Happy Birthday and Goodbye!

March 7-14:  Katarina and Hugh’s Week of Goodbyes and Birthday Celebrations

It has now been just over a month since Katarina and Hugh (and baby Bubak) left and both Robyn and  I miss them dearly.  These two individuals made the first portion of our stay here in Jeju more comfortable and memorable than either of us could have ever imagined.  Their kindness and generosity has been unparalleled, and to show them our love and appreciation, we wanted to send them off with a bang.  Saturday March 7th was a Surprise Goodbye party hosted by Robyn and I,  to simultaneously celebrate Kat and Hugh’s advancing age (JUST KIDDING) and to highlight Katarina’s skills in cradle robbing- Hugh is 5 whole days younger.

Unfortunately the Surprise was slightly botched because they were both supposed to arrive at once, but due to a miscommunication of sorts,  we “SURPRISE”d Katarina all by her lonesome, and then some 5 minutes later, subsequently “SURPRISE”d Hugh when he and Jenie arrived together.  No matter, the rest of the evening unravelled famously with Robyn’s ever popular Jello Shooters and my Oatmeal cookies- all 100ish of them baked batch, by batch, by batch, by batch, by batch, by batch…. by me and Jason in my toaster oven…. over a span of 8 hours… now that’s love.  The highlight of the evening was likely the elaborately wrapped gift box containing many a travel necessity, newlywed sweatshirts (it’s common in Korea for couples to dress in matching clothing when they’re newlyweds, and since living in Korea was Kat and Hugh’s several-year-long honeymoon, it only seemed fitting) and the priceless and ever-desired Obekwan necklace and keychain (Actually you canput a price on them… a whole 50 cents.  Obekwan are 500Won coins we had made into the respective accessories).  

Two days later we continued the birthday celebrations on Katarina’s actual birthday- March 9th, at Bagdad with a lovely dinner and a stop in at “Photo Maru”, our favourite place to get airbrushed glamour shots taken while wearing Disney ears and clown wigs. And finally, after another 5 days (once Kat and Hugh and Bubak had already moved in with me before they made their great departure back to Canada), Hugh celebrated his Birthday in style wearing a Farmer’s hat all evening, drinking tea and playing board games in my lavish apartment (let us not mention the classy photo of me when Hugh let me borrow it).  It certainly was no frills, but it was another great night to remember.  

Only three evenings thereafter and Kat, Hugh and Bubak were on a plane back to Canada…. or wait, first to Seoul… and as a result of first flying on a domestic flight, they didn’t realize that THEY FORGOT BUBAK’S MICRO CHIP DOCUMENTS until they were already on the mainland!  For a minute it looked like I was going to have one last Hoorah in Seoul with them because Bubak would not be able to enter Canada without these papers (i.e. I was going to fly to Seoul to bring them to them), but as luck would have it (I kinda would have liked to see them again), we found a delivery service capable of delivering the docs just in time for their  final departure. 

And that is how Jeju ended an era. We all miss you here so dearly… it’s just not the same… already counting down the days ’til we reunite back home.

xxxooo  

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