The lunar calendar says 15th August and it means eating mooncakes and pomelo, drinking tea and looking at the full moon for Singaporeans. At the parks, kids will be playing with traditional lanterns or those omg-so-noisy electronic lanterns and sparklers. Naughty kids will be burning lanterns, candles, candle boxes and whatever they can find to start their own bonfire. Even naughtier kids will be trying to invent their own fire rockets. Naive kids will be throwing sparklers up trees and make a wish if their sparklers stay up there before burning out.
In Korea, it means everyone will be flocking back home, and school will be like a graveyard with the out-of-place foreigner who is left to fend for himself with supplies from the convenience store. Geraldine wants a little bite of the festive atmosphere too, so she started asking around if there is a house that she could visit. Her second plan would be to climb mountains with some Korean friends. Third plan would be to visit a museum with Chuseok activities. Fourth plan would be to rot in the dorm. Thankfully, Geraldine's friend, Shinho오빠 has a friend who is willing to welcome the both of them to his grandparents' house.
So today, Geraldine woke up at 3am to wash the bedsheets and left the dorm at 5am to catch a cab to the subway station. She managed to book a cab with her nursery school standard of spoken Korean! She had to leave so early because she needed to meet Shinho오빠 7am at Cheonan 천안, to take a bus to Jincheon 진천. All these to avoid the traffic jam around Seoul and reach the house early enough to join in the activities.
When the two reached the house, the family was doing ancestral rites, and they were kind enough to allow Geraldine to take some pictures. They then had breakfast and the food was wonderful. Homecooked! (Geraldine misses her mummy's cooking)
After breakfast, they went to seongmyo 성묘, which would be sao3 mu4 in chinese. Very interestingly, this family decided against the traditional tombstone and opted for a garden tomb. In recent years, it is in vogue and also definitely more environmentally friendly. In place of the intrusive blocks of stone, a tree is planted.
All of them then went back to the house for some gathering and relaxing time. Shinho오빠's friend's (Haeok오빠) cousins like skipping and Geraldine skipped a little with them. Everyone joined in, even the kid's daddy. It was fun. But Geraldine also realized that she has grown old and is not as energetic as before haha. The twenty-somethings also had a little chat after that and Geraldine honestly wished her standard of speaking ain't that of a 5 year old kid. Boohoohoo. She is able to understand most of what is being spoken (unless it's super fast with super difficult words) but it takes donkey years for her to construct what she wants to say and then it breaks the whole flow of the conversation. Aargh~
Then it was lunch time!
And photo-time with Geraldine's lousy phone-camera that kept saying "blink detected" and refused to take any pictures. Geraldine needs a new camera.. Anyone?
Just before they all left, Haeok오빠's grandmother shoved 10000W into each of the 3 kids' hands. According to Shinho오빠, this means that she really loved having them around and wished that they would visit again. How kind! Initially, Geraldine was really afraid of how the whole visit would turn out. Too many scary grannies and mothers in the dramas!
[Photos coming soon...]
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