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Grace from work was supposed to come early and help me, but bailed at the last minute. It really pisses me off when someone offers to do something unbidden, then doesn't do it, with no warning. This happens a lot in Korea. Luckily Heather's daughter Kate enjoys helping me cook, and she had a friend with her, so I had a couple assistants for a little while.
I didn't make it such a production this year, because I didn't really have the money. It's expensive paying for pretty much the whole thing by yourself, even back home. Heather bought some of the ingredients and the chicken again this year, so that helped. It also took some weight off my shoulders that she bought the chicken preroasted. She said mine was good, but Costco's was better. Heather isn't known for her tact.
Anyway, here's a picture of the meal. We had chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, sweet potato casserole, rolls, squash, deviled eggs (as appetizers), eggnog, and apple cider. Lee, one of the teachers from work, also brought wine, and Heather bought beer. I had also made cranberry sauce earlier in the week, but I goddamn forgot about it until the day after the meal. I was really mad, because it cost me like fifteen bucks to make. The flowers on the table were also from Lee--a gift to Heather for hosting. For dessert we had one of my leftover birthday cakes (the one I bought), chocolate cream pie with whipped cream, and this really awesome pumpkin pie I made with a recipe that called for vanilla ice cream in the filling. It came out so well that I was extremely pissed to find that when I went back to Heather's for some of the rest of the leftovers a night or two later (I had to walk home on Saturday, so I couldn't bring everything that night) and found that her father had eaten the rest of the first pie and all of the second. I've learned from this and other events that I should never leave things at Heather's if I want them back: they always end up, in whole or in part, lost or eaten.
About the same amount of people showed up as last year. All of the other foreign teachers came, except Moriah, who was back in the States for a few weeks, but the only Korean teacher who came was Lee, despite my having invited all of them, and a couple having seemed quite excited for the event. Oh, Korea. Other than that it was Heather's nuclear family, Kate's friend, and Heather's niece and nephew. I really love her nephew, Jiseok, although he was being quite saucy that night, trying to take my shirt off and other such inappropriateness. We all (sort of) joked he learned that kind of behavior from his father.
Lee and Leon, not really arm wrestling:
Heather said it took her the whole day on Sunday to clean up, I assume beyond the time she spent at work. Normally when I cook at someone's house, I clean up after myself, but I spent something like 15 hours and nearly 100,000 won to cook food for her family and employees, and was cleaning up as best I could as I went along, so I don't feel guilty about leaving a room full of dishes and messes. She insisted I leave it, anyway. I left quite a bit of leftovers for them, there, too, not to mention those exquisite pumpkin pies.
