soup kitchen

yesterday i went to serve at a soup kitchen in harlem. it was in the basement of a church, & i think we fed about 200 people. about 15 members from our church (mostly km) went to prepare & serve the food. & we gave out small bags full of Christmas presents. our km worship pastor led a really good time of worship. he plays some really impressive jazz-style piano. even though his english is not perfect, he was really good at getting different people to come up & sing on the mic. i got to share a short sermon before the meal. i think it's always a good experience to serve people in that setting. always eye-opening. & i have to admit that seeing will smith's movie, "pursuit of happyness", made me look at homeless people in a different light.

my nephew's first birthday

last weekend we celebrated jack's first birthday (dohl). a few weeks b/f the party, my sister's church had a guest speaker who criticized people for spending too much money on their children's birthday parties. funny timing.

at the party, many of the guys were wearing orange ties. i felt left out of this recent trend.

december birthdays

so many friends & relatives have december birthdays. last week we had one dinner for 4 different birthdays. suhee's birthday is dec 9.

first snowfall

yesterday we had our first snowfall. it was a beautiful morning to wake up to.

thanksgiving day football

thanksgiving was strangely warm. it was perfect weather for our church football game. about 10 years ago i bought my football cleats, knowing that i would only use them once a year. i guess i'll be ready to use them again next thanksgiving.

i picked up suhee's new car last night. mazda6 sportwagon. we got an awesome deal through carsdirect.com. we paid $2,229 below invoice price.

gideon keeps sucking on his big toe

scott brenner worship concert

on friday our church hosted a worship concert w/scott brenner. he is a caucasian-american who is married to a korean woman, & he's been doing worship ministry in korea for many years. he has some serious worship-leading skills & the band was awesome. & he actually sings in korean too. it was great to see the sanctuary full of people of all different ages. & there was so much passion for the worship. you could feel the energy & buzz in the air.

pastors conference

yesterday i went to a korean-american pastors conference. right before the first session started, pastor david chae (i went to seminary w/him, & i was on staff w/him at onnuri church) handed me a guitar & asked me to lead some worship. yurie song happened to be there so she helped me to lead the worship. yurie was traveling w/the ywam team from kona. yurie was one of our youth group teachers in korea & she was a singer on the worship team at onnuri church. it was a surreal moment because during the worship i realized that loren cunningham was right in front of us in the front row. he is the founder of ywam (youth w/a mission), & i've been a fan of his since i was in high school. also in the front row was pastor danny han (who was my youth pastor & role-model when i was growing up). & sitting behind them was dr. john kim (leader of the jama movement). ever since i was a teenager i've seen dr. john kim speaking at many large events. it was weird to see all those people together in that setting.

many people make fun of my black rockport shoes & call them "grandfather" shoes. i noticed that loren cunningham was wearing the same shoes as me.

loren cunningham led a session & it was awesome. he basically shared his testimony of how he started ywam. even though i knew the story because i read his biography, it was amazing to hear him tell the story. he talked about "walking through the cross", or suffering for the ministry. he shared about how he was so ashamed when one of his big ministry projects failed in a big & public way. there were a lot of sniffles & tears in the room.

before that i've heard loren cunningham speak twice at large events. & honestly i wasn't thrilled about his messages. but yesterday i was so moved when he opened his heart & shared his life experience w/us.

hello CM

today was a big day for our church (english ministry), as we started a Children's Ministry program during our service. it is for children 14-months & older. this is a great step forward for our ministry. but i have to admit that i kind of missed having some of those little kids running around the sanctuary before & during our service. it felt a little empty & quiet without them.

halloween

gideon spent his first halloween w/his cousins. he even went trick-or-treating. if you can't tell, he dressed up like a penguin. the penguin suit was a gift from patty & bowie.

i must be getting old

last sunday we played basketball at church. i got to take some pictures during the first game. then when i started playing i kept thinking, "man i want to sit out so i can take more pictures". it's pretty sad that i would rather take pictures over playing basketball.

the 'cute' guy taking the weird left-handed layup is our youth director (pat nam).

