Engagement

Woot! It's official!

Snoqualmie Falls

How it started:
When I departed for Africa in August, AB gave me ten envelopes. I was allowed to open one for each week I was in Africa until we see each other again in October.  Each envelop contained a written letter, one or two physical letters, and one or two photographs.  I soon found out the letters were each about some aspect that he liked about me (blush).

 

 

When it came to be the last week, he told me to hold off opening the letter, and bring it with me to Seattle where we were going to celebrate a friend's wedding.


Seattle:
In Seattle, we had decided to go visit a famous Seattle waterfall during the day and then have a nice dinner at night.  But unfortunately, it looked like it was going to rain, so we decided to change it to Wednesday.  On Wednesday, we had planned to go early in the morning, but we both slept in late, and then I took a long time looking for the item I was going to mail KP for her Nov bday.  To top it off, there was traffic, so we didn't get to Snoqualmie Falls until almost midday.  It was very different from what I had remembered from childhood. It used to be simply a trail down to the waterfall, but now part of it was paved with plaques about the hydroelectric power plant that was underneath the waterfall. It was fascinating, so I read every single plaque - including ones about different conifer trees.  But Alan appeared distracted and didn't seem to have any interested. I even said, "you're not paying attention at all are you?" and he simply replied, "Nope!"

Lower Snoqualmie Falls

Unbeknownst to me, AB had arranged KP to be there that morning to help take pictures. She had just arrived by plane that morning for a business trip, and was hoping to get to work by noon, but I was taking my time moseying about and looking at every single plaque.  She was supposed to have gotten there to take the after pictures, but now she was in time for the actual proposal. AB didn't get a chance to scope out the place prior, so while I was enjoying myself, he was busy trying to figure out what's a good place to propose and not take up too much of KP's time. KP did find a nice place behind a rock to hide, when AB suggested that place for me to read my last letter, I dismissed it as being too crowded.  So then the chase began with AB and I walking around, and KP surreptitiously following behind us.  At one point, we had gotten to the end of boardwalk at a scenic viewpoint of the waterfall, and KP and AB were hoping that was the final spot, but once again, I found it too crowded so we started walking back.  KP quickly texted AB that she was right in front of us, but he didn't see the text, and she quickly turned and tried to walk in a different manner so that I wouldn't recognize her.  I was busy reading the plaques, so I didn't notice anything. I also noticed Alan texting quite a bit. He gave the excuse that he was trying to figure out when to meet up with his friend Sharon.

Snoqualmie Falls River Front

We finally walked down a path to the river-side, and settled behind a big rock, hoping it was more secluded.  I read the letter, and AB proceeded to give a small speech summarizing the letters.  He then paused and looked around, so I looked around as well, but he kept on putting his hand on my head to keep me from turning my head.  He explained he had asked someone to be a photographer, but didn't want me to see him...or her.  Then AB got on a knee and pulled out a box.  At that point I was still sitting down, so I was looking up at him, and decided I needed to stand up, but took some time to fumble with the letter to keep it from blowing away.  Finally I stood up, AB pulled out a glimmering ring, and that was it!

So shiny...

Video of engagement taken by bucket list girl (with full commentary, unfortunately it's sideways).

AB then pointed out the photographer, and to my surprise, it was KP! She was so sneaky, had even talked an hour with us on the phone the other day and didn't mention anything about coming to Seattle.  Thankfully the weather was bad on Monday so she was able to be there for the proposal.  KP said, "Congratulations!" and then a stranger popped out from the trees next to her and also said congrats.  At that point, KP yelled, "Complete stranger!"  Apparently it had always been on the complete stranger's bucket list to see a proposal, so she had followed KP around.  The bucket list girl had first surprised KP when she was hiding behind a rock and thought she was taking a bathroom break. KP quickly corrected her, and she continued to follow KP around.

Thanks for the beautiful flowers KP and MZ!

We took some more pictures next to the waterfall, now without my silly backpack, and said our good byes to KP who had now had her work out for the day.  We went to Din Tai Fung for lunch, which had some yummy xiao long bao, sao mai, and spicy beef noodle soup.

