Date Night

Last night Eric and I managed to go out on another date. That's two in two months. My Aunt Shawn will be so proud! A couple of other teachers here (they're actually twin sisters) have been volunteering to babysit basically since we arrived. One of them is new, so we met her in Mississippi, and the other has been here for a year already. Still, because Charissa is new, Esther has spent a lot of time around our group of new teachers, so the kids have gotten to know them both really well. They live near us, so on Wednesday nights when we come home for Bogwongdong, Esther and Charissa usually share a taxi with us (4 is usually the max, but the kids don't count!). Every week the girls joke about taking Cade home with them and this week when they got out of the taxi at the bottom of our hill to walk home, Cade was really upset that he didn't get to go with them. I mean really upset! Thankfully, our taxi driver thought he was so cute that he didn't mind Cade screaming and crying the rest of the way home. 

So, on Friday night, we figured we should take them up on their offer, and let the kids go over to their house to play. They were so excited! We didn't bring them any toys to play with, but in typical TCK style (and being watched by a couple of TCKs--the girls grew up as missionary kids), we knew they wouldn't have any problem!

      *Speaking of TCKs, as we were walking to dinner (a new route), there was a white kid who walked out of his house with a football. He said hi to us, and immediately passed his football to Eric, telling him to catch. He walked down the street with us for about 5 minutes, playing catch with Eric and talking about his grade, what sports he plays, and what school he goes to. Then he said he had to go and turned around and ran back up the hill. It was a unique experience. Here's a kid who doesn't have a yard to play in or anyone to play American football with, so he picks up a game with the first white guy he sees walking down the road. I wonder how often he does that?*

Eric and I took off for dinner in Itaewon at Chaakra, an Indian restaurant I'd been hearing about since we got here. It's strange, actually. Indian food is something that I have been trying to convince Eric to try ever since we met. I got him to try Thai food on our first date, but it's taken me nearly ten years to get him to try Indian food! We walked in and were greeted by the joys of the fishbowl lifestyle. There was already a group of about six YISS teachers in there having dinner, but I had gotten him this far. I was not about to let him get out of it just because there were people we knew in there. Besides, there isn't a restaurant in Itaewon we could go to without running into someone we know! Five minutes into our dinner, another YISS staff family walked in, but they decided to try their luck and finding a non-YISS inhabited restaurant. 

Eric was excited when he found out there was a buffet and even more excited when he learned the price. Fifteen bucks for a buffet in Seoul is a pretty good deal! I'm normally not a buffet person, but I wanted Indian food and if this is how I had to get it, I was willing to go for it. At least this way, I didn't have to try to read the menu. Who knows what language it might have been in!? We had lots of new, spicy foods (samosas, beef vindaloo, curry chicken, mutter aloo, channa masala, saffron rice, tandoori chicken, naan bread...yum!), some good, refreshing salads, and a custard dessert that Eric thought was revolting. Last night, he said he liked the restaurant and we would definitely go back, but I'm not sure if he's still feeling that way today...

After dinner, we went for a walk through Itaewon. We managed to find a store that sells shoes big enough to fit Eric so that he can stop wearing his tennis shoes with holes in them to cross country practice, ended the night with ice cream at Cold Stone (the group that we had dinner with walked in right after we did, of course!), and were even able to get back to get the kids using a new shortcut. 

The kids had had a great time with Charissa and Esther and Miranda had even come over to hang out with them, too. They are adored by all of our new friends here, and we are very blessed to have such great friends already!