1) You can speak Korean.
2) The other party can speak English.
As previously mentioned, I've developed quite the relationship with a few of my Taekwondo girls. They're all younger than me, but they keep me highly amused and have become the little sisters I've never had. I enjoy their company and being so far from home, they are the closest family I've got here.
That being said, it was our good friend's birthday and we were all excited to celebrate it. Let's say off the bat that with this group of 4 girls, only one can speak English. And unfortunatly, it happened to be HER birthday we were trying to plan as a surprise. Success? You tell me.
Let's call it a failure #1:
I receive a text message from one of the other girls, Sora. All in Korean, of course. So I ask my coteacher to translate it. She of course does a poor job and I'm thinking Darima (the birthday girl who speaks English) is leaving Yeongju. So I text her asking why and when she's leaving. She's confused, obviously. So when I see her later on, I ask her to translate the message that Sora sent me. It basically said, "Amy, Darima's birthday is coming up, what should we do for it?? Should we do something special on Saturday?" Crap!
Let's call it a failure #2:
Sora relentlessly tries to plan with me, both of us using as much Konglish (English + Korean mix) as possible. We finally somehow come to agree that on Darima's actual birthday (Thursday), her and the girls would come to my place at 5:00 and buy a cake and presents and surprise Darima. Trying to plan a surprise for the person who is usually your translator is rough. Every once in a while, Sora would say to me (loudly and often in the presence of Darima), "Amy, Thursday, ok??? Uhh Darima, Thursday, five dirrty, uh, me, you house go go, ok??" Come on, SHHHH she's right there!!!!!!!! Crap!
Let's call it a failure #3:
Everything is going well, all the girls have their gifts and letters set. I ask my Taekwondo master if we could be a little late since we're throwing a small party at the same time as practice. So he asks, "Ah, so it's TOP SECRET?" to which I reply, "yes, so please do NOT SAY ANYTHING." To which he promises. Thursday morning on my way to school, he tells me he told Darima about the surprise!!!!!!!!!! WHAT. THE. HELL. I half yell at him and he oddly denies it but Darima and his daughter both confirmed he did in fact say something. I ask her what she knows and she claims she just knows there's a party going on. CRAP AGAIN!
Let's call it a failure #4:
SO, I am waiting at my apartment for the girls to come over so we can go buy the cake. They call me and tell me to meet them at some bakery which I can not find. We finally find each other and Sora says "Amy, me you cake. Bobae, Seong Eun (the other girls), gift." So I'm thinking they are going to buy her the presents (but I still bought her something anyway). After we get a delicious sweet potato cake, we go buy the "gifts" which turned out to be a bunch of chips, cookies, and crackers. Geez!
Let's call it a failure #5:
I had a perfect ploy for getting Darima to come over. I told her I bought a new moped (which I had planned to) and for her to come over after school so we can ride it to practice together (which we sometimes do anyway). Pretty perfect, yea? But Sora keeps calling and texting Darima to hurry and come downtown so ALL 5 of us can go to practice together. Meet at Amy's! Mind you, this is Darima's actual day of birth. Stop texting I say! Crap!
Let's call it a failure #6:
We lay out all the food on the floor to eat for the party. I want to move it to hide it so that when Darima walks in, she doesn't see it and know something's up. But they don't. And then they play some "happy birthday" background music as she walks in. Pretty obvious, but that's okay.
So, even though the element of surprise was pretty much non-existent, overall, it turned out to be a good time and I know she was really happy. The girls asked me to smash the cake in Darima's face because she would otherwise beat up the rest of them if they did it. So I did.
I still gave my TKD master crap about ruining the surprise, though. He told me a secret and said it was top secret and not to tell anyone. So I said I would tell everyone because to him top secret doesn't mean anything!
My darling Korean family:
No comments:
Post a Comment