Saturday, September 16, 2000

Class had been exhausting, so sleeping late was glorious.  Way too much extraversion for me all at once these past two weeks.  Today was a day for wandering the streets hand in hand with my guy [henceforth known as Sir Galahad] & taking in the sights, sounds, smells, & of course, tastes of NYC.  We went straight to Washington Square Park to watch the ball games.  They are so much better to watch there than at an NBA game.  From there, it was on to some street festival where I bought purple chopsticks.  Tried to meet up with a friend who happened to be here on a photographic assignment but never got in touch.  Cruised through Chinatown & ended up at a Malaysian restaurant just when we were getting hungry.  How fortuitous.  Tried not to stuff ourselves since we were meeting another friend for dinner, and he had promised a feast.  I had Malaysian fritters, stuffed with something yummy & assorted other unknowns.  Met our Korean friend at 6PM & left with him to his home where we met his wife, in-laws, & two adorable children.  On the way, we stopped at a Korean grocery store.  (Galahad & I bought Korean toothpaste to bring home & try.)  We were fascinated by the whole experience & spent much more time than was expected with our eyes wide, taking it all in.  We were the only round-eyes there.  They even had moochi ice cream, which I had seen only at one other sushi restaurant ever.  So, naturally, we bought some -- strawberry & green tea flavors.  Back at his house, we gorged until we couldn't move & even then had barely made a dent in the food.  We had a huge (with a capital U) sushi platter, karbi (no idea how to spell that -- Korean ribs, sort of), and other delicious unpronounceable-to-my-American-lips dishes.  Talked until late into the night....