gideon's new friends

gideon has been busy making new friends. 1st pic is w/logan (son of jin & julie). 2nd pic is w/micah (son of young & eunice).

pilgrim church

last sunday some of our church members gathered for dinner & fellowship. suhee & i had a great time. we feel so blessed to be entrusted with this ministry.

danny lee's wedding

last weekend danny lee (korean kid who grew up across the street from me) got married. my brother & i used to beat up on him when he was a little kid. now he is really tall & really big & he's a new york city cop. because he is a family friend, my whole immediate family was at the wedding. it was strange to see my family all together & all dressed up like that. it was also strange to be at a wedding that i wasn't officiating. it freed me up to play the "wedding photographer" for the night. people who didn't know me probably thought i was one of the hired photographers.

funny picture

before i left ca, jonathan gave me some pictures on a cd. this one is so funny. it's "mantastic".

i can't believe we left california

we recently made our big move from california to new jersey. i still can't believe it; it feels so surreal. i haven't lived w/my parents since i was in high school, but i'm back living w/my parents (until we find a place of our own). this is the town i lived in since i was a one-year-old. it's weird how familiar places have changed so much. we started at our new church (pilgrim church in paramus). we will be leading the english ministry. it really is a great church w/a great senior pastor.

though we were excited to come back to new jersey, it was really hard to leave ca. at our goodbye party our church members even made a banner that said, "farewell pastor joe, suhee smn, & gideon". & we were really touched to have some of our friends come to see us off at the airport. (thank you guys). but the thing that touched me the most was that our church members collected money and bought me a lens for my nikon. they got me the nikon 85mm f1.8. it's my first expensive lens that proudly says, "made in japan". (thank you guys, i felt like you really knew my heart, my wants, & my needs. suhee & i felt really loved & blessed by you guys. we miss you guys so much.) but i've been trying to mentally turn the page & start my new life here.

as part of my chu-family-duties i took my nephew (matthew) to his peewee football game. i took this picture w/my new lens. the lens is so sharp it'll cut you :> i envision how this lens will take awesome pictures of gideon & my future kids as they grow up :>

when i talk to strangers about our moving situation, they often say, "how could you leave san francisco?" it's not an easy transition, but we really believe that God opened this door for us to come to new jersey & serve the church here.

100-day (behk-il)

today we had gideon's 100-day (behk-il) party. pastor bae led a time of worship and said a blessing-prayer for gideon. thank you to everyone who came and thank you for the presents.

sf giants game

last night i finally got to go to a sf giants game. my friend royce got free tickets. like everyone says the ballpark was beautiful.

church growth

someone from houston told me how k.j. choi (pga golfer) recently started attending a korean church in houston. soon afterward the church doubled in size. my "source" said that people just want to be able to say that they attend the same church as k.j. choi.

on the one hand, i think that's a really stupid motivation to attend a church. on the other hand, i believe that the church is trying to reach stupid people.

some pastors try very hard to NOT show favoritism to celebrities/famous people and rich people. while others use those people to attract more people into their doors. i don't think either approach is right or wrong, just something i'm thinking about.

my brother gets to meet famous people...

my older brother works for an asian-american entertainment company (imaginasian). he gets to travel all over the world and meet many celebrities. i usually don't care that much but his company just hired josh "the babyface assassin" barnett to do commentary for pancrase fights that they will begin to air. josh barnett is one of the best heavyweight fighters alive today. so my brother had dinner with him last night & will continue to meet w/him in the future.

stressful day

suhee had a minor surgery today to remove some "membrane" from her uterus. they think it might have been part of the placenta from gideon's birth. the surgery seems to have gone well. thank you to those of you who have been praying for us.

lately i've been feeling so stressed out. mostly because of today's surgery, & partly because of the headache of preparing to move. i've been working as the "resident manager" of my apartment. up until recently, working w/the larger management company has gone smoothly. everyone there has been super-polite and competent at what they do. then last week, one very incompetent person from the company tried to blame me for something that she failed to get done. she was so rude, & i felt so disrespected. the following day she kind of apologized to me in front of the guy in charge of the company (who also happens to be her dad). it's funny how one bad experience makes me think of the whole company in a negative light. (i guess that's how many people feel about church.) but it's weird how that one small experience got me so angry. sometimes it's hard to be "big", & so easy to be "small & petty".

