Wintry Things

"We just moved here recently. About six or (mentally counting in head) no, it's been eight months now." That's how it usually goes in conversations with acquaintances. Then there's a moment of recognition that over half a year ago may no longer qualify as "recently".

Neither of us is overly eager to check out new and unfamiliar places on the weekends. My mental list of local restaurants to try and nearby cities to visit has grown faded and yellow with disuse. I guess these are signs that we have settled in.

But then again, there's also the cold. The frigid, bone-clattering cold might be to blame for us laying low too, storing up our energy for the winter holiday to come. These days, I practice macro photography in the mornings, trying my best to take pictures of snowflakes on my windshield with a cell phone while my car warms up.

I finally realized that there is a "pro" (aka manual) mode on my phone and look forward to the next flurries for an opportunity to improve.

If I had a past life, I'm pretty sure I was a meteorologist because I just love weather and precipitation so much. Even when there have not been snowflakes, there's usually some kind of icy forms to snap away at while I wait. It amazed me how much it can vary from one day to the next. Thick ripples like stained glass, fractal clusters like magnetic shavings clung together in the oddest ways.

In case I hadn't gotten the temperature's chilly hint, the holiday season has arrived. Yet I still felt surprised to find goodies on my desk at work one morning.

I used some leftover yarn to crochet some motifs to create an "ugly Christmas sweater". The kids at school loved it and it won the grand prize at a party Isaac and I attended - a hot cocoa variety pack and a restaurant giftcard.

We ventured out on a cold evening and found some pretty Christmas lights in the neighborhoods nearby. Here are our three favorites: More is better, giant dog, precision.

I apologize for getting off of my regimented weekly schedule. It's been a slowly slipping thing - from Fridays to Sundays, then missing a week and then another week. I'd like to blame it on the holiday season or the bitter cold weather we've had lately, but I can't be sure about that. It might just be that we are settled in now.

And so I have decided, for now at least, to write posts here bimonthly. I'll finish 2016 with a holiday wrap up, and then begin the new schedule next year. Starting in January, I plan to write new posts the second and fourth weekends of each month. I still wish to maintain this blog and want to do it on a regular basis. But I want to keep things interesting too, and since our pace has slowed down, it makes sense that my blog will too.

Thanksgiving and Break

We blink and it is December. Looking through my phone pictures from the past two weeks, the tell-tale signs of late autumn stick out - nearly monochromatic images - raucous crows on bare trees and surprise ice on windshields.

Two weeks have passed since my last post - and in that time I learned that the cliche is true about holidays - sometimes it feels like you need a second holiday to recover from the first. Our Thanksgiving was special and memorable, but was also so busy and eventful that I just now feel back on track, a week later. It's hard to get back to normal life after so much fun.

We stayed in Louisville for Thanksgiving - a decision first formed after making the 8 hour drive back in September. It's a lot of travel for just a couple of days. Our choice was cemented when we received the exciting news that our friends from South Korea (our former next-door neighbors) would be visiting the States over the holiday.

And so I planned and prepped for my first time hosting Thanksgiving dinner. After returning from the three grocery stores I visited to find all of the ingredients on my list, I tried to take an artsy photo of the produce. Maybe it was silly, but I'm glad that I did because in the end, I barely took any other pictures of the big meal.

Our Thanksgiving dinner: planked salmon, roasted pork loin, sweet potato wedges, a foofy salad, rolls nobody ate, garlicky veggie chicken pasta that I forgot to take out of the fridge and pumpkin loaf.

Unbelievable. That these are the only pictures that I took. So out of character for me and my friend who always have a moment of silence before meals to take photos.

I blame it on the fact that we had not seen each other in eight months and were simply too ecstatic and distracted to bother.

We enjoyed our meal - and ended up eating the pumpkin loaf and sweet potatoes for breakfast for the rest of the holiday.

























After dinner, we and our friends (who were not so tired thanks to jet lag) did something that was a first for all four of us. Black Friday shopping on Thursday night. I feel a bit ashamed to admit it, and to inadvertently support companies making employees work on holidays, but it was a neat experience.

I have never seen Target as packed as it was at 6:30pm on Thanksgiving. Two items stuck out of almost everybody's bright red buggies - flat screen TVs and giant teddy bears. Another surprise - for the first time I ran into one of my students outside of school - a third grade sweetheart shopping with her mother!

