next to me at this PC bang at this very moment. So rewind my story back to Saturday night and to me sitting at home debating what to do for dinner when I receive a knock on my door. Ho Seak, now a badly dyed brunette, was joined by three chingus, none seeming to possess a high level of English. They sit down on my floor and proceed to eat all my cookies that my boss gave me as a New Year's gift and drink all my beer and soju. They are, of course, still hungry after all the cookies are gone. As I have, I was yet to have dinner, so I ask them to accompany to Ace Mart to buy Mandu, Ramen, and some more maekju. Maekju is beer, but soju is a Korean's preferred poison. I dissuaded them from the soju but instead picked up some makoli (rice wine) which is very good mixed with cider (the name for lemon-lime soda like Sprite, not the apple variety). Of course, none of them had any money, but it was only about $20 and in retrospect considering the generosity I received throughout the rest of my holiday, I was happy to oblige.

The five us went back to my flat and being an utter slob, I had to wash most of my dishes. I was happy that one of them did the cooking, not that any of the feast was particularly complicated or time-consuming. We sat on my floor to eat and luckily they saved me from having a lot of dishes to wash later by eating directly out of the pot. The food and alcohol had altogether disappeared and soon my friends followed suit with about as much ceremony as they had come, leaving me scratching my head as to the whole proceedings. Not that it was unusual for me what just happened, but by the fact that it has become normal for me. I feel like I am living in East Quad again back at uni, but rather than me shouting awful broken Spanish while drunk it has been replaced with even more awful and broken Korean. I even have the dorm room style mini-fridge.

So go ahead and fast forward back to Monday night dinner. Three of us now, the Legend, the dog nanny, and myself (I am purposely avoiding using real names to keep their identities secret so they would have plausible deniability that the are in fact associated with such a heathen as myself). Place: the new restaurant across from E. Bo-young. Are you up to speed? Good. Okay. Dinner is truly an international meeting of the minds, the Legend being a lively old mate from New Zealand and the nanny as I had said is British. I felt this little summit lacked a certain flavor, an actual Korean representative, and already being jilted by Grand Master, against my better judgement I invited my boss, which actually, depending on how you see it, turned out to be rather enjoyable. My boss, the unrelenting bundle of excitement that she is, couldn't turn down the invitation to meet more foreigners as she showed up with her hapless husband in tow. Her timing couldn't have been worse, as we had already finished dinner and were on to the soju. Any reservations I had about drinking with my boss are completely out the window now. Here in Korea it is almost a requirement for an employee to get absolutely s***faced with his or her boss, even to the point of vomiting and returning to drinking as to not disrespect their boss. Public drunkenness, when done in company, is celebrated rather than shunned like it is in the west. Finally an aspect of Korean culture I can appreciate. Sunny, my boss, who legitimately hates no one, took a great liking to my friends. Here's the kicker, though--she paid for dinner for all of us and I couldn't for the life of me change her mind. She and her husband didn't even eat, only had a few drinks, yet they picked up the tab. But don't get it twisted, I am not complaining. My bank account said thank you very gamsa as well.

Being only across the street from my school, my boss wanted to show off our school and we went up for coffee. After some time here, the dog sitter, being responsible in her dog sitting duties, felt this was a good time to retire back to her surrogate house for the long weekend, and we said our annyeongs and parted ways. Lucky soul, because this was clearly the moral high point of the evening. She got out in time, lest her innocence be soiled by the likes of me and the Legend. When she went home, I thought the night was winding down--good night out if it did indeed end here. I had already hung the 'Mission Accomplished' banner and was heard to be talking about the 'final throes' of the soju. So my boss and her husband in the big yellow bus drove the dog nanny home, but before that my boss asked if we were headed to another bar and if later she can rejoin us. To my own complete and utter amazement the Legend said that we were in fact continuing (okay, so I wasn't THAT surprised, no protests were made by me about these plans). The Sacheon Legend told her to come around later, and I half-expected that she wouldn't come. When I half-expect something, it's actually more 60-40, and prior knowledge was on the side of her being boozed out for the night. Now in my mind, I am always right, don't forget this, except when I'm wrong. This time I was wrong. I'll admit to it here, but ask me again and I won't, because like I said, I am always right and I have a reputation to keep.

