Green Glass River Bend

Another long absence since my last blog post. Classic.  In that time I went to Chicago for about four weeks and lived with Eric at his apartment. To be honest, before I left Boston, I was a bit apprehensive about the whole thing.  Taking myself away from my friends and the familiarity of Boston to live with my boyfriend in a different city? But thankfully, it was far from the experience I was worried it might be. I had a lot of fun exploring the city, and working in different locations everyday (but mostly Panera, my most dependable source of wifi and comfortable booths <3). Plus, weilian would often get out of work around 5pm and sit with me while I finished up my work for the day, often accompanied by some bubble tea from Vivi's (the amount of money I spent on bubble tea last month is probably not okay.) At night we'd chill (sometimes with Eunice and Alex (Eric's friend from Traders who eats plain greek yogurt and egg whites for dinner...no carb life is real)), either cook dinner or eat out (Chicago has some mad good food) and sometimes watch movies or go karaoke-ing. Speaking of which, I watched some really good movies over the last couple weeks! Finally saw Fight Club which is such an old classic but somehow I never got around to it. Also watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which I would highly recommend (cinematography was beautiful and quirky), as well as Minority Report (which gave me a slight mind-fuck, but Eric told me I was probably over-analyzing it) and The Truth About Cats and Dogs (an old rom com). The last one we watched was Anchorman.  Incredibly, impressively stupid but pretty entertaining (oh and did I mention stupid?) Oh and since we talking stupid, the absolute dumbest thing I did last month was getting hooked on an iPad game called Cow Evolution. Basically you cultivate cows and can unlock higher level cows but combining lower level cows. By harvesting their poop, you make money (some of the higher lvl cows poops are worth hundreds of thousands of coins @__@) In short, it's a game that requires zero intellect or skill, but we played it religiously to unlock new cows and buy cute hats for our existing cows. Looking back, I really cannot believe the amount of time I spend dragging cows...but if I had the iPad with me now, I would probably continue playing in a big way. Oh man. 

Anyway, I took a lot of pictures (like, a lot) over the last month, so I'm gonna hand it over to the collages and captions now :)

Chicago O'Hare airport after 4 hours of delays in Boston weeee

Lobby installation in the John Hancock building- It's hard to see from this photo, but the installation is actually only half of a sphere, and the top is a mirror to make it look like a full sphere!

Drinks with Eunice at the Signature Room in the Hancock Tower! We felt so fancy sitting there overlooking the city with cocktails in-hand, but realtalk - the cocktails weren't that great. Had a lot of fun catching up with Eunice tho :)

Too many options at Joyyee @__@

Friends and food! Featuring a lot of asian food, asian drinks, and asian friends lol. 

Jesus lord those buns were beautiful and delicious. Had sum dim sum (never gets old) the first weekend in Chicago - was pretty solid! But let's talk about those eggs. Sweet god they were amazing. Soft boiled to perfection and seasoned just right. When I went home I tried to make them myself lol. I actually got them to taste quite good! But they were ugly as fuck so I didn't include any photo evidence. 

DIMSUM. All you can eat sushi @__@. Ramen at Oistar! (Literally the most delicious Chashu I've ever tasted) and some quality Chicago deep dish pizza! It was my first time eating it and I quite enjoyed it...but still loyal to NY style thin crust :P

UNF. Strings Ramen (favorite ramen place I hit up in Chicago hands down), Chicken and waffles from Meli Cafe. Fu ji fei pian (uh definitely spelled that wrong) from this balling Chinese place called Lao Si Chuan. Their food is on point. Bacon Chicken omelette from Meli as well! That was a damn good meal. 

Some of my cute breakfasts, and Frank the kangaroo that Eric got me from his adventures in Australia. The first morning I woke up, I rolled over and saw him laying on the pillow looking at me :3 what a cute little dude...except eric always uses him to hump my arm. -__-

Potsticker flower

Brunch for two

The view from the top of the Hancock Tower!

Seeing the bean for the first time!

Millenium park at night @__@

Cool public art / lights and some lanterns from Strings Ramen hehe

Merry-go-around at Navy Pier

The night Eric and I walked around the city and did absolutely nothing for hours. In the end we went to target, bought blank notebooks and sketched in the large (deserted) amphitheater at Millennium Park. :) It was a really relaxing evening and I even got to take a picture of the Bean with literally zero people around. Success.

