To Teancum and Bethe

received 7/27/09

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bug,

How's recovery coming*? I'm trying to get exercise, too, but I might drown because every time it rains, our apartment corridor gets flooded. (The drain pipes are all broken.) It doesn't get into our apartment, but it makes jogging in the morning kind of wet and slippery. Oh, well.

We're teaching a family with two boys who are about your age, and they make me think of you. They both play baseball. Last week Sister Pak taught them to play Uno. Within three rounds they were beating us--I think they cheat.

Man, July is almost over! The summer goes by so fast. Of course I didn't get a summer vacation, but missionary work's gonna be no fun in the winter, so I'm trying to enjoy this while it lasts.

I just went to the U.N. Memorial Cemetery today--it was very beautiful and very sad. I'll try to send pictures if I can.

I love you.

RoseE"


*Teancum suffered a minor hip-bowl dislocation during fencing practice and has been undergoing physical therapy to correct it.



to Bethe, RoseE writes:

"Dear Bethe,

It sounds like you're having a pretty quiet summer over there. Must be nice. Here in Korea it is monsoon season. It is raining pretty often (and when it rains, it rains hard, let me tell you), and when it isn't raining it is gray all day. I think I have seen the sun once in the last two weeks. It is also pretty warm and humid, but it's not too bad yet.

Yesterday a member offered to buy me some soup called boshintang. Boshintang is expensive--because it is made of dog meat. Really. I politely declined. I can eat bugs, and raw fish, and cloves of garlic, but I don't think I can eat a dog. So instead I had Samgetang, which is chicken-and-rice soup with ginseng. It was hard to eat because all the bones were still in it, even weird bones like the neck and the spine, but I ate it all because it was better than eating dog.

I've learned a little bit of hanja!** [She writes the characters for 'door'--which looks like a swinging bar door from the old west--and for her name, remarking that " . . . nobody really uses this name; I just like it because it looks pretty." It does look pretty, like three fireworks going off simultaneously.]

I love you!

RoseE"


**Bethe is a student of Mandarin Chinese.