Heather is a happy 9-weeks pregnant with our second baby, who is going by the fetal name of Ga-Ga.
This photo was our first glimpse. We'll be expecting our newest little one in late March/early April next year.
The name Ga-Ga was chosen by Baengy, who is developing into quite a big Baengy indeed. Heather and I were both stumped on a placeholder name for our newest family member, after all, how can you top Big Baengy?
After dispensing with suggestions including 'Small Baengy', 'Big Baengy 2' and 'Baengy of Reasonable Size', at dinner we turned it over to the original Baengy who was toddlering around the table. When we asked her what her sibling should be called, she simply stopped and said "Ga-Ga".
So, Ga-Ga, we very much look forward to meeting you in the new year.
The actorhabitof, puttingoffordelaying blog posts.
Ex. He dearly loved to blog, yet his blogcrastination led to very sparse posting indeed.
Of late, this blog and I have come to an agreed framework of sorts. A roadmap for peace. A six-point plan or a four noes and one without.
Whatever one may like to call it, it's a way for us to coexist in peace together. The problem with blogs is that once an author endeavours to cultivate an online following, it feels somewhat uneasy to neglect posting for long periods of time, leaving your possibly still-existent readership base with a void once filled with your mediocre ramblings on life in the conventional lane.
Thus a conflict ensues between the forces of time management and those derived from the imagined expectations of one's audience.
The agreed framework hinges upon the idea that as long as readers continue to jingle the sitemeter with daily visits, Lee's Korea Blog shall continue, but only as time permits. In other words, nothing changes.
But it's official.
One of the other reasons that blogging has become sparse these days is because all of my photos are of Baengy. So if that's what you want to see, hey, you know where to come.
As someone somewhere famously once said,
"I have nothing to offer, except blood, toil, tears, sweat and Baengy photos."
As you may recall from biology class, babies require sunlight, air, water and nutritional sustenance in order to survive. While administration of the former three can be fairly straightforward, the proper feeding of babies can require years of practice.
For the average human baby who is busy building a bitsy burgeoning body, teeth are non-critical luxuries with a high calcium cost. With the elongation and strengthening of bones also in full swing, such valuable mineral resources become thinly spread.
Baengy hasn't developed molars yet, so she can chop things with her incisors, but she can't chew. To help her out, we do a bit of parental preparatory pseudo-chewing, which consists of us manually mushing Baengy Rice in a bowl with a spoon.
Baengy Rice is very much like normal rice, but Mrs Farrand adds more water and some other goodies like miniscule bits of tofu and vegetables. The result is a commendable concoction of pasty pebbles.
Now there are many ways to get food into a baby's mouth, but there are only a couple of ways to do it that are sustainable for a parent's mental health. You see, nearly every baby is fascinated with everything for Two Golden Minutes. The key to accomplishing tasks that are longer than two minutes in duration is to distract them long enough. Even if you manage to cram food into a baby's mouth after the two minutes have expired, if they're bored, they just dribble it out onto their clothes. That's why Baengy is holding a spaghetti jar lid in the photo above. I have become reliably confident in lids, most of which extend the Two Golden Minutes by an order of magnitude.
And because each baby will only allow a specified number of spoonfuls to enter their frontal crevasse in any one sitting, one needs to optimise the volume of food going in on each run. This necessitates paying attention to the architecture of the rice on the spoon, or as I like to call it, the rice-chitecture. You'll notice in the photo above that the amount of food is clearly suboptimal. One needs to really pack it on there more like a champion.
Here's one I prepared earlier.
Note the look of apprehension on Baengy's face, in full knowledge that an enormous dose of ricey goodness is coming her way.
This is after the spoon has been retrieved for reloading. If you're wondering what happened in the middle, just imagine an abstract blur of mouth, teeth and spoon.
This was one of our daughter's first experiences with eating barely solid food. The food wasn't hot, so I guess her expression of disdain was more reflective of the repulsion of consuming anything but milk.
A slight improvement occurred over the next few days. As babies learn to eat, parents learn the intricate art of feeding.
These days Baengy has learned all sorts of new tricks. She can spot her favourite foods by sight alone, imbibes fluid from an adult glass and has developed a screeching affinity for nuts and berries.
Her favourite food would probably be spaghetti and/or peaches. Both of which she manages to obliterate by squeezing through her hands and smearing onto surfaces within her general vicinity, like some kind of culinary graffiti.
We like this chicken noodle place near our house in the Nakseongdae area. They sell a massive chicken kalguksoo for W6,000, which by general rules of geometry would typically not be consumable by a single person alone.
The owner of the place is this halmoni, who always comes and sits with Baengy for a while, and often times carries her off triumphantly to tour the kitchen. This particular photo was taken back when Baengy was in the Chubby Checker phase of infantile development.
Now she's well into the Lanky Legs phase.
