Our newest little chingu.

Little Won Bin
Won Bin and his godfather
Won Bin and his godmother
Piggies!
Pearl (the new mama!) and Won Bin

(Note: This post is woefully overdue!) About three weeks before Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving--late September), I called our friend Pearl to see if we could get together to hang out Saturday night (it was Friday night). It was late, but I figured she'd be up since she said she'd been having trouble sleeping in her last stages of pregnancy. She answered the phone, and I said "Hey Pearl. It's Aubrey. Paul and I were wondering if you and Andrew (her husband) could hang out tomorrow."
"Well, I'm in in the hospital actually. I just had the baby a few hours ago."
"Wow! Er...congratulations! I'm sorry--you must be exhausted. I should probably call you back another time!"
"No, it's okay. I'm just resting right now. Would you like to stop by and visit this weekend?"
"Sure, of course. We'll be by tomorrow afternoon--is 2:00 okay?"
"Sounds good."
That's not word for word, but pretty close to how the conversation went. I was so surprised that she was willing to talk after just giving birth!! I would have probably just handed the phone to my husband.
So, that weekend we brought some baby goodies over to the Joong Ang maternity hospital, where Pearl was staying. Her in-laws were there looking after her (her parents live in L.A.). The room was steaming hot (they always keep Korean women very warm after birth)--it felt like a sauna! Her mother-in-law began furiously cutting up fruit to give to us from a basket given by Andrew's company. We sat on the floor and chatted with Pearl (who looked really good after just having had a baby!). She was very happy that she'd given birth naturally, especially since 80% of Korean women have C-sections. She wasn't hooked up to any monitors or anything.
They hadn't named the baby yet. Andrew's father-in-law was supposed to come up with the name (which is typical, here). We didn't get to see him that day, as the hospital kept strict visiting hours for the babies.

A couple weeks later, we called Pearl to see how things were going with her new little one. Apparently, he'd just gotten over a case of jaundice and had recently returned from the hospital. She asked if we wanted to come over to see him. We agreed, and her in-laws picked us up the next day and took us to Pearl, who was staying with her aunt (Andrew works in Seoul and commutes home on the weekends).
Won Bin (the baby) was sleeping when we arrived. Paul and I went into his room to see him. I think Pearl had mentioned to Paul earlier that she and Andrew considered us unofficial godparents (since we are "spiritual", as Pearl put it), so she asked Paul to pray for Won Bin. Then both of us took turns holding him, which was fun. He was very good about it and didn't cry for a long time, until at the end of my shift when he got hungry.

Since I'm missing being around my nieces and nephews, and missing seeing some of my best friends being pregnant and about to have kids (you know who you are!), it's been fun to get to know Pearl and Andrew, and now, Won Bin :)