For dinner, AB took us to a fancy fusion restaurant in Woodinville called the Barking Frog where we had the most fascinating combination of foods:

Palate cleanser: some combo of nuts, carrots, veggie, sour cream

Appetizer (enough for meal for 2!): penn cove mussels- coconut-curry broth/coteghino (sausage)/bok choy/grilled naan

Scallops: squid ink fettucine (so it's black)/ikura (salmon roe)/chinese broccoli/bok choy/carrots/kaffir lime-ginger broth

Seared duck breast: duck confit/chard/sweet potato pie/cherry compote/cacao-brandy cream sauce

All in all, a great day! :D

Seattle: indoor sky diving, UW, cascades, square dancing, weddings.

Saturday

Girls Night Out with girls and AB: It was supposed to be girl's night out, but what was I supposed to do with AB who flew all the way from Houston and had his plane delayed 4 times? To top it off, we hadn't seen each other for an eternity (or exactly 2.5 months). But it all turned out okay I think. AB got to catch up on some email, chat with some other fellow Houstonian, while I got to cover up my abysmal of a toenail.

Sunday:

Chinese church with parents: When my parents invited us to their church, I don't think they took into account the fact that AB would probably be unable to comprehend any of the sermon, or at least 99% of it. And my understanding of these sermons is probably already 50%, so I suppose AB got about 25% of the message after final translation? He claims he understood it, but I could very well have been telling him about some other sermon I heard about and he wouldn't know (except that I'm writing about it now).  Anyhow, it all turned out okay, people did not bombard us with questions as Asian women are prone to, and it was overall nostalgic to be back at the church I grew up in.

iFly (indoor sky diving): After church we headed to our scheduled appointment to do some indoor skydiving! It was so much fun and crazy. Never imagined I'd actually be flying. Although the promotional videos were of people going up into the air, doing flips, and all kinds of crazies, this first session was supposed to be mostly about keeping balance. We got to sit and watch the previous group go while we waited for our instructional video, and during that time, I calculated the exact angel my legs and arms needed to be at to give me optimal lift. Okay, maybe not calculated, but I was coming up with all kinds of flying theories. I'm pretty sure during that time AB was just worried about whether the safety net was secure, if we could possibly fly too high, what the damages could be..  

It wasn't anything too scary - did not require jumping from a high ledge or anything. You simply walk out onto a safety net, lean your body forward, and the wind will carry you up as long as you maintain a semi-superman pose. At the end we had a choice if to fly up and down (with the aid of the trainer), and it gave a similar sensation as going up and down a rollercoaster.  I thought overall I did fairly well, except I forgot to close my mouth a few times and spit must have floated up somewhere.  AB, on the other hand, was a riot to watch! I feel kind of bad for making him do this, but at the same time, I think it's a once in a life-time experience that's worth experiencing. Anyhow, right off the bat, he was stiff as a board. There were parts where the instructor tried to bend his elbow 90 degrees, but he was so focused on bracing himself, his arm kept on springing outwards to a straight V. My brother and I got a kick out of it, but I have a feeling AB didn't find it so funny.  Afterwards, he didn't recall that part at all, but was so shocked by how much wind was blowing into his face.  Apparently during that time, he related to the song, "I can't feel my face when I'm with you, but I love it!" except he didn't love it.  He couldn't understand why the instructor kept on telling him to relax.  Haha!  Thankfully the second time around was an improvement for all of us!

  

Meeting up with the Nerd Herd: Met up with JS, AL, and AC. I can't believe people are getting their own homes, getting married, starting their own families - people are really growing up faster than I can take it all in. Nostalgia aside, it was nice to see everyone, although briefly.  It's nice to hear AL and JS are even moving in together. It's like the Nerd Herd had a time of dispersion, and now we're migrating together again. How nice!

Monday

Somehow I have a very poor memory of what happened today. I recall going to UW, showing AB around UW and then grabbing some world famous Molly Moon ice cream, but I don't recall...oh that's right! Canoe ride! How could I forget! We went to UW and did a canoe trip after we went to bellevue - now if only I can recall why we went to Bellevue. Hm....  Oh that's right! We had lunch with NT at Microsoft! It was nice to feel her hair again - I mean - see her again. :D  Maybe we'll have a big international organization leader in our midst one day. 

Anyhow, we had a nice canoe ride out on Lake Washington. It was quite empty except for the UW crew team. We felt pretty inadequate next to them, and at one point we almost interrupted their practice. Oops. We had a nice work out on a cloudy day (thankfully no rain), and we canoed along the bank and observed the ginormous lake-side mansions. We also spotted some cranes, ducks, geese, and ran a bunk a duck island, or so I called. 

UW was grand as usual. I took AB to see the Suzzallo library, and to my pleasure, he found it just as amazing as I did.  It was as I had described to him - like the Harry Potter dining hall.  Ironically it's called the Allen Library.  It also happened to have a harry potter exhibit right outside the Harry Potter room. Afterwards, I wanted to get AB a UW t-shirt, but I totally forgot where the HUB was, so I asked around. But I asked 3 people, and nobody knew! The first girl was apparently a foreign student who could barely speak English, the 2nd girl looked older and pointed us in the wrong direction as we later found out, and I'm guessing maybe new or a grad student (?), and the third girl said she had only been there 2 weeks, but managed to point us in the general direction.  Ultimately I looked it up on AB's phone.  Sighs.

Molly Moon ice cream was heavenly texture, but neither of us thought much of the flavors that we got. It's been so long since we got ice cream, we totally forgot to get tastings before buying it. We got balsamic strawberry and lavender honey.  Lavender honey was my choice, because it sounded so exotic and fragrant, but I totally forgot I don't like the smell of lavender much; thus, it wouldn't be so unusual for me to say I didn't care much for the ice cream flavor either. Meanwhile, the balsamic just clashed with the soft gentle strawberry flavor, although the strawberry itself was tasty.  How unfortunate! Next time we will be more careful in our flavor choices.

Tuesday

Tuesday was the day we were supposed to go on a two-day North Cascade hiking trip, but instead, we only had Tuesday to drive up there because the silly Walmart store couldn't get my parent's mattress order right, and so it got delayed to Wednesday (so have to be home that day). Sadly, the mattress still wasn't delivered on Wednesday and my parents had to go pick it up from the store (which they tried to do earlier, but they had mistakenly sent it back to the factory) - sighs, long story of incompetence. 

Anyhow, that meant our leisurely hiking trip turned into an all day marathon drive through the North Cascades, then Leavenworth, and then back home. It was still beautiful, don't get me wrong, but it would have been so much nicer not to have been cooped up in the car all day. We did get out in the scenic points and took some pictures, so it wasn't a complete leg-atrophying day. Also got some yummy ice cream in leavenworth (whiskey creme and tiramisu).  mmmmm!

Wednesday

This day will have to be saved for another separate post.

Thursday

Nice day of having lunch with KP near Puyallup (or as AB calls it "Pully-up"), then tennis with the family, and a nice dinner at Sora Sushi. Delicious sushi with great happy hour menu (5-6p).

At night, we took my brother to his square dancing practice. Last year, his team won the yearly school competition, and so this year, they decided to start practicing extra early to regain their crown. It was such a funny crowd to see. There were senior citizens, middle age adults, young adults, and then this one group of hyper teenagers. They hadn't danced since last year, so they had forgotten a lot of the moves. Watching the other group was like watching a well-oiled machine, but watching the kids was like watching bumblebees rushing from one move to the other. It was hilarious to watch though and they were laughing and enjoying themselves as well. I had no idea what square dancing consisted of, and now I have a much better appreciation of it. 

It consists of 4 couples facing the middle, making a square. There's a caller on the stage who calls out a move every few seconds, and the groups have to perform the moves. If they fail, they are out (or so it is in an actual competition).  And the moves are complicated!  There are the well-known ones like dosi-doe, but there are also weird ones like make the wave, or turning the gear ...I'm pretty sure I'm butchering the names.  Some are simple moves, and others look sooooo complicated. Kudos to the elderly with still such sharp brains to remember all the moves. 

Friday

This was a pre-wedding day of wedding activities. In the morning we went to help AW (the bride) make center pieces and sandwiches. Then had a brief lunch and then went to get my first every manicure done along with the other bridesmaids at Stop 4 Nails. Unfortunately only one of the guys there seemed to really know how to do it (the thin guy), whereas the others' nails quickly came off or bubbled. After I came back, my mom was like, "I could've done that for you!" - since she did nails in the past. 

Then we had a rather early but delicious dinner at Top Gun Seafood, after which we went to rehearsal.  Sadly AB had to leave to be a groomsman in another wedding in another city (we got invited to 4 different weddings in 4 different cities on the same day), so I had to send him off at midnight :(.  He missed his rehearsal, but luckily he attended AW's rehearsal, so it was kind of like he attended rehearsal. 

Saturday

AW's wedding! It was beautiful! It was lovely! It was perfect!

Sunday

After church, got to see KP one last time and along with my bro, played one last game of space team.  Peel the potato!!!

