Helen & Joel’s engagement pictures in DC
Helen and Joel really couldn’t have picked a more stunning fall day than today for their engagement pictures. What a fun and beautiful afternoon we had walking around Meridian Hill Park, the National Mall and the Tidal Basin for pictures. Oh, how I love living in DC with all its wonderful places to photograph.
I Street Bike Social makes DC that much more fun
When I ride my bike around DC alone, no one claps for me. No one cheers. No one dances. Because that would be weird, right?
Well, things are a little different when you’re one of about two dozen riders in the I Street Bike Social. People on the sidewalk clap. And they cheer. And yes, they dance. Certainly, it helps that the ride leader has a stereo system hooked up to his bike. It’s surreal to be pedaling down K Street at night, all lit up by semi-empty lobbying offices, while “Stayin’ Alive” booms from in front of you and cyclists surround you.
It’s also so freakin’ cool. I think we must’ve looked like a small parade that lost its way.
Most people seemed to be new to tonight’s bike social. There were several riders like myself who came alone. There were also some random bicyclists we picked up along the way, which added an air of whimsy to the ride. See in the picture above the two guys riding away from the rest of us? They were heading somewhere else and decided to join the fun. Cheers all around, as I recall.
Jordan, our ride leader, started this bike social for his employer BicycleSPACE after seeing a similar bike ride in Boulder, Colo. Here in DC, we started out at the BicycleSPACE office at 4th and Eye St. NW at 8 p.m. – close to sunset – and then wound our way through H Street, Capitol Hill, the National Mall, Foggy Bottom and Georgetown. A light breeze blew and the temperature was just right as we coasted around. DC is beautiful at night. We had some mishaps with the contraption carrying the stereo but Jordan played some good tunes: Adele, Rhianna, Outkast. I tried boogeying on my bike but that’s actually kind of hard if you don’t want to crash. Which made me realize I had never listened to music while riding my bike.
As I mentioned before, other people seemed surprised and really pleased to see us. We weren’t doing anything special, but somehow, being part of the group made us all look special. By the time we took a break by the Potomac River, the sky was dark and I gratefully drank from my water bottle. After about 20 minutes, we headed up K Street. I broke off at 11th St. to go home. Two hours of leisurely biking was enough for me.
For all the fun I had, I think the name “bike social” is a bit of a misnomer. It’s not like all us bicyclists were talking and laughing and socializing all the time. I did chat with a cool woman who just moved here from Wisconsin three weeks ago. I also talked with a nice gal wearing a bike helmet that looked like a houndstooth ball cap. But for the most part, those conversations and the whole night gave me more of a sense of community. People seemed to simply enjoy being a part of this small band of bikers, taking over one or two street lanes at a time – even in Georgetown. Which is kind of crazy if you’ve ever been in Georgetown.
Can’t wait for next week!
An early morning run around Hoan Kiem Lake
The usual swarm of people riding motorbikes around Hanoi was replaced by a swarm of people exercising on the shores of Hoan Kiem Lake this morning. This is a daily Hanoi occurence, according to Lonely Planet, and it really is a sight to see. Indeed, this morning there were tourists milling about, taking pictures of the exercisers!
I left my hotel at 6:30 a.m, ran down the street leading to Hoan Kiem and saw hundreds of people walking, stretching and sometimes running in a counter-clockwise direction around the lake. It’s that counter-clockwise direction that surprised me the most at first. Until I ran out there, I hadn’t realized I expected to run clockwise. Those Communists, they have to do everything differently. Hehehe. Better to go with the flow than get run over.
Any exercise you can imagine people might do around a lake, people were doing it. Most people walked while chatting with friends or family. About a half dozen men ran (no female runners except me). Most people wore loose clothing but there were a few groups of young girls wearing tight tank tops and shorts. There were old people in pajamas pushing their wheelchairs. Several groups of about 25 women performed synchronized calisthenics to music, including the Muzak version of Que Sera. Barechested old men swung their arms to and fro while walking at a brisk pace. Lots of people stood around moving their hips in circles, like they were hula hooping without the hoop. There were about 10 women dancing while balancing plastic balls on small tennis rackets. Several couples waltzed to classical music blaring from a portable speaker. I saw one older man stretched out on a yoga mat and one woman walking backwards. There was even one enterprising lady sitting with a small scale, so you could check your progress after your morning constitution.
By 7 a.m. the fun was pretty much over. The exercising ranks had thinned to almost nothing and the motorcycle traffic had picked up considerably. I wish I were around for another morning of running and people watching around Hoan Kiem!
Day trip to Cham Island
Things I thought about while swimming, snorkeling and lounging around Cham Island:
1) I’ve never seen such brilliantly blue starfish. It looks like some kid spread blue Play Doh in the shapes of stars all over these rocks.