Over the next several days that comprised our holiday weekend, the four of us kept busy. I was excited to show our friends around the place we call home now, and especially to introduce my girlfriend to some of my favorite brands like Target and Kate Spade. We made coffee with our beloved nespresso machine and enjoyed relaxing mornings together. We visited Frankfort with its charming small town vibe and toured Buffalo Trace Distillery.

The Distillery was just as lovely and enjoyable on trip number four. And I truly think our tour guide this time was the best one yet.

November just disappeared, time snatching our holiday right out from under us like icy winds whipping brittle dry leaves. Since our friends left, Isaac and I can't help commenting on how our apartment feels empty, or on how nice it was to be living side by side with "our neighbors" again, if just for a little while.

Week in a word and a few photos

A one-word summary of this week: planning. All sorts: progress reports and lesson plans at school, the menu for my first Thanksgiving dinner attempt, details and outings for special house guests arriving this week, financial preparations for a big purchase I've been putting off.

Planning doesn't make for very good reading, does it? So instead I'll just share a few pictures I took this week - tiny moments of excitement or uniqueness.

I made kimchijjigae (kimchi stew) this week. I consulted Maangchi's recipe but also just kind of tried to make a kimchi-licious soup using the Korean flavors and ingredients I'm familiar with. Anchovy, seaweed and green onion soup stock to start, then added tons of chopped sour (old) kimchi, carrots, green onions, gochukaru, brown sugar and maybe something else I can't remember. Isaac loved it and had second helpings of everything which I've learned is the true sign of whether or not he really likes something. I think he mostly just liked that it was very spicy - when I sipped just a spoonful at a time while taste-testing it had my nose running!

Louisville's first frost happened just over a week ago now, but a second sprinkling of ice crystals confirmed it - winter is coming. I have been excited about snow - but this icy stuff makes me feel more nervous than giddy. Even if it is awful pretty.

Date night Friday night at one of our favorite spots - Shalimar. 5 minutes up the road, eternal groupons that make the final bill just over $20 for a fancy cloth napkin and table cloth kind of dining experience. I tried the vindaloo - Isaac's favorite - and now understand why it is so. It has humongous chunks of meat and potatoes in it, and isn't creamy and sweet like some other curries.

Back at home, weekend mornings still feel super special thanks to our nespresso coffee machine and some tiny shortbread biscuits shaped like scottie dogs. Another great thing about the nespresso is that its pods are made of aluminum which can be recycled and which are super delicate. Why is the latter a great thing? Both times that we have ordered the coffee capsules online, they arrived partially damaged, resulting in the company sending us a second order free of charge.

Cookie looks forward to her big adventures on the weekends - poking things with her nose, hiding under covers and doing laps around the living room at a light-speed run expressing her pure delight. A binkying bunny (that's the word used for a rabbit's joyful hopping dances) is one of the sweetest things on earth.

 Like I said before, it's been a week full of planning. Not much else. Tis the season I guess. Happy pre-Thanksgiving!

New Local Favorites

In all of our driving around and exploring these past months, there are a few places that have stayed on the mental back burner. Every time we would pass by and see the unfamiliar sign, we (usually I) would say "One day we've gotta check out that place."

We finally visited two such places recently, which in the end far exceeded our expectations.

The first is a cinema called Xscape Theatres. Based out of Indiana, this local chain of movie theaters excels by elevating and perfecting the movie-going experience. It feels like a frequent cinema-goer compiled a list over the years of things that irked him and things that could be better. Then he went and built this dream theater for others to enjoy.

All of the theaters at Xscape are equipped with serious stadium seating and leather electric recliners. It is unbelievably awesome. Even leaning back with our feet up, people could still pass by to get to their seats, and the heads in front of you don't even come close to obstructing your view of that big screen. We saw Dr. Strange and it really was the perfect movie-going experience. Unbelievably comfortable, perfectly crisp and power sound with booming bass but not painfully loud, a large and sharp image that makes you feel like you're really a bystander to whatever's happening in the movie.

Afterwards we climbed to the top of the theater to try and take it all in better. They really thought of all of the details. Like at the front edge of the floor on each aisle, just behind the chairs in the row ahead, there are small plastic barriers to prevent popcorn, candy and trash from falling down to the level below.

The drink stations are at a self-service bar, not behind a counter. Because if you pay five bucks for a drink, you really do deserve free refills.