Semongkong

If you ask anyone in Lesotho, "Where should I visit on my day off?" they would say, "Semongkong."  Semongkong definitely lives up to its reputation, although in reality, you're actually seeing the waterfall called Maletsunyane Falls - but who can pronounce that? You see this calm river going through rolling hills, and then "BAM!" the earth majestically parts and a beautiful waterfall appears.

Semongkong has a couple of things you can do, which I got really confused about prior to going there, so to clarify:

The Donkey and the Duck Restaurant at the Semongkong Lodge

*Semongkong Lodge is generally where people stay if they plan on doing an overnight trip. However, it's actually quite a distance to the actual waterfall, depending on what you want to do:

1) Drive to the view point: 

The view point is beautiful, but you can't actually get down to the waterfall or stand on top of it. On the way to Semongkong lodge, there's an obvious bridge right before you get to the town of Semongkong, but instead of crossing it, you make a right onto a dirt road and drive about 20 minutes to the view point. It's not that obvious that it's the view point, but there is a dirt path to the left where 4wd cars can take.

View from the viewpoint

2) Hike down to the bottom of Maletsunyane Falls (4hrs including a lunch and snack break):

This is a hike that we took a guide with us because we made a day trip and didn't want to get stuck somewhere. R110, so pretty decent. But in reality, it was pretty straight forward. You go in the direction the road leads you out of the Semongkong Lodge, into a village, past the village (this part is flat), and continue following the road that cows/donkeys/horses take, and then you'll see a huge valley on your left. I suppose if you've never seen it before, it'd be hard to tell that's the place you go down. And when I say down, I mean really, really down. Some places were so steep, the guide had to hold AV's hand and support her down to prevent her from slipping (granted, she had running shoes on).  Still, it was quite steep. 

Guide and I at the point where you make a left into the canyon

Heading down! Quite steep!

It's quite an amazing view initially, but then you'll make a turn, and "BAM!" the Maletsunyane Falls appears. So you actually just see a beautiful canyon for the first part of the hike down. When we actually got down there, we just sat there and ate our PB&J sandwiches and listened to the fall roar. Kind of felt bad our guide didn't have food, so I gave him an orange. o_O  

First time AV and I got to see Maletsunyane Falls!

Maletsunyane Falls

I felt like the way up was way easier, despite the heavy grade, it was still much easier going up than essentially sliding down.  

Apparently the alternative is you can take a pony or a car to the point where you actually start hiking down, which probably would've cut down on the time.

3) Hike to the top of the falls/abseiling (aka repelling):

This is essentially the same initial route as hiking to the bottom of the falls, but you make a left turn earlier prior to the sheep barn. Oh yeah, it's weird when you hike to the bottom of the Maletsunaye Fall, feel victorious because it was so difficult, and then see little sheep on the other side of the river just chomping along on the grass and walking without giving a hoot about how steep it is. Anyhow, the sheep barn houses those master hiker sheep at night. 

This is generally the route to go abseiling. I don't know why people don't just say repelling. But this is supposed to be the Guinness World Record highest abseiling place in the world at ~230m!

This is actually at the bottom of the falls, but the abseiling is from the upper left.

4) Overnight pony trekking:

This entails taking horses and riding them to some distant town and staying in one of the traditional houses. I don't know the details because haven't done it yet - but hopefully someday!

5) Somehow getting to this other fall:

Yeah, really don't know details on this one. Don't even know the name of the falls...

*Pictures courtesy of AV

Mokhotlong

View point on drive to Mokhotlong

This week, I'll be in the outreach clinic in Mokhotlong (pronounced Mohhhotlong, where the hhh sounds like someone about to spit), an eastern district of Lesotho.

The trip here today was pretty crazy...crazy as in a good demonstration of what schedule means in Africa. So the week before, a driver found me and told me he was gonna be my driver to Mokhotlong, so we set up a time for him to pick me up at 8am. Long and behold it was 8:30 AM and still nobody so I called him, and he tells me he's no longer the driver, and it's someone else. So I called driver 2 who tells me he'll come pick me up at 10 ish.  I should have known that meant 10 30, which was when finally showed up. But there were 2 other ppl in the car! Apparently we had to go back to the coe to drop someone off. ..then on our way at 1045 right? Wrong! We were going to pick up pizza.  And while waiting for pizza, they wanted to do some shopping. Finally we were on our way....but wait, had to pick up a pharmacist. So in the end, leaving at 8am actually meant leaving at 1130 or 12. Oh...and on the way we stopped at 2 clinics and transferred yeast to some other car. Yeah. No idea why yeast.