2) The water is so clear!
3) I didn’t know there were so many pastel-colored coral.
4) Did someone drop a big blue soccer ball into the South China Sea? What? It’s a sea anemone? No way!
5) Why don’t I know more about the underwater ecosystem?
6) Oh my goodness, schools of silver fish seem to be swimming circles around me. So cool.
7) This was totally worth the $40 I paid to Cham Island Diving.
Royal Korean procession through Incheon Airport
One of the many reasons I love Korea – cultural experiences in the airport!
Cherry Blossom Parade
Above: The most beautiful but least interesting floats in the parade.
Below: Crowds, crowds and more crowds! Lots of kids were equally scared and excited by the revelry. I love DC.
Thinking Day | A cross-cultural food experience
One of my best memories of being a Girl Scout in Jeddah was celebrating Thinking Day. This was when Girl Scouts and Girl Guides from other countries living in the city got together for one big hoe-down. Okay, not exactly a hoe-down, but one big cultural exchange.
The day began with a procession of scouts from each country carrying that country’s flag. I always wanted to carry the United States flag. I thought it would be fun to march around in my green uniform and hold the flag straight up. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t drop it. I never got to find out. Instead, I sat on my school gym floor with hundreds of other scouts as groups of girls glided by with flags, including those of India, the United Kingdom, France, Pakistan, the United States and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Girl Scouts fascinated me the most as they appeared to have run to the fabric store and wrapped themselves in bolts of gray cloth from head to toe. Well, except their faces, thank goodness.
What does any of this have to do with these photographs here, apparently taken in the present time, at my present home, without anyone wearing a Girl Scout uniform? (Though that would be kind of cool.) Well, Thinking Day also involved food. And the other night, as Dulce (from Mexico), Ting-Ya (from Taiwan) and I (half from South Korea), cooked foods from our countries, I remembered Thinking Day. How lucky am I that more than 20 years later, I keep having interesting cross-cultural experiences with my friends?
Ting-Ya showed us the massive amounts of preparation that go into creating a Taiwanese dish. I showed them how to make kimbap. Pictured above is the very first one I’ve ever made without my Mom’s assistance. And Dulce made an American salad with ingredients all the colors of Mexico’s flag. Now I’m thinking of throwing a Thinking Day-type dinner party, where everyone brings a dish from a different country. Yum!
A procession of the Virgin Mary through Cusco, Peru
There she is: a purple-enthroned picture of the Virgin Mary, parading through the streets of Cusco. A Peruvian friend said these Virgin Mary processions take place all the time. Marissa said she sees parades almost every week. I imagine how much a parade a week would enliven my life and hope I wouldn’t take it for granted.
Cusco, Peru
The Plaza de Armas in Cusco, Peru, attracts both tourists and birds to its colonial architecture, such as La Compañia de Jesus (Jesuit Church) and the fountain in the middle of the square. I love this picture because there’s so much going on: church spires glowing in the setting sun, bird flying, tourist in tough vest looking at the sites, fountain spouting water, person walking past the fountain… More to come!
Raining & singing in the Pantheon
When my mom and I visited Rome, I couldn’t wait to visit the Pantheon. You see, not only is the building 2,000 years old, it also has a hole in its dome. When it’s sunny, light streams through this oculus; when it rains, water falls through. I could see storm clouds building in the distance. Maybe, just maybe, I’d be lucky enough to see it rain in the Pantheon? My mom said she was ready to go. I stalled. “Oh, look at those pretty engravings over there! Aren’t these crosses over here shiny?” Yeah. What I really wanted was rain, rain, rain. And finally, it came. And it was magical. The rain fell in slow, sparkling sheets. Most everyone stopped what they were doing and stared up at the dome. Flashes popped and cameras clicked. A couple umbrellas snapped open. A red-and-white chain kept visitors out of the direct path of the rainfall but many people still got wet. Oooh. Ahhh.
While at the Pantheon we were also lucky enough to hear a choir performing inside. A Catholic church group from Manhattan, Kansas (my birth city!) were walking from famous public building to famous public building in Rome and singing their hearts out for free. So lovely.
Kayaking on the Potomac River
It was the first un-humid, un-sweltering day in weeks when P. and I decided to knock an adventure off our “Top 10 Things To Do This Summer” list: kayaking on the Potomac River. Oh, the gorgeous views we saw! Georgetown, the Lincoln Memorial and Roosevelt Island, a rainbow, ducks – I saw them all in a way I’d never seen them before. Still, I was disappointed to find trash floating all over the river. At first, it was just a bottle here and there. I actually picked up an empty Pepsi bottle, vowing to myself I would pick up any more trash we found. But then it became clear this task would be overwhelming. Ugh.