We caught the matinee show, which means we paid $6.50 each for our favorite movie theater experience ever. If it had the sweet-but-not-too-sweet caramel popcorn like Korea, it really would be perfect.

Next up, our lunch destination. Driving all around Louisville and through Frankfort and Lexington, we've spotted numerous locations this fast food restaurant chain - Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers. Now we've seen many unfamiliar fast food signs since moving here that we have yet to try - Rally's, Moby Dick, Frisch's Big Boy. But this one has felt especially tantalizing to us because of its specialty, as stated so proudly on its signs: chicken fingers.

A brief (and maybe embarrassing) history of our fried chicken love: both the South and South Korea are legendary for their cooking and consumption of the stuff - with South Korea having more fried chicken restaurants than the entire world has McDonald's restaurants, and the South being the birthplace of every fried chicken restaurant chain worth mentioning - KFC, Bojangles', Church's, Chickfila, Zaxby's and now Raising Cane's. The past few years I've chosen Zaxby's as the destination for my family birthday dinner. The day little Emmett was born, the Moaks went through the Chick-fil-a drive-thru twice. I better stop now.

And so with "chicken fingers" in the title, it was inevitable that sooner or later we would have to try it. Now I'm just ashamed that we waited so long.

Raising Cane's has actually been around for a while. It was founded in 1996 by a LSU alum who didn't listen to the haters who told him that the fried chicken business was already too crowded. In the past 20 years, more and more stores have been popping up around the South and creeping ever outward. Louisiana, Mississippi, Kentucky, Ohio and Missouri all have handfuls of Cane's. There are even four restaurants in South Carolina!

The restaurant menu is extremely specialized - chicken fingers, fries, toast and coleslaw. And that really is it. They make these few things so well, and don't have to provide anything extra to keep people coming. No salads, no wraps, just fried golden goodness.

Two bites in, I told Isaac, "You know, I think this is better than Zaxby's." It's an obvious comparison for the seasoned fried chicken lover, being the other major chain who is known for chicken fingers, texas toast and crinkle fries. The more we ate, the more we both realized this truth to be indisputable.

Just like the Xscape movie theater, we found this restaurant to be the ultimate form of its category. Each location we have visited is sparkling clean with great service and perfectly delicious food. Their chicken tenders have a lightly crunchy batter and are melt-in-your-mouth juicy inside. The fries are golden goodness, the bread crispy puffiness, the tea fresh (never gritty) and sweet that you have to mix in unsweet with it.

And just in case we weren't sold already, the restaurant is named after it's founder's best friend - a yellow lab named Cane. Labrador pictures decorate each restaurant, along with whatever sports team is most popular among the locals.

They also have a rewards program that gives you a free meal for signing up and then lets you acquire points to earn more free food.

Maybe this is starting to sound like a commercial - but we just appreciate well-run establishments. Good product, good price, good service, efforts to gain customer loyalty - all things we seek out when choosing where to spend our money. Also we just get really excited about fried chicken.

We enjoyed Xscape and Raising Cane's so much, two weekends in a row now we visited this duo of entertainment and deliciousness.

I find it inspiring that even these days, when there are so many big businesses and tough competition, if you do something and do it very well, you can still succeed. Movie theaters and fried chicken are both industries dominated by a few big name chains in most areas. Yet these two businesses have managed to break through and establish themselves in one town after another. They already have our loyalty and we look forward to sharing them with whoever else makes it up this way.

Lessons from the Hunt

Sunday morning we turned on the heat. Too many of the trees had already shed their leaves for me to justify another day trip to some pretty place. And a rawness at the back of my throat scratched like a bug stuck between the blinds and window pane - the cold is coming and we're already fighting it.

Besides our trying-to-stay-cozy weekend, I want to try and share some things I’ve learned lately. Most likely it’s not new information to others, but the process of acquiring this information was to me (in retrospect only, and hopefully to you now) a bit humorous. I’m talking about job hunting.

Growing up, I had at least a normal amount of work experience. There were summer jobs, after school and weekend jobs in high school, part and then full time office jobs during college. I’m an honest and hard worker, and was able to find pleasure in each different job. I remember the pharmacy manager kindly insisting that I didn’t have to clean the floor mats with a Mr. Clean magic eraser, but then continuing to scrub because I could see the clear line between dirt and cleanliness that I had made.

