My Weekend Activities

Last night--Saturday--I got together with Andy (for the first time since New Zealand) and Greg for lamb skewers and makkuli in Bongcheon. It's been about three months (Wow!) since the last time I partook in this delightful ritual of ours, and I can assure you that it has lost none of its charm, deliciousness, or inebriating power, during the absence.

Still, I passed on third course in Itaewon, where Greg and Andy headed next, having visited that locale on Thursday for the trivia game at 3 Alley Pub--and left with what my Dad calls a "splitting headache". We came in sixth, despite knowing almost everything. I'm positive that you have to cheat to win nowadays.

Anyway, just as well, since the makkuli was particularly strong last night. I am famous for leaving Bongcheon just in time to get kicked off the subway at Sindorim, on its last run. I beat the odds, and made my line 9 connection at Dangsan with time to spare.

I awoke this morning feeling a little delicate, but as it was such a glorious day, I soon ventured forth into the Gang-seo (west-of-the-river) morning. A brisk walk around the neighborhood gets the heart started. The temperature was mild, the sky blue and clear, the wind a gentle breeze that mitigated the warm sunshine perfectly.

Later on, I couldn't resist sitting in the park (not the Hangang Park, but the little MaeHwa Park beside my building) for a couple of hours reading a book.


As a result, I am a hundred-and-twenty-some pages into The People of the Book, a novel by Geraldine Brooks. About a book. I love books. This one is about a Jewish prayer book called the Sarajevo Haggadah (which is a genuine relic, though the account is fictionalized), and its path across Europe beginning in the fifteenth century, framed by a modern conservator. Sort of like The DaVinci Code, but more like The Name of the Rose ...