Otherwise, the drive here was beautiful! Rolling hills of multiple different colors of green, brown, yellow, orange, gray.  Some of the hills were brutal with hairpin turns requiring us to slow to 20 kph.

We also stopped by the Leribe and Botha Bothe clinics. All the clinics have a similar layout and beautiful building. 

Botha Bothe Baylor Outreach Clinic, which looks exactly like Mokhotlong's (without the beautiful flowers).

I was a little worried about going out to the country, not sure what the hotel will be like, but it's actually quite nice.   Has everything, just no wifi (Yay for data and reception). Even get the added benefit of TV which I usually don't have. So here goes a week of watching random TV shows and news and game shows where half of the time they speak in English and half of the time it's sesotho  (I think). Also it appears the channels alternate English and sesotho shows.

My hotel room: Senque

Inside hotel room - it was nice, even had an extra bed where I can throw my clothing onto, and a TV of which I can't understand half of what they are saying.

Restaurant at the hotel - it's quite nice!

View from my hotel of the endless mountains. Also note traditional Lesotho house on left.

Given no day light savings and early sunrise and early sunset, I'm hoping I can get in a habit of rising early to get some exercise. But somehow I don't think it's gonna work out....not a morning person.

When I asked people how they liked Mokhotlong, people kept on saying it is peaceful.  I'm pretty sure now that it's an euphemism for boring, which is what the pharmacist I came with outright said. I suppose this will be a good opportunity to reflect on God's creation and how amazing it all is.  

View on my way to the hidden lake (see below)

Random lake I ran into on my run/hike/exploration of Mokhotlong.

Kome Caves

We went to Kome caves this past weekend:

The drive was fairly NOT straight forward, but fortunately we didn't make any wrong turns, just that Google sent us down a rough terrain and we had to find a new route. We ended up getting some instructions from local village kids who directed us.

Also had to take some dirt road on the way there, and tested my driving skills (first time driving on left side of the road).

Kome Caves

Material these caves are made from - clay

The caves themselves looked surprisingly artificial.  It looked plastic!  But actually they used wood as a scaffold and put clay over it to make it look like little cave huts. 

Inside the largest cave

The tour guide provided some interesting history. The most interesting was how the caves were a refuge to hide against cannibals. Apparently toward the east were some cannibals and there is a place called the gap of traditional dress, which was so named because that's where the cannibals hang all the traditional dress of the girls they ate. And the bottle caps twinkle in the breeze.  Another landmark is the mountain of trapping. That was named for the place where cannibals set traps for their prey. When we asked why they eat humans and not animals, the tour guide said it's because humans are slower. O_o

Kome caves are named for the first person who discovered them. Mr. Kome was flying away from a war when he discovered the caves in 1824.  The cave houses built there are still the same houses built then. And now the ppl living there are descendants of the lion, leopard, and cat clans while the kids are in the 6th generation.

National plant of Lesotho - Spiral Aloe

There is also a hill named the hill of drowsiness.  That's because Mr. Kome is a traditional medicine man and he put traditional medicine there so that when enemies reached that cave, they would fall asleep and when they woke up, they forgot where they were going and only where they were from.  So they just return to where they came from.

Afterwards, we went to Teyateyaneng (TY for short), where we saw traditional weaving take place. Apparently each of these large blankets take 4 weeks to make!  The ladies take one threat at a time and place it one on top of each other. These are really expensive, so I only got osme coasters for souvenir. 

Hiking with the Hash House Harriers to Lion head Mountain

Start of our hike:

Can you see the lion head profile?

Yay! Top of the lion head!

Looking out into Maseru (Lesotho capital)

Little kids amused by the photos LK took.

Back to the school where I was ceremoniously initiated into the Hash House Harriers!  Involved some drinking....of water.

Baylor COE

Baylor Clinic of Excellence:

This is where I'll be working for the next year!  Isn't it a beauty?

Visitor Doctor's Office (you can find me here!)

Classroom

This is the Queen Mamohato Hospital next door - it's so beautiful and new! It even has a helicopter pad, but unfortunately no helicopter yet because it's built with the intention of expanding in the next 10 years.

View from the clinic

Look how beautiful this clinic is!

Speaker from Beautiful Dream Society told real stories of human trafficking victims.  If it's too good to be true, it's not true.