So she came later to the new location sans husband, which gave the Legend a mischievous delight. I would later learn he had set his lustful sights on my boss, and swore up and down that she was flirting with him and playing footsie. Several beers and copious amounts of soju are coursing through my veins and I am beginning to come out of my own shell. I had many weeks ago asked my boss's assistance in finding a nice Korean girlfriend for me. I let her know I fancied the barmaid, and I did, she was absolutely gorgeous. So Sunny goes about trying to play the matchmaker, much to the embarrassment of the poor waitress. I did get some coquettish glances out of her when she thought I wasn't looking, but when she noticed my eyes trained upon here she quickly turned and went about her work. This, however, was not the girl I proposed to. That comes much later. God, I would have loved to though, would she have me.

Sunny gets a call from her husband, and I can see sort of a change in the Sacheon Legend's countenance, a tad concerned he was. Not because the of the obvious shameful acts of adultery I have no doubt he was entertaining in his mind, but that she was actually going to leave before he could make his move. She tells us that her husband wants us (I am not sure if it was more 'her' and not 'us', maybe he saw the way the Legend was looking his wife) to join him and his friends at a different restaurant not far away. So the Legend settles the tab (I am very good at acting like I really want to pick up a tab when someone already has it in hand) and we were off again. We come to a little hole-in-the wall back alley type place only to witness my boss's husband and his friends engaged in an frenzied epicurean pursuit of alcohol of food, plates and empty bottles everywhere. I am thoroughly impressed, as I had pegged him for a light-weight. He did eventually show his true colors, but he is at the height of his game now. The foreigner v. Korean ratio shifted sides at this point as up until now the Waegookin outnumbered the Koreans.

His friends were, as to be expected, equally sauced and I had some deep intellectual conversations with one of the men about the Detroit Tigers and Joel Zumaya's throwing arm and if Jason Statham could really take Jet-Li, the movie 'War' being in heavy rotation right now on OCN, the movie channel. I like the Transporter, but I still maintain that Jet-Li would work him over like there was no tomorrow in a real fight. My new Korean friend was defending the Englishman for some reason, but I guess Jet-Li is Chinese and not Korean. I say he WAS my new Korean friend. That was at least until I went to the bathroom and when I came back my ex-chingu for some reason accuses me of not washing my hands and would not let it die. Sir, I will not be slandered in that manner, I always was my hands after using the toilet. I went back and washed them again to placate him, drying them off in his presence in case he was still not satisfied. He went on blissfully unaware that I had set a blood feud against him, and as Tom Monaghan I hope can attest to, my grudges don't die easily.

So I am worried that the Legend will do something embarrassing with my boss, he is still sitting very close, but something new caught both of our interests--the women that I think may have been the owner of this bar. She was the type of bar worker that I am used to back home. Think Hooters Girl in appearance and mannerisms. It is a shame she didn't speak more English. This, again, is not the girl that I had asked to marry me. To get a rise out of the Legend, I told him about how she was caressing my knee every time she came to the table with another plate of God-knows-what. The Legend wanted me to switch him seats. The food she kept bringing out was all but indiscernible to me, mostly obscure seafood like snails and some sort of flat shellfish that was very lobster-esque. My favorite, and by favorite I mean absolutely not my favorite, was the octopus tentacles that were still moving and suctioning to the plate. I envisioned myself dying in an octopus-related asphyxiation when one of the suckers decided to hold steadfast deep inside my esophagus. I think as I chewed they were trying to pull out my fillings. They set something in front me and Legend, which looked like beef, and in all likelihood was beef, but we immediately declared it to be the greatest thing we have every had eaten. I hope he remembers what it was, for the life of me I cannot recall. I would like to believe the Legend was now occupied with other pursuits than my boss at this time, and he became very intrigued with making plans with her husband to go fishing, which I hope he does many, many times so I don't have to. Get me off the hook, so to speak. Pun very much intended, thank you Mr. North, you are the best at the cheesy sarcastic laugh. To be perfectly honest, I gave the Legend my blessing for him to pursue my boss, as long as it didn't come back on me somehow. And long as he laid off the lady proprietor of the bar.