The thing about all of these jobs is - that through one way or another, the person hiring knew me or trusted my family. Cleaning at Grandma and Grandaddy’s office, answering the phone and digitizing transcripts for Aunt Mary, filling my sister’s position at the pharmacy when she went off to college, helping hostess at the restaurant where my best friend waited tables. Then off to college - typing up oral speeches, stuffing envelopes, taking photos at special events, doing secretarial work were all gigs my mom mentioned to me when she heard of co-workers at the university who needed help.

To give myself a little credit, I proved myself worth keeping once I got the jobs, but it didn’t change the fact that the reason I ever got a chance was because the person hiring possessed respected my last name or had some personal insight about me.

I mention all of that to say that even though I am well into my upper twenties now, the past few months was the first time I’ve ever stepped out and found a job completely on my own. An unfamiliar city with little to no experience in my desired field of elementary education. No one to vouch for me (I'm so thankful for Isaac who saw me through it all - a source of distraction, tips and endless encouragement).

It was a humbling and stressful task to boil the essence of me down to one sheet of paper and (if I was lucky) 30 minutes of conversation. Reflecting on it all now, I learned a few things worth sharing - about job hunting and moving through life.

1. Be proud and ready to prove what you say.

As a shy, youngest child, I’ve made a habit of hiding parts of myself and letting others do the talking for me. This does not translate well into adulthood, particularly job hunting. My first job interview was at a private school with a particular philosophy and learning practices about which I had no special training. This did not preclude me from getting the job, I did that part myself. I acted as I normally do in new, unfamiliar situations - say as little as possible and let the other person do the most of the talking. The interviewer noticed that I listed piano playing on my resume, and suggested that I play something for her. Being my typical shy self, I put it off until the end of the interview and then sat down on the wooden bench, carefully adjusting and readjusting its distance from the piano. I played the A section of a Debussy piece, and then the famous lick from a Liszt piece. My hands were shaking and I couldn’t remember any more. I’d been without a keyboard for 10 months in Korea, all of my memorized pieces had slipped into shambles. My parents had brought up our family keyboard to me a couple of weeks ago, but I was still polishing old pieces, not memorizing. The funny thing is, I almost brought sheet music with me to the interview, then scolded myself for being silly - it was an interview for elementary education, not a piano recital after all.

At my first interview I was shy, not confident and not prepared to support what I had put on my resume. That job was definitely not fated for me, but it still hurt my pride. Playing the piano is dear to me, and it’s about time I overcome my stage fright. In the time since then, I’ve been diligently re-memorizing pieces - three down as of today and two more close behind.

2. Sometimes there is no ending and you just have to move on.

A different afternoon. Me across the table from a panel of three. A list of questions before each of us, I carefully read and respond to each. Most are the anecdotal “what would you do” sort of questions. Lots of smiling and nodding, with a concluding word from the principal. Expressed regrets that the hiring process runs through the district - meaning that it would take a while and that I would not hear directly from them. Reassurance that he calls all applicants directly as a courtesy to let them know one way or another. While waiting in the next few days, then weeks for a call that never came, I tried to figure out what I might have said wrong. I didn’t, but I moved on.

3. Covert rejection tactics are used by adults too.

It was like I was experiencing deja vu, or reliving the foggy part of a dream. The job hunt continued - different schools, different rooms, but the way each interview ended seemed the same. Responsibility-shifting phrases like “Well, I’ll talk to my supervisor,” “It goes through the district,” “You won’t hear back from me”. I should have recognized them well, having used them many times myself. “I’ll have to ask my mom,” “I’ll have to double-check with my family”. Sterling phrases to use instead of saying “no”, delaying the rejection in order to be socially polite.

And that’s why when an interview finally ended differently - with talks of pay cycles and jotting down a working phone number for me - I felt the difference, like some cool fizzy soda was pulsing through my veins instead of blood. And so I did what almost anyone would do in that situation - called my mom. Later that week I got the call, and the job.

4. When in doubt, do something prestigious.

At that young, impressionable age of picking colleges and majors, I had no clue what to do. The possibilities (and my interests) felt endless. In retrospect, since I was uncertain, I should have selected something more prestigious, something that would have challenged me. I chose my university, and then my major and minor, based on alignment with my interests - the unfortunately narrow view of a teenager I guess. I wish I would have possessed the foresight to keep my interests as just hobbies and declare a prestigious major with more promising career options. I confused comfort with calling, what was familiar with what I should learn.