Happy birthday to Mom, August and Eun!
I threw my mom’s surprise birthday party at the beginning of May. Organizing this from afar was quite a task.
First, I had to lie to my Mom and tell her I couldn’t escape from DC for the weekend to celebrate a banner year birthday with her. In truth, I woke up early on a Saturday morning, drove down to Newport News and spent the morning of her party day picking up food from KFC, Domino’s and Mona Restaurant, a Korean restaurant that agreed to cater the bash even though they normally don’t serve such small parties. My sister and brother-in-law brought the cake and drinks.
Then, my Dad and I worked together to invite people to the party. Dad focused on church friends and I focused on Korean friends, many of whom don’t speak English. Ah, finally putting my hard-earned language skills to use for the first time in a while! I ended up leaving funny voicemails for almost everyone because no one picked up their phones. Luckily, enough people got the message and showed up.
Finally, I had to decide where to have the party. I haven’t lived in my hometown in a while and I’ve definitely never thrown a party there. I settled on the Virginia Living Museum, my niece’s favorite place to see her fishy friends Nemo and Dori (as well as furry and flying friend such as owls). Jennifer Turlington, the museum’s events coordinator, was wonderful in helping secure a party space and even coming up with the ruse for bringing my mom to the museum: why not have my Dad tell my Mom he was taking her to a flower show there? Not to knock my Dad too hard here, but I was suspicious my Mom would fall for this lie since flower shows aren’t exactly my Dad’s thing. Nevertheless, it worked. Jennifer posted a volunteer at the museum entrance. My Dad went up to the volunteer and said, “We’re here for the flower show,” which were the magic words for the volunteer to lead my parents through a side entrance, then down a path, then into a building, then down a hall into a classroom filled with all of us. Surprise!
The look on my Mom’s face was fantastic! She later said she wondered why she was being led to a “flower show” in a classroom in a building. She also said this was the best birthday she ever had.
August’s 8th birthday party in the beginning of June was a maelstrom of laughing, screaming, sugared-up kids exacerbated by a thunderstorm that led to much indoor horseplay and rowdiness. At the end, when everyone was gone and Eun and Marty were sweeping up and wiping down after their son’s celebration, they said, “See? No one ever tells you about THIS part of being a parent!” Haha! Those two crack me up.
Eun started out as my Asian American Journalists Association journalism mentor over 12 years ago. Over time we’ve become good friends to the point that I feel I’m a part of the Van Der Kim family: Eun, Marty, August and Reid (my godson). So I was thrilled to be at her 40th birthday party in mid July. The best part of the night? When Eun’s sisters-in-law appeared at the front door – they flew in from Arizona to surprise her!
Assisi, Italy
(My mom patiently waited 20 minutes while I waited for the moment above to happen so I could photograph it. Oh, what is it like to have a child so intensely interested in something you don’t care about as much? Thanks, Mom!)
Assisi was by far my favorite stop on the Catholic Extravaganza Tour with my mom. The city is a landscape photographer’s dream: untouched by modern architecture, filled with winding medieval walkways and perched on a hilltop overlooking a vast, green valley. The city’s main draw is St. Francis Basilica, the 13th-century UNESCO World Heritage site that’s the final resting place for St. Francis, who founded the Franciscans. Walking around this old town I could imagine Francis and his followers (including St. Clare, or Santa Chiara, as she’s called in Italian) spreading the Gospel, much to the consternation of some family and friends.
Most everything in Assisi closed by 7 PM, so Mom and I had plenty of time to relax. For me, that meant attending vespers, taking pictures and wandering around. For mom, that meant attending vespers or evening services at one of the half-dozen churches. Mom and I wondered how such a small city – the population is about 3,000 – could support so many churches. Do they not have the priest shortage problem we have in the US? Or is the fact that Assisi is such a global tourist destination enough for the diocese there to keep all the Assisi churches well-manned?
One of the most pleasing and surprising parts of our Assisi visit was our stay at St. Anthony’s Guest House, which is run by Franciscans (of course). I booked a room only a couple days before we arrived, expecting something a step above a hostel. Indeed, the place was sparsely furnished but oh-so comfortable, friendly and pleasant. Every morning they woke up the guests for breakfast by pumping soft classical music over the speaker system. When I visit Assisi again I’ll definitely be sleeping at St. Anthony’s.
St. Francis Basilica
The start of my obsession with Santa Chiara plaza.
Santa Chiara Church, which I consider to be the most gorgeous of the many churches in Assisi.
Flags hanging from a building near Santa Chiara plaza
Assisi as seen from Rocca Maggiore, the hilltop fortress.
Playing with light in Santa Chiara plaza.
Even the grass near a parking lot was beautiful!