last night i showed an empty apartment unit to a couple that just came from russia. i proudly told him how my wife did her first year of college at moscow state university (very prestigious in russia & eastern europe). he one-upped me by telling me that he is a professor from there. he is here in california to teach astrophysics at uc berkeley.

daniel & michelle's wedding

on monday (labor day) two of our church members got married (daniel koo & michelle chang). i was so honored to officiate the wedding. i even wore my minister's robe to look more formal. it really was a beautiful wedding & a beautiful moment when the couple exchanged their vows. during the vows the bride cried, which caused others to get choked up too.

one of the groomsmen is a product developer for shutterfly.com. i was excited to meet him because i am a huge fan & user of shutterfly. he told me about a new poster/picture collage product that he is working on, & he told me that he would send me some free promotionals. definitely someone i want to keep in touch with :>

here is one of my "collections" (publicly shared online photo album) from shutterfly: gideonchu.shutterfly.com

retreat

last weekend we were up in lake tahoe for our church summer retreat. as usual we had a great time together. i think it's always a little awkward when we encourage people to pray for each other. despite that slight awkwardness i was really moved during our prayer time. & i was blessed to have several people come & pray for me personally. after coming back from the retreat i got a little depressed because i missed being surrounded by good peoples.

when jin blogged about the retreat he talked about coming back from brokeback mountain. i guess he compared it to brokeback because we experienced so much male-bonding. we ate a lot meat, we played football in the water at the beach, & we squeezed in together in the hot tub.

good times...

awesome video clip of a politician defending his belief in God & creation

richmondchurch.blogspot.com

on our church blog, someone (i think it was junmo) posted an awesome video clip. it's great to see intelligent people defending their faith in the midst of a hostile world.

randy couture did it again...

this past weekend we had our church retreat up at lake tahoe. it was a great retreat & i am going to talk about it in my next blog when i get some pictures ready. while we were up at the retreat i felt like i was making a sacrifice because i wasn't able to watch the live ufc fight on saturday night. randy couture defended his heavyweight belt. as usual, nobody thought randy could win mostly because he is 44-years old. his opponent (gabriel gonzaga) was much younger & much heavier. i was one of the "doubters" who didn't think randy could do it again. but when i looked it up on ufc.com, i was shocked to see that randy won w/a referee stoppage in the third round. referee stoppage meaning that the ref had to stop the fight & pull randy off of gonzaga because gonzaga could not "intelligibly" defend himself.

randy, you "shocked the world" again. at least the world of mma.

the next time randy fights, i will try not to doubt him again. but if he fights fedor emelianenko, then i will once again join the "randy-doubters". if he beats fedor, i think he will earn his respect as the greatest mma fighter ever. exciting times in the world of mma :>

marathon week

this past week was probably the busiest week of my life...

tuesday: celebrated our 3-year wedding anniversary
wednesday: flew to new jersey (arrived at 10:30pm)
thursday: met w/the local presbytery that ordained me
friday: flew to california (left my parent's house at 4am to make the 7am flight)
friday night: married couples small group meeting
friday midnight: dropped my car off at my mechanic's place (tires were bald)
friday after midnight: went to jae's house for daniel's bachelor party event
saturday morning: went deep sea fishing (ate breakfast at 3:30am, boarded the boat at 6am, returned to land at 3pm)
saturday afternoon: picked up my car w/new tires
saturday night: jean kim & his family of 4 came over for dinner
sunday morning: gave the sermon at cckpc at 10am
sunday afternoon: gave the sermon for our church at 1pm, played basketball after church
sunday night: church servant team meeting

i will never go deep sea fishing ever again in my life. i was so sick & i threw up so many times. it was torture. but it's good to be back on land again. today for dinner we went to jin/mary's to eat some of the rock cod that jin caught. it was really good. i shamelessly invited myself over when i overheard that they were planning to eat the fish on monday night. :>