Getting cultured at the Art Institute of Chicago! The one in the top right is pretty interesting because everything is painted roughly except for the face of the fallen jockey which is delicately detailed. Apparently it was to pay homage to the artist's deceased brother :\ 

My favorite exhibit at the Art Institute! The Ando gallery. The room is dim with rows of polished rectangular wooden pillars and a curved wooden bench. The only light comes from the display case that sort of cuts into the wall. It was also so quiet! When we were in that space, I was overcome with the feeling that I couldn't (and shouldn't?) make noise. 

Deliciously delicious brunch at Meli Cafe. They use watermelon in a lot of their smoothies which I thought was pretty unique. Definitely gonna try making some watermelon-based smoothies this year >:D A giant bubble gun blowing moose (yes that's a truck in the left corner for scale) Clean Slate Riesling - Eric was obsessed. I just thought it was funny that it came with a "slate coaster" aka there was a piece of rock attached to the bottle lmao. Bottom pic is of the four of us at karaoke in Chinatown! Nothing like kicking back after work and unleashing stress by belting out songs way out of my vocal range.

Went on the famous Chicago Architecture Boat Tour! Chicago has some really diverse architecture. To be honest, I zoned out and didn't really pay that much attention to the tour guide cuz I was too busy taking pictures and ogling at the view from the boat. Oops. But yeah here are a few of my favorite buildings from the tour! I particularly really like the green one in the top right. Apparently the curvature follows the form of the river that passes in front of it. So elegant @_@

Exploring the beautiful city with this cutie <3 But actually jesus lord we walked a lot a lot.

One of my favorite shots I managed to take on the Architecture tour! It was the opposite direction of all the bright buildings, but when I saw it I was sort of struck by its quiet beauty. The glowing lights, the moon above, and just everything @__@ I am so bad at expressing myself haha, but basically I really like this picture. It has such a modest and peaceful feeling to it!  I only wish that it wasn't so grainy. But eh, iPhone camera in dim light, I'll take what I can get. 

A really really good day.  I spent all day not being able to work cuz I was so excited to go to Mr. Son Sung Deuk's workshop! He is the choreographer for BTS and I fan-girled harder than I have ever fan-girled in my life. Especially since BTS was basically the first group I really got hooked on, in terms of dance and music. Being able to learn first hand from their choreographer was a really crazy opportunity for me. Anyway, learned Bulletproof pt. 2 form the man himself (pinch me I still can't get over it) and then met up with Eric and Weilian for some quality gyukaku. Meeting one of my heroes and eating delicious japanese BBQ in one day? I am a very lucky girl. @__@

At Navy Pier. Beautiful view from the Ferris Wheel! Weilian clearly looking like he's enjoying himself.

Okay don't even get me started on this meal @__@ Jk I want to talk about it. On my last night in Chicago, we went to go check out this place called Union Sushi and BBQ.  It was basically fusion Japanese food, and some of our food was really fucking delicious. First the sliders. I mean, just LOOK at them. There was curry crab cake, a beef + quail egg, and bbq. I honestly could've just order several boxes of these and eaten them all night long. But good thing I didn't or else I wouldn't have had room for the delicious sushi. My favorite was the Hokkaido roll which I unfortunately didn't include in this collage, but there was seared scallop in it @__@. For dessert, we ordered a pumpkin mochi cake... Oh man. The inside had a sort of ice-cream like texture, the outside was firm pumpkin mochi, and it was topped with caramel and some sort of toffee brittle. The fact that this caption is so long speaks for how much I enjoyed that meal. But maybe it was also because it was my last night so it tasted extra good. 

This picture looks posed as fuck but I swear it was actually a candid! Again I'm a sucker for small boats floating in the water, moonlight, and I guess having eric in the picture doesn't hurt too much :P

One last picture with the beautiful Chicago night skyline <3 (also check it out, I actually look like I have boobs in this picture. Exciting!)

A clear day for my flight back to Boston! On the colorful river during the Architecture cruise. Standing at the exit of the Red Line, watching the rain and waiting for it to lighten up.