The day before my 25th birthday Brendon landed in my life.  For those of you who know him, he does kind of leave a lasting impression, so there was no doubt that I would never forget him since my roommate and I were his expat “Welcome to Korea” party. He was the newest arrival to our small teaching staff at the English language institute at which we worked in Pusan.  Amy and I (yes, there were 2 of us) picked him up and took him to the American-style pub O’Kims, in an effort to ease him ever-so-gently into the Korean life we had there.  Little did I know that he was well versed in the ways of pub life and dancing to Ace of Base.  We had a fun night.  

Because of the interesting personalities of the other expats at our school, Bren ended up hanging with Amy and I a lot.  Our teaching schedules were split, 4 classes in the mornings, afternoons free, 3 classes at night.  We spent a lot of afternoons getting lunch at our favorite eating spots, marvelling at Bren’s ability to eat a whole pint of ice cream (which he still does) at Baskin Robbins while dodging the pesticide sprayer coming down the street, and watching videos in his plush classroom.

And that’s where our story started.  We became great friends.  And that fact has never changed.  

There’s a geographic crooked path after that to where we are right now, but there definitely was a path laid out for us, and we just went along for the ride.

So today’s song is by my favorite, The Cure, which Brendon hates.  He still teases me when I wear my thinning Robert Smith t-shirt.  But I love it.  

And I love him.  

But not in an old t-shirt kind of way.  

In a Love Song kind of way.

***ok, before I get comments about Ace of Base, remember, we were in Asia in the 90’s and this was everywhere along with Shin Seung Hoon (who’s awesome).  It was just like being trapped in the Midwest in the 80’s with few options outside of Europe whining on the radio.  <smiling!>

*** and ok, I keep getting sucked into looking for my favorite Korean pop songs from 1994.  Seo Taiji was huge and this song makes me so so happy.  As does this band, O15B (Gong il Oh B).  Lots of smiling today…