Last winter was six months ago, which certainly was a long time ago, but that is when we went to Cheongpyeong. Cheongpyeong is one hour east of Seoul, in Gapyeong county.
Every signpost in the photo above is pointing to a different pension. It's reminiscent of the crossroad intersection scene in that non-existent book, Alice in Pensionland.
In Korea, a pension is not what retirees get by on, it's like a holiday house for rent.
We stayed for two nights in a pension complex called Over The Mountain. It was a nice place, but a more accurate name would have been 'At the End of a Dirt Road, Near a Mountain'.
Away from the busy roads and sloped roofing of regular Korea, we huddled in our cement cell blocks, warmed by combustion heating.
We ate a barbecue dinner pack, which was one of a few things orderable from the local store, the name of which was, fittingly, Store.
The mountain air was crisp and punctuated by short bursts of profound realisation.
In the mountains of Cheongpyeong, all is possible.
Here's a frozen waterfall in the frozen Botanic Gardens of Cheongpyeong.
And here's Mrs Farrand near a frozen waterfall in the frozen Botanic Gardens of Cheongpyeong.
Baengy now holds the distinction of quite possibly being the only Korean-Australian baby to have ever slept through an entire hike through Cheongpyeong's Frozen Botanical Garden.
All in all, we rather enjoyed our trip to Gapyeong county. We also enjoyed the transition back to normal civilisation, facilitated by a cup of boiled water seasoned with powdered instant coffee. It was delicious.
Here's Baengy and Heather checking out the newest kid on the block, Anthony's daughter Khalisi. She was born with a full head of hair, which is a source of envy in the world of babies.
Khalisi is around 8 months old now and growing up fine. We expect that she and Baengy will get along like a house on fire.
Right before this photo was taken, Khalisi informed me that she is a fervent reader of Lee's Korea Blog and has been dismayed at the recent lack of posting.
Hopefully there won't be too much blogcrastination before the next one.
Three hundred and sixty five days after catastrophic translocation into the world of bright lights and cold air, Baengy turned one. In the beginning, a faint awareness of environment and self coalesced as mixed feelings of warmth or discomfort were liberally applied by unseen hands of immeasurable strength. As the world continued to turn, it was observed that objects afar became less blurry, things nearby could be grasped with hands, and milk could be summoned through vocalisation of the hunger pains arising from the stomach area.
Babies become noticeably more human at twelve months of age. At this milestone, any new kind of food is first inspected before being eaten and the two large people walking around the house become known as omma and da-da.
Heather and I do what we can to raise (but not smother) and mother (but not spoil) our little bundle of joy and wonder. It's an infinitely fulfilling learning experience, as Baengy drags us, kicking and screaming through parenthood.
First birthdays are big events in Korea. As such, a meeting was held between the ladies of the Farrand house, in which it was decided that a trip to Busan would happily fulfill all familial expectations of the (Heather) Jung family.
After all, Busan is where the largest concentration of Jung's choose to reside.
It's also where the joy of soap bubbles can be shared with fellow infants graduating towards toddlerhood.
The house of Jung halmoni is the agreed location at which various family offspring interact under the collective watchful eye of seasoned caregivers.
Offspring are free to eat and do mostly as wished, save for a few hard rules.
Eating of fruit: allowed
Eating bits of rubbish: not allowed
Clapping of hands: allowed
Slapping each other's faces: not allowed
Baengy is the fourth of five granddaughters in her family chapter. The benefits of successful infant-politics are vast, and include access to used toys, as well as the transfer of intimate know-how concerning their operation.
The eldest granddaughter is Ji-Ye, who evidently derives much humour and satisfaction from blocking camera shots.
It wasn't long before we had Baengy hanbokked up and ready to go. In Korea, the first birthday often includes a dol ceremony, in which various articles said to symbolise future life developments are laid out on a table. For example, a pen can symbolise academia, money can symbolise wealth and a piece of string can symbolise a long life. The first-birthdayee is then placed in front of the table and reaches out for an item, that will supposedly foretell their future happenings. Baengy usually grabs whatever looks interesting, and she reached out and grabbed the money.
I guess that means we can retire early.
Although an early night was had, it seems the festivities lasting until 8:30pm were sufficient to induce deep daytime sleep the following day. Heather and I used the opportunity to relax and recharge.
The simple act of falling asleep at the right time of day can be a priceless gift. Like all parents who know that such occasions are not to be trifled with, we let the sleeping baby lie.
One and a half hours of paradise later, Baengy was up and learning about flowers.
Traveling on a high speed train with a high maintenance baby is both exhilarating and exhausting. Parents attempting to do so are advised to pack plenty of snacks and plenty of patience.
We also had a small gathering in Seoul at the Hoam Faculty House on campus. Drinks and mischief flowed freely.