rbc mommies & babies

bye bye miata :<

today we sold suhee's miata. i was sad because it was a fun car, & we got to ride the carpool lane w/two people. but i was happy because we got a decent amount of money for it. we sold it back to the used car dealer that we purchased it from. they gave us $6,500. that was a good amount considering the fact that we smashed up the front end (actually suhee did that). we were trying to sell it to our friends for $5,000; so i feel like we made $1,500. i guess that amount can go to my next camera lens, j/k.

today was the last day of our church's VBS

that's my boy...

the in-laws

suhee's mom spent two months w/us to help w/the baby. last week suhee's dad came to spend one week w/us. they both flew back to korea together this past monday. we had a great time of family bonding. we had a chance to spend a few days in the russian river area. it was so beautiful & peaceful up there. here's a pic from the balcony of our rental condo.

macro lens

i borrowed a fancy camera lens from david song. it's a macro lens which enables close-up photography. this lens costs more than my camera-body.

youth retreat

today i got back from the youth retreat & i had a really great time. the students were so sincere & real in their pursuit of God. i've spoken at many korean youth retreats & i think that so many korean kids are so jaded & phony in their spirituality. but the kids i met this past weekend (mostly vietnamese, some chinese) were so innocent & genuine in their faith. it was like a breath of fresh air. i felt so honored to be entrusted with sharing God's word with them this past weekend.

youth retreat this weekend

this weekend (friday-sunday morning) i'll be giving the messages for a youth retreat in the santa cruz mountains. it will be a gathering of one chinese church & a handful of vietnamese churches from the bay area. for those of you who pray for me, please pray for this retreat. i'm really excited & i hope that God will use me to make an impact in their lives. at the retreat center i won't have internet access & i heard that there is no cel phone reception either. so i guess i'll be "retreating" from technology & communications. :>

American vs Chinese Justice

This past week, two news stories caught my attention. Here is an excerpt about the former head of China's FDA...

China executed the former head of its food and drug watchdog on Tuesday for approving untested medicine in exchange for cash. During Zheng's tenure from 1998 to 2005, his agency approved six medicines that turned out to be fake, and the drug-makers used falsified documents to apply for approvals, according to previous state media reports. One antibiotic caused the deaths of at least 10 people.

Here is a excerpt about Scooter Libby...

Breaking news reports late on Monday showed that President George W. Bush had commuted the sentence of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, a former top aide who also served as Chief of Staff to Vice President Dick Cheney. An appeal by Libby to stay out of jail pending an appeal of his conviction for committing perjury and other offenses was rejected by a federal court this morning.Libby did not receive a pardon, but he did have his 30 month jail sentence commuted by President Bush. He remains guilty of the felonies of perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements in the federal investigation of the outing of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. He will also pay a $250,000 fine.

Although Libby's crimes were not as severe as Zheng's, I am still amazed at how differently the American government and Chinese government handled these cases. At first I thought that America has become too "soft" as a society. Soft in our morals and in our ability to execute justice. But on a more positive note, I believe that America is a country that has embraced the concepts of mercy and grace. Even if all of us don't agree with this kind of forgiveness, I think we can all understand the heart behind it. Despite all the political reasons for "commuting" Libby's sentence, I believe that the main reason was a simple desire to forgive.

Jin & Mary feeding their son a lemon

7-7-07

today is 7-7-07.
this date occurs once a century.

i think that most people are superstitious.
& many people consider 7 to be a lucky number.
it's even an important number in the Bible.

i heard that there are a record number of marriages today. something like three times the usual number.
& many women have scheduled to have their c-sections today, so that their babies could be born on this day.

studies show that successful athletes tend to be very superstitious.
& highly-successful people in various fields tend to be very superstitious too.

in china, 8 is considered to be a lucky number. so the opening ceremony for their summer olympics will begin on 8-8-08 at 8pm.

interesting

getting burped

here's a picture of gideon getting burped, 18 days old.

last weekend

last friday gideon was circumcised. he seems to be healing well but also seems to be in pain. he kept us up for most of last night. on saturday his umbilical cord fell off. so now his belly-button looks pretty normal.

on saturday in the ufc (ultimate fighting championship), bj penn beat jens pulver. even though jens seems like a nicer guy, cooler person, more humble, better character. i couldn't help rooting for bj penn simply because he is asian. i guess part of it is that i'm tired of people thinking that asians are so wimpy & weak. two of the best fighters in mma (mixed martial arts) are asian, bj penn & denis kang. denis kang is half-korean & half-french, his father being korean.

on sunday our church members returned from their mission trip to the Crow Nation (Native American Indian Reservation) in Montana. as expected, they had a great trip & great experience. i was sad that i couldn't go w/them this year.

on sunday night i went w/jin to help him buy a fish tank from a guy he found on craigslist. the guy's three-car garage was full of fish tanks, wall-to-wall. apparently he breeds fish & sells them. since i consider myself to be a considerably knowledgable fish-tank person, i kept asking the guy questions about the equipment & how to set up the tank. the guy just assumed that jin & i lived together, thinking we were some kind of alternative-lifestyle couple. & we drove there in jin's wife's little hot-red scion. so before we left i made it clear to the guy that jin & i don't live together & that's not "how we roll".

gideon's first week home

we brought gideon home last friday. he has a really busy schedule for this week...

monday: first doctor's visit

tuesday: appointment with lactation specialist

wednesday: second doctor's visit

friday: circumcision

& every day he has a photo shoot with us at home. suhee is working so hard & is doing such a great job. it's amazing how much our lives have changed in such a short time.

Birth of Gideon Wisdom Youngjin Chu

June 11, 10:40pm
7 Lbs. 9 Oz.
20.47 inches

Suhee’s due date was June 7. We entered the hospital at 3am on Monday, June 11. We were about to be sent home because Suhee’s contractions were not strong enough and she did not dilate enough. After getting an ultrasound we learned that her amniotic fluid was very low. For this reason we stayed at the hospital. During the contractions Gideon’s heartbeat slowed down significantly because there was not enough cushion provided by the amniotic fluid. Later we learned that Suhee’s water broke over 24 hours prior to entering the hospital. Later in the day Suhee developed high blood pressure and a fever. The fever was probably caused by an infection. The fever caused Gideon’s heartbeat to speed up too quickly. For all of those reasons our doctor strongly recommended that we get the baby out quickly with a C-section. In addition to this it was about 10pm and Suhee was still not dilated enough, even though she was getting augmented/induced all day with pitocin. And she was exhausted from the long labor, lack of sleep, and lack of food/drink. She did a great job under all of that hardship. During the C-section we learned that the umbilical cord was wrapped around Gideon’s neck. This would have caused him even more stress if a natural birth was attempted.

Now Suhee & the baby are doing fine. We feel so blessed & so fortunate. We want to thank everyone who supported us and prayed for us.

If you are interested in seeing more pictures you can go to: gideonchu.shutterfly.com

due date

today is the due date for our first child. but so far, no baby. now we're getting anxious. i guess we feel like we've prepared everything, so now all we can do is wait.

because suhee's mom is living w/us, i've been watching tv less & going to morning prayer more. actually the three of us have been sharing a "family worship" every night. suhee told her mom to limit it to 30 minutes, but we've been averaging one hour.

one of the highlights of my week was stocking up my coffee supply. i bought 13 pounds. the bag on the left is 5 pounds of guatemalan something. the coffee guy called it a "guat". he also explained to me that kona coffee is so expensive because the u.s. laborers cost more. he said that the coffee from oaxaca, mexico is very similar to kona. so i got two different varieties from oaxaca.

we're about to start our "family worship" now.

i hope the baby comes soon.

last weekend

on saturday i went to a birthday party for one of our church guys. at the party, three different people brought their digital slr cameras & a bunch of camera equipment. at the party there were five photography enthusiasts (4 nikon owners, & 1 canon owner). our numbers are growing. i realized that you can't be camera-shy when you come to our church events, because people are always taking pictures.

on sunday one of our church members was baptized at our service. after the baptism our small group sang a special worship song to celebrate her baptism. we convinced her husband to sing one of the verses alone. he was a total stud because even though he's not a polished singer, he sang very sincerely & moved his wife to tears.

after church we had our first softball practice, in preparation for an upcoming tournament. we're forming a team together with the korean ministry. whenever i hit the ball, it wouldn't go as far as i expected. in my mind i kept blaming the bat. back in ny we used to go to the batting cages to prepare for a softball tournament. so nerdy.

suhee's mom flew in last wednesday. she'll be staying w/us for two months to help out w/the baby coming. now that we're all prepared, i'm anxious for the baby to come out. due date is this thursday, june 7.

the perfect church guitar

i'm posting this blog to brag about the guitar that we bought for our church. actually i wanted to tell my friend paul about it. we recently got the "godin a6 ultra semi-acoustic". we got it for just under $700. if we were going to spend more we would have gotten the godin acousticaster. & if we were going to spend even more we would have gotten the gibson chet atkins sst.

the reason this is "the perfect church guitar" is because the price is reasonable. & unlike an acoustic guitar, this guitar is not fragile & does not require much maintenance. it is an electric guitar that has an acoustic pickup system. & it really does sound like an acoustic guitar. it reminds me of the takamine sound & the taylor sound (mix between acoustic & electric). & it looks awesome & it is really light.

mt. diablo

on memorial day a few of us from church went to mount diablo. mount diablo means "mountain of the devil". anyways it was beautiful. we were all surprised at how nice it was up there. even my 9-months-pregnant wife did some hiking.

good eats

Our friends (Abe & Judy) visited San Francisco & treated us to dinner. They wanted to eat Dungeness Crab, so we ordered the “Crab Feast” which feeds four people (at Bobo’s in SF). It was truly impressive.

Hotaru (San Mateo) is one of the few Japanese restaurants that is actually owned & operated by Japanese people. They have awesome curry, but here is a picture of some of their salmon (sake).

thank you for the baby shower!

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who threw the baby shower for Suhee yesterday. Especially to Mary who hosted & Michelle who prepared everything so well. All the gifts we received were really nice & really generous; & they will all be put to good use.

I also wanted to say thanks to all the guys who took me out for dinner yesterday. I had a good time & my steak was awesome. I'm hoping we can play Risk again, maybe this Saturday after the UFC? Go Chuck!

grilling obsession

Grilling has become a new obsession of mine. The good thing is that it's causing me to do more of the cooking at home.

it's a small world after all

Part of my job as the resident manager of my apartment is to show people our empty units which are for rent. This morning I showed an empty unit to a woman from Chicago. Her husband is going to be a doctor at the Kaiser hospital in Richmond. It turns out that she went to grad school at Northwestern & she goes to Parkwood Church. A few of my old Chicago friends go to Parkwood & she totally knows them well. And I found out that my church youth leader back from my high school days is serving as the interim pastor at Parkwood. Small world.

gas grill

I finally got a gas bbq grill. I always wanted a nice, big & shiny grill; but I settled on a tiny one that I got for $30. I plan to use it to cook more on the balcony of our apartment. One of the reasons I got it was because we found out that Foodmaxx has pretty good steak for really cheap. Jonathan came over last night. He said that every time he comes over, we keep talking about Foodmaxx. It’s true that Suhee & I keep telling people how great Foodmaxx is. I cooked up these New York Strip Steaks yesterday; they were from Foodmaxx.

childbirth class

last weekend, suhee & i attended a birthing class. it was amazing to learn more about it. every birth truly is a miracle. in the past i've heard the "argument from design" used to prove the existence of God. for example, the human eye is so complex that someone must have designed it. it would take even more faith to believe that the human eye is a product of evolution. learning about childbirth made me think about the "argument from design". the way that a woman gives birth is so complex & so amazing, i have to believe that only the almighty God could have designed it that way.

apparently one in three babies in the U.S. is delivered by cesarean section. in great britain 55% of babies are delivered by c-section. obviously a natural birth is generally safer for the mom & the baby. it's confusing to know when to argue against having a c-section, & when to give in to the doctor's advice.

philip yancey

last week i went to see philip yancey give a message on his lastest book which is about prayer. he was introduced as, "the white guy w/an afro". he had a good sense of humor & he was a master storyteller.

about five years ago i read his book, "what's so amazing about grace?". i've never heard anyone explain God's grace as well as him. that book was really amazing, especially the chapter about the lovesick father. he talked about how God loves us so much that it makes him sick.

anyways, i think i've "typecasted" yancey as the guy who is good at talking about grace. even though he was talking about prayer last week, all i heard was the message of grace.

he showed pictures of the mountains in colorado springs. he explained how the mountain-top snow melts to form fresh lakes. then those lakes overflow & form rivers that flow down into the city. he compared that to God's grace that always flows down to the lowest depths.

go warriors!

Last night the Golden State Warriors won their first-round playoff series against the #1 seed, Dallas Mavericks. This is being called the “biggest upset” in NBA playoff history. It’s funny because the Warriors have always been known as a lame team that didn’t get any love from the fans. But now everyone is jumping on the bandwagon. Last night the local news showed how many celebrities came out to watch the game, including Snoop Dog.

The Warriors are based in Oakland, & I’m disappointed that they are not called the “Oakland Warriors”. I don’t know the reason behind that, but it makes you think that they are ashamed to be an Oakland team.

I have theory that wherever I am living, the local teams tend to do well. The summer that I moved to Chicago was the year that Michael Jordan & the Chicago Bulls won their first championship. I lived in Chicago for 9 years in the 1990s; & that was the decade of the Bulls. When I lived in Queens, both the Yankees & the Mets made it to the World Series in the famous “Subway Series”. When I lived in Seoul, Korea did really well in the World Cup Soccer Tournament and placed fourth.

I haven’t kept up w/basketball in years, but I’m excited to watch the Warriors go all the way.

funny story about beer & sahnmaru

Sahnmaru is a korean restaurant that I go to pretty often w/church members. Recently one of our church guys went there w/his parents, & they ordered three beers w/their dinner. The waitress served his parents, but didn’t serve him beer. His parents insisted that he was old enough to drink legally. The waitress said that she has seen him at the restaurant w/ “joseph chu moksanim” (moksanim means pastor). That’s why she didn’t feel comfortable serving him beer.

I want to find out which waitress it was. She sounds like a cool lady.

$400 haircut

so i heard someone talking about how john edwards (presidential candidate) paid $400 for a haircut. apparently it's true. & he did it twice. he hired a celebrity hairstylist from beverly hills, who charges $150 for a men's cut. but the price goes up when he needs to travel to meet his clients.

dog the bounty hunter

For several years I’ve been a fan of the reality show, Dog The Bounty Hunter. In fact I’ve talked about the show several times in my Sunday Sermons. Unfortunately few people share my enthusiasm. In our church we have one police officer. He is the only one who “gets it” when I talk about Dog.

Lately I’ve been reading the blog of a well-known pastor named Mark Driscoll. I was thrilled to see that he blogged about this show. He said that this show & The Ultimate Fighter are the best reality shows. And he said that he watches this show religiously w/his three sons.

Dog is a tough guy w/a big heart. He is able to intimidate & subdue his suspects. But after he catches them, he counsels them to reform their lives. The show often shows Dog praying w/his family. And they occasionally show him meeting w/his pastor to receive counsel & prayer.

On one episode he went to city hall to receive an award. Dozens of reformed druggies & prostitutes came out to honor him. When he saw them, he was moved to tears & said to his wife, “Beth, these are our people”. That really reminded me of how Jesus reached out to the lowly.

On one episode his wife bought him a shirt w/a designer label. He told her that he doesn’t wear clothes w/another person’s name on it, unless the name is “Jesus Christ” or “Harley Davidson”.