Skip ahead a bit well beyond when most western bars have already called last call and shut the doors. Our Korean friends had enough. I have no idea how they got home, but at the risk of sounding callous, this wasn't really my concern. I have at this point in the evening yet to spend a single won. Do I feel a bit guilty, yes. Again, am I complaining, no. The Legend and I are clearly the only people still capable of even standing up straight, and needless to so say, we were not even close to being finished. My dirty mind had set about on a mission now, too lurid to go into on this forum. And from the lusty look in the Legend's eyes I knew he had similar designs. We were going to find us some Korean girls. To keep up appearances however the Legend said he was going to get a cab and I gave the lame excuse that I would make sure he did. With my boss gone, I can relax again and set my one track mind in motion. The Legend wanted to go back to the last place. I, however, wanted to look around a bit. I won out, and we went took a stroll up Samcheonpo's 'bar district', if you can call it that. We came to back to the bar with the stoic native standing guard. I have lost all track of time at this point but it had to have been close to 3:30. The place is clearly open now, and packed still at this time of night, but after a quick stroll around we realized we would not get a table. I think the waitstaff took the piss out of us a little as we came in looking a bit out of place and left quickly. I could hear them laughing and carrying on a bit. Mr. Indian, why do you hate us so much?

No worries. New place, new set of waitresses for us to ogle. The Legend, being a great corrupter, was encouraging the poor girl to take shots of soju with us. She was the type A Korean girl, absolutely, unrelentingly shy, but our western charm (pretty funny because I am not charming in the least back home) was working on her though. Somehow we ended up ordering a plate of dried squid, which we thought was just service. It is not only popular, but almost required in Korea to eat what is call anju, basically bar snacks, while drinking, and they are normally free. The squid ended up on the bill however, and both the Legend and I do not particularly care for dried squid, so it pretty much went to waste. How do I know that it was on the bill? I finally picked up a tab! There is hope for your boy yet. The booth across from us sat, or maybe slumped a man absolutely tanked into submission, on the verge of passing out or being sick all over the place. As the Legend would say, 'chundering'. We were a bit jealous of him because the waitstaff were focusing their attention on him and not us. We were however making bets as to the outcome of this poor sap. I put 5000 won down that he would pull through like a champ, but it was never settled as the man just got up and left, and neither of us could really be bothered to follow him.

At this point now we are the only customers in the bar, and I guess the general rule here is that the bar stays open until the last customer leaves, no matter what. I could feel they wanted us to go though. We weren't being a hassle, but from my extensive experience working at bars, I could understand that it was time to go. I made a last trip to the bathroom, and on the way I literally ran into our waitress, not hard or anything, just sort of a nudge and she playfully cornered me by the door and started pulling on my beard, which drove me absolutely bonkers. Really, I am not a sloppy drunk, and the fact that I can still account all of this to you after close to 12 straight hours of drinking should be proof enough. I'm never one to lose my ambitions completely, but hormones and the alcohol dictated to me exactly how the next 5 minutes of my life would play out. I surely wasn't the gentleman my mom would have wanted me to be, and I kinda grabbed her and kissed her. She didn't want me to do it, and pushed me away, but that isn't to say she didn't like it. She asked me for my cell phone and being just an absolute state I gave it do her. She typed in her number and hit send so she would have mine. As you can probably guess by the importance I am placing on this, I am a bit of a loser in the love department, I'll admit. Here I'm Don mother f'ing Juan. There you have it, all that build up, and finally this is very same barmaid I had asked to marry me.