But it’s through discomfort and challenges that we grow and become better. After finishing college and working full-time for a while, I decided to go back to graduate school. I chose a field that still feels both uncomfortable and challenging to me - elementary education. The past few years of attending graduate school and now starting a new job have helped me grow as a person tremendously, besides any professional growth. I don't regret the journey I'm on, but it's another lesson I've learned and hope to pass on.

If you've made it this far - thank you. You must love me or be bored. I'll be sure to return with something more light-hearted and fun next week.

Red River Gorge

When you've got a lot that you want to share, it's hard to know where to start. And then it's even more difficult to be concise.

We finally got to escape, our yearly autumnal excursion to the mountains. Our usual destination, Ashville, is uncomfortably far for a day trip and so we picked somewhere new. The day started with a drive, two hours east, past Frankfort, Lexington and into the Daniel Boone National Forest. As we travelled, the sky transformed. Just watch it in the pictures below as we traveled east from Louisville.

This summer has been one of the wettest I've ever experienced, but the past month has been extremely dry. Which usually means lackluster fall colors. But as we grew close to our destination, things finally started to look a bit more autumnal.

The plan: a day hike on some of the trails in the Red River Gorge. The Gorge is an impressive collection of sandstone cliffs and arches, sheltered canyons and waterfalls. It's a rock climber's paradise, and a lovely getaway for everyone else too. The road leading to various trails shown just above is made of gravel and the fine white dust of ground sandstone. Isaac's car was sugar-coated with it by the time we left. But when we arrived home, all of the fine silt had blown off except for bits stuck to fingerprints on the edges of doors.

About 100 feet past the trailhead, we began to understand a bit more about this place. Our hike began on top of the gorge, on sandstone cliffs similar to what we could see before us. It's not that we were so very high up in mountains, but the sharp contrast of cliffs and canyons gives that feeling. Our trail wound around the edge of a cliff, offering vista after vista on both sides perfect for snapping pictures.

Above, Isaac's reaction after I said "Dr. Nam goes on a hike. Wearing a jacket with a lapel and carrying a chick-fil-a cup." Below, this rock was too picturesque to resist awkwardly posing for a photo.

The two days prior to our visit, this trail was closed because of a wildfire started by an unattended campfire. You can see some scraggly burnt trees.

After trying to cut back on my picture taking, we finally reached Courthouse Rock, a sort of halfway point on our route.

One of my favorite parts of hikes is noticing the trees themselves and how they change along the trail. On top of these sandstone cliffs, with cold and biting winds, the trees can't grow very thick and wide. They seem so lean and resilient, miniature versions of their cousins below in the canyons, tiny forests high up top.

Isaac being patient as I tried to take pictures that did the wind-swept trees justice. Below, stretching pines that looked like topiaries and reminded me of Korea.

Courthouse Rock was truly stunning, especially the part shown in the pictures above. This is a terrible panorama, but I was trying to show its sense of openness. A narrow stretch of bare sandstone, with endless ripples of canyons, ridges and mountains all around. This is looking east, just on the edge of the Appalachians. The only other place I've ever experienced this feeling of openness - a narrow path with drops on either side and 360 view - is at the Grand Canyon.

We walked a little further and then it was time to descend into the canyon. The route we took goes down and then doubled back in the gorge, across a stream and then up again.

The only part of the path we saw that was noticeably man-made, a sturdy staircase. The rest of the trail is wonderfully natural feeling, even the intersection of three different trails shown below features just unobtrusive signs.

A new perspective of the sandstone cliffs.

As we descended, the forest transformed. Here trees wore a lively green with bursts of saffron sunlight.

We walked on and on, and finally I had to admit that the photos just weren't capturing the moment well enough, and I eased off of snapping pictures of everything.

We padded along, crossed the stream, ascended, and walked along the top of another sandstone cliff.

And as if the Gorge hadn't already filled us enough with senses of wonder, we found ourselves surrounded with a fragrance. Isaac noticed it first. A surprisingly familiar smell. It has a smell so unique and instantly recognizable, yet we couldn't believe it at first. Ginseng. But we continued to walk, and continued to smell that sweet, tangy, warm, one-of-a-kind scent. If it wasn't for Isaac, and my exposure to Korean foods through him, I wouldn't have recognized the scent and would've just passed it off as a neat woodsy smell. I guess that most hikers here do the same.

We plodded through forests filled with ginseng on Saturday. Never would have guessed that. We laughed and marveled about it for a good chunk of the way home. We will definitely be coming back here.