This was the start of my obsession with beautiful door knockers
Tourists sitting on a wall outside St. Francis Basilica
Mom standing in a perfect ring of light in Assisi.
Assisi is the home of St. Francis, founder of the Franciscans, known for wearing sandals
Red flowers like these hang everywhere in Assisi.
Sunset at Santa Chiara plaza
Outdoor climbing in Carderock, Maryland
After one year of intermittent indoor climbing, Angie and I climbed outdoors for the first time last month, in Carderock, Maryland (she’s wearing the grey shirt, I’m wearing the orange shirt). Oh, the vertical maze of tiny, rough and random footholds in real rocks vs climbing walls! I learned that I have to trust myself and my body. This is harder than you might imagine when you’re 15 feet up, clinging to the side of a rock, balancing on three toes on a small, jutting pebble and desperately scanning the seemingly-flat rock surface for another small, jutting pebble that spells salvation because it just might make a fabulous next step. “I don’t know where to go next. Can you help me?” was my oft-repeated request to folks on the ground. I slipped and slid many times. And I learned I’m not as brave as I thought I was, thus the yelling whenever I slipped and slid, and then the giving up a couple times before I made it to the top. Still, I enjoyed the challenge – and the fresh air – and look forward to climbing outdoors again.
Mom, the world traveler, in Paris
Doesn’t my Mom look so cute in this picture? This is as close* as she and I got to famous Paris monuments during what I’ve dubbed our “Catholic Extravaganza Tour,” a 2+ week adventure through pilgrimage sites in France, Italy and Germany. At this point in the journey – the beginning, that is – my Mom was still oh-so willing to let me photograph her. By the end, she was tired of her personal paparazzi. But hey! She now has some of the most awesome and candid vacation shots ever. I’ll be sharing more of them over the next couple weeks.
*We had planned to use our five-hour layover in Paris to venture into the city for lunch. But Air France didn’t cooperate with us. Our flight left DC late and we had just enough time in Paris to transfer from one airport to another, where we caught our next flight.
Go, Go, Gadget!
What could be more fun than an all-afternoon trivia romp and scavenger hunt around DC’s famous and obscure sights? That’s exactly what I said to myself when I saw the ad for DC Challenge a couple months ago. So with help from friends and friends of friends, we cobbled a team together – Team Go, Go, Gadget! – and off we ran through downtown DC (with about 2,000 other trivia fiends) this past Saturday. The only rules were we had to use only our feet or public transportation and we had to take a photograph of the WHOLE team at each trivia location.
We searched for answers to clues such as: People say that the word “lobbying: comes from favor-seekers hanging out in this hotel’s lobby. It shares a name with a longtime NBC Today Show personality. Take a picture inside (if they don’t get sick of Challengers running through) or just outside.
Know the answer to that one? We didn’t. Tony and Ben researched the answer on their phones while the rest of us guessed aloud. The Couric Hotel? The Lauer Lounge? Ann Curry Motel? Thank god for iPhones and Blackberries, which gave us the answer: the Willard Hotel. And so we all ran over to the Willard Hotel, where a bemused employee to take a picture of us in the lobby. And you know what we found out? The scavenger hunt organizers didn’t tell the hotel – or anyone else/place on our clue list – that oh, 2,000 sweaty people might be dropping by on Saturday afternoon to snap a photograph.
Eleven clues, a few miles and almost three hours after we started, we crossed the finish line. It was a fantastic way to spend an afternoon!
Reid’s 5th birthday party
There’s nothing like the sound of about a dozen five-year-olds eating birthday cake and ice cream. They’re all “MMMMMMM…..” and “CHOCOLATE! CHOCOLATE!” and “YUM!” as loud as can be. They lick their forks and their lips. They laugh and smile and make you remember when you were five and your biggest problem in life was Mom not letting you eat a second slice of cake. Happy 5th birthday, Reid!
Digging out from Snowmageddon
Digging out from Snowmageddon in Lorton, Virginia. There’s more snow coming!
Women Photojournalists of Washington
My dear friend Abby at the Women Photojournalists of Washington exhibit opening at Honfleur Gallery in early November (I know – this post is way overdue!)
Miss Allison, photographer extraordinaire and super running buddy!
After the gallery opening, Jenna, Amanda and I took off to photograph as part of FOTOweek DC’s late-night photo contest. A few dozen Native Americans from across the United States set up teepees on the Mall to bring attention to their request for a Native American veterans day.
Crawling through the grass for a shot.
Amanda in “The Blair Witch Photo Project,” as Jenna said.
Warming up with jazz at Columbia Station in Adams Morgan.
Jenna’s happy with her late-night Jumbo Slice (which later fueled dancing at Madam’s Organ.)
(Above: That's me photographing while snowshoeing through a snowstorm. Picture by 