I don't know how much of this the Legend witnessed, but I didn't mention it when I returned to the table. The barstaff were a little more vocal now in trying to get us to leave. I think their exact words were as follows: 'Home. You go to the home', and we gave them no fuss. The Legend and I parted ways just outside the entrance, and for all I know he went of somewhere else still looking for a girl of his own. He could still be passed out in a ravine somewhere for all I know. Again not my concern. Right now my primary task is to check my a** home. Easy enough task for me because I am like a drunk homing pigeon--I never fail to find my way home, no matter what country or state of inebriation. My one-track mind is set, my mission not complete until I am safely in 406 Princeville and the door closed behind me. My simple mission is interrupted by a phone call. Thinking it might be the Sacheon Legend lost or something, but he is a legend for good reason and a resourceful old bloke, so it had to be someone else. I looked down at a number I didn't recognize, but answered it regardless. I normally screen calls I don't know because I get a lot of wrong number calls and still habit from when I was dodging Chase and Citibank. I am glad I took this call. The contents of the conversation were unbelievably dirty and not in the least bit shy or subtle, the other party doing all of the talking, and of course will not be recounted here. It ended with me saying, '406 Princeville'. As I said, I will try to keep this PG-13, so as to the following events, let us just fade to black and fast forward to the next day, let's say 2pm. I will end this chapter here, but is by no means the end of this story. If you are still with me, I really truly appreciate it.

2pm Tuesday, today, or it was today when I started putting down this chronicle. So 2pm yesterday I get a call, actually maybe it was a text, it is the dog nanny. She wants to get lunch. God love the girl for not calling me until 2pm, because was engaged in battling the fiercest hangover in the history of man. This is not a hyperbole, I challenge anyone to claim they've experienced worse, and I will punch them in the face. A hangover it the body's way of condemning our debauched nature the night before--a lesson I never seem to learn. Food did seem like a good idea, but I was really in any shape to go out in public in the state that I was in, so I replied back that I haven't really been up and about yet and I need a shower at least first. We make plans to meet at Homeplus, which I wanted to show her the day before but it was closed for the holiday. I know there is a bit of a food court, and I told her we can get something there. I had never got food like that there, but how hard can it be? Turned out a bit more of an ordeal. Then Ho Seak calls (see, I had a reason for mentioning him before) 'Yo bo seyo' I answered.
'Rain...you, where...uh-dee?'
'Homeplus.' was my reply.
'Ok, ok.' Line goes dead.

Five minutes later Ho Seak shows up at Homeplus. He probably could have helped us figure out the food court if only he had been a minutes earlier. I introduce him to dog sitter, and tell him she wants to do a little shopping. He wants us to meet up with Grand Master. Ho Seak says something and runs off. The dog sitter purchases a few western things that you cant really get anywhere else close, and when we are in the checkout Ho Seuk appears again out of breath like he had just ran somewhere. Where he went I will never know. Ho Seak says something about going to Grand Master's house, but not now, we had to wait for some reason. The dog nanny wants to go back and check on the dog, but I think she really just didn't know what to think of what was happening. I was lost myself. So she says that she is going back, and I tell her that me and Ho Seak might go to my house, but I told her that I was ashamed to invite many people to my house, or something like that. She told me she was offended by another foreigner in Jinju asking her to go back to his place. Obviously this is a different situation, but I played it safe. Basically, I was at loss for words as to a good explanation, and it was a bit awkward for all involved. So we head off in separate directions, I gave her a vague word that I would maybe call again when I figure it all out. Ho Seak then decides he wants some chocolate after we left the store, and wants to go back into Homeplus, all the way to to the bottom floor to get some chocolate. He has his chocolate now and is happy, so now we can go back to my house.

Instead of going to my house I tell Ho Seak I want to go to a PC bang. He takes great care and effort to try to find us some computers next to each other--I couldn't care less. I finally get to sit down, log on and start to check my email and he gets a call. He gets up, he says, 'Grand Master, go, now, bali bali'. I am a little annoyed, but ok, ok, let's go. He paid the man at the counter about 50 cents for the time we were there, and we go out to street. I thought we were going to walk to Grand Master's house--it wasn't very far--but Ho Seak stops me. No, no, wait, and a little bit later Grand Master swoops in and up to the curb in his car and we get in. Grand Master really wants to meet the dog sitter. I guess Ho Seak told him about her. He asks me were she was, and I figure she is back with the dog. He knows the man who owns the dog, his kids go to Wu-Shu, so we set off in that direction. I call the nanny to make sure, and apparently she hasn't even made it there yet, I guess she was trying to figure out her way around town. She is about at the Lotteria, the Korean McDonald's rip-off, and so I tell Grand Master this, and he does this crazy u-turn, and then another crazy u-turn when we she her to be on the same side. She gets in, and I tell her our destination: Grand Master's wife's grandmother's house.

