I Was Right About Chang

Thanks to everyone who offered birthday wishes. Because of the time difference, I figured my birthday lasted about 14 hours longer than usual. And it coincided with the Times’s traditional pre-Olympics dinner. Chang Lee, you might remember from the first post, was put in charge.

Dinner was fantastic — about 20 courses of authentic Korean fare. This great picture by Becky Hanger does it some justice. (I wonder if the Yustein-Albarino party table will look like this?) The dinner started with heukimjajuk, a black sesame porridge, and ended with sujeonggwa, a ginger and cinnamon tea. He explained everything we were eating and I believe none of it was alive at the time of consumption. All a big plus.

But what you might also remember is that during our preflight “breakfast,” Chang regaled me on the many ways one could enjoy a tornado, that soju-beer concoction. During dinner, Chang demonstrated the proper technique for downing an Olympic Torch Tornado.

   Whether is was because it was my birthday or because we had spoken about it at JFK, Chang decided, among the 35 Times’ people present, that I was the one to give it a try. It is a fairly elaborate undertaking. An empty longneck bottle of beer is turned upside down (at that point it already begins to look like a torch). Then a glass of beer is placed on the bottom of the bottle and a shot glass of sujo is plunked down inside the beer glass. With one hand, and one hand only, you have to down the drink in one fell swoop. Take it from me, it is not so easy to keep that glass from slipping off that beer bottle. But as you can see in the video, I nailed it on the first try. Video is courtesy of Archie Tse, the deputy graphics editor.

Terri Ann Glynn, who is the sports department manager, and who somehow managed to get us all to Korea, was also celebrating her birthday. She managed to escape the tornado but after dinner she and I both got a cake. She then led the parade to karaoke near our hotel, but I had to beg off. I had to get up at 5:30 to get to a very early photographers’ briefing for figure skating down at the coast. Just as well because Terri Ann is an amazing singer, and I, well, I can do Olympic Torch Tornadoes!

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