On the right is Ji-An, on a reciprocal visit after we dropped by on her first birthday a few months ago. Her father, Joe, is a fellow Nanoomite who runs ZenKimchi. They're currently organising some exciting Food Tours in Korea.
If you're in Korea and looking for something different, I recommend checking them out via this link.
All in all, Baengy's first birthday was a resounding success. It was my 30th as well, which was nicely convenient. But once a baby is begotten, one's own birthday becomes decreasingly relevant. I guess that's a good thing.
One heartwarming general rule of thumb is that most kids will someday grow old enough to look after themselves. In the meantime, sleepless nights endured and food throwing events inflicted ensure that all parents pay the price for daring to persevere. But cutting through the relentless barrages of baby bombardment exists an arcane instinct continuing to power the minimal energy requirements needed for a civilised amount of patience.
Hence the continuation of the human race.
Every once in a while, Baengy learns a new trick. Some are taught, while others seem to materialise from thin air overnight. Not more than a few moons ago, we discovered her feeding herself.
We watched, astounded. While she just gave us a look that said "Yes?"
The intellectual development of human babies is driven by endless short-lived curiousity in all things forbidden. Then again, I guess it's easy to see why a champagne bottle might be more enticing than her regular barley water. Holding Baengy in this photo is Jinkang, who is also expecting.
The word expecting is rather nice. Although if indeed the Korean Farrands find it pertinent to produce further offspring, we will dispense with the word 'expecting' and instead focus on 'physically and mentally preparing'.
But babies do have their rewards. Mostly it's to do with wearing hats.
Baengy's favourite book is called Pizza Tiger.
Synopsis: An anthropomorphised child tiger extends warm invitations to his compatriots Eudyptes chrysocome (penguin), Ursus arctos (bear) and Giraffa camelopardalis (giraffe) to eat pizza. Much to their dismay, household ingredients are insufficient. Together with mother tiger, the four animals (who would normally not be in such friendly association in the wild) go shopping for ingredients. Due to differences in opinion as to what deliciousness entails, they choose strawberries, fish and the inexplicable Korean guk-soo (noodle soup) as ingredients. The story ends with mother tiger executing a culinary improbability by producing a pizza that all animals enjoy.
When I read it to Baengy, I enjoy pointing out the inaccuracies.
Earlier this year, we were offered accommodation in the Seoul National University family apartments. It's much cheaper and closer to the lab, but not quite as nice as our old place and not big enough for three adults. We had to part ways with Jang-Ho, Heather's brother, with whom we had been living. He now has a new place not far from us, and word on the street is that he has a new girlfriend.
The tabloids are going nuts.
For every itch that arises in Korea, there are numerous companies who
specialise in scratching. Most can be found online, and these days for
companies like removalists there's a peculiar reverse-auction
method available. As a customer, you can post online what your needs are
(expected moving date, address, amount of furniture etc), and
different companies will ring you and offer their lowest bid. A
few removalist company reps visited us in the days before the
big move. One of them was a 60 year old guy who told us that he had been
moving furniture in our area for over 30 years.
Then along came a
younger representative from a different company who told us that he
moves furniture faster and cheaper than the old guy we had just met.
In the end, the company we chose sent three men and a lady to our house. The price was W700,000, but we didn't have to pack up anything. All the clothes
were still in our wardrobes, blankets on the beds and utensils in the
kitchen cupboards. You can pay a cheaper price and do all the packing yourself, but we wanted to take it easy. Two of the men set to work piling our stuff into
large blue boxes, while the lady went to our kitchen and started
recording how everything was stored.
I think the third guy's job was to stand outside, smoke cigarettes and make sure nothing went wrong.
Because most Koreans live in apartments and because most apartments have small doors, nearly all furniture extraction on the peninsula occurs by means of skycrane.
The move went fairly smoothly, with the removalists even making our beds and hanging our pictures on the walls. They had drawn plans of where everything was stored in our old place and unpacked it all as accurately as they could.
Meanwhile, Baengy played some tunes on her baby piano to help us settle in.
Our friends from Adelaide, Damien and Susan, left for Australia around the same time we moved house. Whenever longtime expats head home, it's a great opportunity for a virtual garage sale. We picked up quite a few things, including their car, which runs on pure enthusiasm rather than gasoline.
We've named her Sunny the Sonata.
Prior to moving, we were a bit concerned about how our little offspring would fit into a change of abode. Babies will cry when they're bored and cry when they're overstimulated. Baengy just spent the night sitting quietly and staring at the new surroundings.
But early in the morning, she was up and happily chewing on her favourite gangnaengy rice puffs like nothing had happened. She's either a very flexible character, or somewhat forgetful. We like to think it's the former.
For those moving house in Korea, we recommend saving yourself the hassle of packing and unpacking. Pay a little more and all you have to do is stand around and watch. You can find the removalist auction services by searching on Naver for the term 이사경매.