We are greeted by his wife's family, but notably by an 82 year old woman that walked in the shape of an inverted 'L'. The house was the biggest Korean house I have been in, but maybe still a bit small in Western standards. Still, very nice place. No one is really talking to me and the dog sitter except Grand Master, but they were, it seems, very open to talk about us. The grandmother is absolutely fixated on me and kept trying to talk to me in Korean and perhaps a bit angry by the sound of her voice when I kept saying I don't know. They all seemed nice enough though because they had us eat a traditional New Year's dinner on low tables that everyone sat around on the floor in the living room. Something with rice cakes, that's all I know. I was offered some soju, and the smell alone turned my stomach, but out of respect I didn't decline. Dinner was over and we lingered a bit, but then everyone got up almost at once to leave. We get in Grand Master's car, but now his wife and his 1 and 3 year olds are coming with us. In the back Ho Seak is holding on to the 1yo, dog sitter riding bitch seat, who know, in the middle, and me next to her. The wife riding shotgun, the 3yo riding in a backpack on her back. I'm thinking, please God, don't let us get into an accident. Those poor kids.

We get to Grand Master's house safely. The wife gets out, her and Ho Seak go up to the apartment, Grandmaster tells me to move up to the front seat. We sit a bit awkwardly in the parking lot with the car off--the wife took the keys up, they live on the 14th floor, slow elevator. Ho Seak comes back down with the keys and gets back in the car. Now what was going to happen next I really had no clue. I assumed he would take the dog sitter home and then me home. When I told him she wanted to go back to check on the dog one last time before she went back to Sacheon, he looks at me like this was the farthest thing from his mind, but he takes her back anyway. But then he makes like he is going to wait for her to finish with the dog. She and I are both confused and I say that she doesn't want him to wait, and I say I want to go home now as well. He strikes up an attitude with me but starts driving to my house. He has already told me that he wants to have 'familiar relations' with her, and I see this as his reason to being a bit angry. Whatever, I did the introduction, I don't owe him anything. Ball's in his court now.

We get close to my house, and I say I want to go back the back the PC Bang, so he drops me off here, where I have been sitting since penning this account. Ho Seak has since left, but the hardcore gamers are still here keeping me company with the sound of machine guns and explosions. I am perhaps the only one using a computer for non-game related purposes. Then I get a call. 'Uh, Ryan, why did your Wu-shu teacher call me to say he is waiting outside in his car.'
'I have no idea. I am no longer with him. Maybe he wants to give you a ride to the bus terminal.'
'I hope that's all he wants.'
'No, no. You met his wife. He's a good guy.' I know better. 'Give me a call if there is a problem.'
'Right-o.'
Well, the ball was in Grand Master's court, and I think he's trying for a slam dunk. I'm a very bad man. Mates are mates, as Rent-boy said something to that nature.

And since my story has caught up to me in the present, I don't really see any other way to end the story, unless I start relating my possible schedule for tomorrow. 10:30am I have some private English lessons, 11am is Wu-Shu, 12 to around 8pm at E. Bo-young, back to the grind after the long holiday. After that you might very well find me in this exact seat in the same PC Bang. I rather like this one, it's better than the one I have been going to since my laptop decided to puke out on me. I will say this though, all the images I had in my head about Chinese New Year, you know dragon parades and fireworks and all that, none of it actually happened. Maybe it did and I was just too hazy to notice, I don't know. This little fact that my stereotypical preconceptions of the holiday were not fulfilled is reason for a bit of disappointment. I want a do-over!

---

---