August was up just before 7. We had breakfast, did recycling, etc. and left the house at 9, taking the bus over to Wolgye Station, where we met up with Sarah and a couple of the new teachers at APIS, including the new art teacher and the stay-at-home dad I communicated with back in the spring. August was a little nervous about people, and didn’t want to stop at the playground before going in. And once on the platform he wanted to stay in the backpack. But he did pretty well with the people. Everyone was there about 9:45 and we headed down.
A kind of difficult ride down on the subway, as August kept wanting to nurse. Finally pulled out one of the ZonePerfect bars and that placated him until we got to Junggok Station. We walked up to the ARA Art Museum, which I’d never heard of before this show. It is on a side street, behind the Gana Art Center in Insadong and the big Buddhist temple. So we’ve been around it many, many times, but never seen it.
The show was pretty amazing. Four floors with a couple hundred works by Mr. Brainwash: http://www.mrbrainwash.com I’m quite familiar with Banksy, but had never watched the film Exit Through the Gift Shop, which is about Mr. Brainwash. Carly told me about it in the morning, and I’d watched about 50 minutes of it, so had a decent idea who he was. Anyway, think Warhol meets Banksy. It also reminded me a lot of the Chapman Brothers show that Meg and I went to a couple years ago down in Gangnam and that I then took Carly to. Seeing the show was kind of difficult though as August got upset, wanting to touch the art. Carly took him out to the lobby area, where they played on the iPad and investigates a tray of metal paint and sculpture tools (he particularly liked the knife, which of course Carly wouldn’t let him touch). We sort of took turns to see the exhibit, and took August in a couple times. One time, when Carly brought him in, Sarah played with him a bit. We looked up the stairs and there was a piece with Mickey. He said “See Mickey Mouse?” I was surprised and asked how he knew Mickey Mouse. “From the diaper.” Indeed, he had some Mickey Mouse diapers in Centralia. But a pretty impressive connection to make. Then he walked around a bit with me and we saw a piece with Picasso in it. He lasted a few minutes. When I had gone through it all, I went and switched with Carly. August got really upset that I wouldn’t let him go in with her, so I had to take him outside. He’s got a new distinctive ‘waa waa waa’ cry the last couple days when he can’t use his words. Anyway, we were outside for several minutes until he started to calm down and wanted to go back in. We were heading back down the stairs when Carly came up.
We went back down to the gift shop where Carly got a poster for her classroom, and I got a couple postcards. There was a puzzle, and they had a demonstration one on the counter. August really liked this, and we played with it for several minutes. Carly wished they had found it when they were sitting in the lobby. Everyone else was ready to head out, so we said goodbye. We played with the puzzle some more, then walked up towards Subway for sandwiches. Along the way we saw that they had lotus flowers at the big Buddhist temple, so went and saw those. August wanted to touch them, and I let him touch them a bit. But generally he wanted to get going. He remembered throwing coins in the pond, but I told him we couldn’t do that now. But then I started throwing pretend rocks in and getting pretend splashed, and he really got into that. So then he was upset when we were ready to leave.
Went up to subway and he helped decide what veggies to put on our sandwich. Sat and ate. August didn’t have his shoes on, and he liked being in his bare feet. From there we walked back down to the station and headed home. As we went, he made up, all on his own, a ‘chomp’ song sort of to the tune of “Cada Semilla”. He was using his hand to chomp me and Carly, and also towards passerby. He was also singing Wheels on the Bus and sang “The flushes on the bus say flush, flush, flush” That also reminded me that a few times now he has sung “The penis on the bus…” instead of “The people on the bus…” and thought it was quite funny.
We expected him to take a nap, but he didn’t. Instead, he wanted Carly to talk about something: “Talk. Want to talk. Trees. Talk about something.” He wanted me to turn on some music, and I asked what he wanted, and he said “I do not know.” He’s been saying that a lot when asking him for opinions. At 4 we headed outside. We stopped at Mama Juice and they got a watermelon juice to share and I got an iced latte. We went across to the fountain, and Carly and I got a bit wet. He got close to the fountain once, and ran around it a couple times, but mainly played over by the recycling bins, then started wandering off. The fountain turned off and we made our way over to the playground and played there, mainly with the exercise equipment, but also with the teeter totters, spray bottle (he enjoyed squirting us, and another boy, who played with him a bit), and climbing wall for a bit. The fountain came back on at 5 and we went over for a bit longer, but August wasn’t being drawn in. He also played with the vending machines, and at the playground wanted to go in a pretend fountain, which he and Carly ran around in.
From there we all went to the pink building, which August now knows is Lucky Mart, and did some grocery shopping. August helped bag veggies and take them to Carly and the basket. We headed home and Carly made fruit salad and French fries for dinner. We had fun with that.
Gave him a bath, then he was ready for bed around 7. He ran out and said goodnight to me. I went in and told him to think about what he wanted to do with me tomorrow when Carly went to do some work. He said “Playing! And do things.” Helpful. He was asleep at 7:15.
Oh, and yesterday I forgot to mention that at a couple points he started to chant or sing to the pace of my walking, all on his own. At one point he was doing a two bar thing: “bum bum bum bum 1 2 3 (rest)” over and over again.
Subway:
Art museum:
Subway:
Home:
Juice and park:
Running in the pretend fountain:
