Korea Connection - Sat., Aug. 27, 2016

None of us truly knows where life is going to take us. Sure we might have grand plans with places to go and things to do. And there's the ever-present pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps advice: "plan your life and work your plan " (or something to that effect) or "if you don't design your own life plan, you'll fall into someone else's plan." I'm sure you've heard these or similar quotes.

I think I live more by the chaos theory: live life as an adventure and see where it takes you. We had a dose of that this past weekend.

Bob and I were looking at photos of our good friends Kevin and Stefania. The last we knew they were living in Korea. But on Facebook we were seeing photos of them on the River Walk in San Antonio. We were scratching our heads wondering if the photos were memories like Facebook likes to post of your past. But they kept posting photos that showed as six hours ago or two hours ago.

We contacted Kevin and Stefania on Facebook. Lo and behold, they were in San Antonio. We were all free on Saturday night, so we picked them up at Airmen's Base entrance of  Lackland's training center and took them out to Random Beer Garden. There we could eat, have a couple of beers and catch up with where we had all been.

Kevin and Stefania were introduced to us through mutual friends about 20 years ago in Oregon. They lived in Corvallis and we lived near Wilsonville, Oregon. Our home on the Willamette River was perfect for afternoons of waterskiing, barbecuing, and enjoying the company of our friends. We usually had big potluck dinners on our deck.

We moved away to Tacoma, Washington, and they visited us there before we moved to Hawaii. Kevin went to school to learn Library Science and then went to work as an air force civilian. We kept track of them as they moved to Colorado, Minneapolis/St. Paul, and then Korea. So we were very surprised to see them in San Antonio.

Kevin's training class at Lackland Air Force Base was the main reason they were here. It was their first time to San Antonio. Since they had already been in town for four days, they had done the River Walk and the Alamo.

It was a beautiful evening so we took them to Random Beer Garden out by Boerne City Lake. There are food trucks and music, not to mention lots of beers on tap. The music wasn't loud so we were able to carry on a conversation. We had such a great visit. It was like we had never been apart for over ten years. There's a lot to be said for good friends!

80 beers on tap

We ate pizza from Z's Pizza

Look at that wall of taps!

Stefania and Kevin

Stefania, Bob, me

Stefania, Kevin and me

Kevin, Stefania, Bob, me

Talk flowed freely and we learned what it's like to live in Seoul, Korea (crowded, advertising on every inch of buildings, buildings on every square foot of land, hard to learn the language, people are very nice). Then we talked about where we all had lived since we last met. Kevin and Stefania invited us to visit them in Korea. Well, howdy, that wasn't on our bucket list! Kevin has a two-year contract for his library job in Korea. 

Unfortunately, we had to break up our reminiscing. Kevin and Stefania had to leave for the airport at 3:45 a.m. and I had to be at work Sunday morning. We took them back to the Airmen's Gate and said our good-byes while they waited for a shuttle from their hotel to pick them up at the gate.

It was a wonderful evening! Hugs to you, Kevin and Stefania. We're happy you made it home safely.