HJ (my wife) has her hair grown enough to curl herself for the first time since her surgery a year before, for we are going to have a luncheon with our old college friends. We invited Young Hi and his wife to share our car to drive to a restaurant in the Korean town. The Korean town is not like Seoul with high-rise buildings but like Yungdeungpo with a taste of small city. Driving with an old friend couple gave me and HJ an unusual delight. HJ even warned me a couple of times not to get too excited for the safety on the road.
Choi, Chung, Kang, Koh, Kim, Park, Park of San Diego, Shim, and most of their wives also came. It was a big new-year meeting thanks to Bryan and Dongku for organizing. We are now all around mid-seventies (septuagenarians). Everybody congratulated HJ for her complete recovery from the cancer. And it was a great day for all of us celebrating our healthy longevity and a new year.
Bryan, a legitimate member of a Korean poets association, read three poems of his own. Poems were either interesting or a bit difficult to comprehend for a stone head like me. Expressions were odd but creative. At our age, anything is meaningful, I thought. One could be ill and lie down on bed struggling for life. Bryan took pain to create those poems with his old brain for us. We thanked him. I give him applaud. Then Dongku with humor and friendly seriousness brought a Chinese verse to pontificate with his interpretation. Participants had to read parts of the verse one after another. It was a time to check if we still remember those Chinese characters we were forced to learn back in those rebellious young days. It was a good try and fun.
We are in a sense out of touch of the real world being retirees over ten years. So, I thought anything is blessing that gives us a peace of mind. I put some of my effort to know God, though impossible. I decided to understand Christianity besides being a Christian that I am. Christianity in my opinion is higher level than Confucianism. Objection being granted, Confucius thought that ethics (moral law, which could be a god to him) and reason are the essence of the universe. Chinese culture grew out of Confucianism. On the other hand, Christianity has moral law, reason, and God. God is believed to have created the universe and man. Christianity is easier to access in English than in Chinese. So, I chose to read English literature. It gave me peace of mind. Knowing God is joy to me. (January 15, 2013, KYP)
