just beyond our fence is a huge tree. i say huge because our house is on a pretty high hill overlooking a cliff of sorts. anyway, this tree peeks beyond the cliff. on this tree are green prickly balls. they are the strangest looking things. i've been wondering about them since first seeing them. in fact a few weeks ago, i climbed over the binju ditch (not sure about the spelling) and tried to reach out and grab one. no luck. fast forward to yesterday. i ran to a portable classroom to escort one of my students who happens to be korean. she noticed one of these spiky balls on the ground, picked it up and began peeling away the casing. low and behold---a chestnut! what an odd discovery. she knew just what it was and began to describe her family's method of cooking them. the ironic part of this story is that she is severely language impaired, yet teaching me a little something. they soak them to soften the shell, then add the actual nut to other dishes.
Chris and I are creatures of habit. We like what we like. When we find something especially wonderful, we tend to go a bit overboard. Case in point--Chinese restaurant in Minot, ND. We frequented it often at least a couple of times per week. This was basically THE place we went out to eat. The host actually started to say things like, "nice to see you AGAIN." We were rather embarrassed and fearful that his line would eventually become, "your usual table?" Thankfully we moved. Since coming to Korea, we've tried every Brazilian Steakhouse (there are 4 or 5), I deemed Ceia my favorite. It has the most delicious white rice with which I put this onion mixture on top and it is oh. so. yummy. We became frequent visitors--typically one night per week. We joked between ourselves that we were going to be greeted as we were dreading in Minot. It never happened, thankfully, but who knows what the staff actually said as they primarily spoke Korean :) Another quirk Chris an...

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