birthday salute

birthdays are a different animal here in korea than those of you who reading from a more western culture might be accustomed to hearing about. here, as in other east asian countries, birthdays are less celebrated or revered, on average, than are the anniversaries of one's death. as an example to clarify, a korean might not always know when his or her parents birthdays are, but they sure as hell know the anniversary of the death of their great-grandfather.

of course, since i'm not from an east asian culture, i tend to take more meaning in celebrating the lives of those close to me still alive than i do in feting someone i never met who died before i was born. it is with this in mind that earlier in the month, some of us got together to celebrate the birthdays of a couple of people--my wife, seung-hee, and my good pal, ben, whose torso above says it all.

we first got together to celebrate seung-hee's birthday. the scene was more subdued and hard-charging than the second celebration in a few days would be, the two celebrations befitting the personalities of the people being feted. we ate a good dinner at a nearby restaurant, chugged it on over to bumpin' for a nightcap or six and then called it a happy 30th for my wife. above left, my wife and ji-soo and, above right, phillip and yours truly...

a few nights later, we saw fit to gather again for ben's 30-somethingth (i can't remember, to be honest, but he's not as old as i am, which he'd be happy to enumerate for anyone). instead of convening at a restaurant, it was decided that our favourite after-work pub, chunjee gaebyuk, was more appropriate. it was more lively, as my wife demonstrates by whacking ryan on the cheek, than our dinner party of previous (though jason, nathan, and penny's countenances might suggest otherwise)--and we got the added pleasure of witnessing the premier presentation of our very own "stacey of liberty".

a lot more soju and beer were to be bound, gagged, and forced to do unseemly things to our livers and the camera got up and started shimmying around the room, creating exquisite examples of how not to take photos that other people might actually clamour to see.

a perfect cap to the dinner party, if not the evening, was the fall of the year's first snow. it snowed like hell's dandruff for an hour and then stopped. in this photo, please note the orange-coloured snowball (or else a UFO).

it was a happy, gay night, full of laughter, merriment, tawdry humour, and imbibing to an allegedly unhealthy degree...