유림공원, Aka The Bunny Park, Grand Opening
Korean life June 28th. 2009, 11:24pmThe park near our house had a grand opening ceremony. Fireworks, Korean dancers, singers, music, etc. My wife and I invited some friends of ours along on a picnic to celebrate. I had seen the place in the past few weeks getting finished, after they installed the bunnies. There was only one bunny left that we saw, and one chicken. Where did they all go?
I was excited the park was finally open for everyone to enjoy. We organized at the nearby subway stop and headed over. Most of the grassy area was still “off limits”, but we found a secluded spot for a picnic. Like clockwork we got rained on shortly after we settled in to eat. Luckily, the park had provided for that contingency and handed out free umbrellas we could keep! Awesome! We held off from leaving, as the storm blew over in less than 20 minutes, staked out some chairs and sat back down to await the fireworks.
One of the couples has a young baby, and people were constantly coming over and taking a peek at the child. I guess this happens everywhere, but I can’t imaging trying to play with or pick up a complete strangers child. The baby had this drawing affect on the crowd, as if everyone wanted to see what a “foreign baby” looked like “in the wild” or something. The father told me that butchers in the local street market will come over and try to pick up the baby fresh from chopping up some pork chops without washing their hands. Ew. I’m going to need to devise some sort of barricade system for our child when she’s born to keep people away.
The baby lasted through the Korean drum session, but the Korean zither put her to sleep. That instrument, accompanied by a flute was almost enough to lure me to sleep too. It’s very comforting stuff. The baby didn’t cry the entire day until the fireworks started to bang and flash across the sky. It was pretty loud, and she wasn’t the only baby crying. The path leading out of the park needed a little trickery, but thanks to scouting out the park with my dog the past few weeks I knew which way to go to avoid the big crowds. The group got out with minimal fuss and they headed back home via the nearby subway stop.
It was a good experience and I can’t wait to have more picnics in the future.
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