The K-Pop Dream 103 Day Off 3/

Raging wind howls. The brown earth, the torn, blasted earth.

The greasy s.h.i.+ne under the sun's rays. The restless, gloomy world of automatons. Our gasping is erratic.

Our lips are dry. Our heads filled with stupor--yet we stagger forward, ignoring the pain in our pierced and shattered souls...

Moving a lump of sand as carefully as possible to ensure it doesn't fall, I end my turn.

I turn to Hora and say, "It's your turn now."

She smiles and rolls up her 'imaginary' sleeve complaining, "You took so much"

She leans forward and proceeds to take sand from only the outer region of the sand tower.

"Ay that's too little" I pout playfully.

She smiles even more brightly and answers "That's because you took way too much."

'Challenge accepted'

I stretch out my hands like claws and announce, "Here comes the excavator"

I reach and in deep and start slowing excavating the sand. All the while Hora, is making exctied sounds antic.i.p.ating failure.

It sounds something like a rhythmic beat "o oh ohhhh o"

"Daebak (Impressive), You're taking everything"

I rotate from claws to a more finger like motion as I take a bit of sand from the closest edge of the chopstick making sure it doesn't fall.

Hora complains once more, "You can't do that. It's unfair"

I laugh and counter, "An excavator has many operating modes"

It is now her turn and she once more plays it safe reaching for the outer edges exclaiming in a soft protest, "This is dangerous"

Getting really immersed in the game, my eyes bulge and I nervously watch and she starts moving sand.

The chopstick begins to wobble but she presses forward. She bites on her lip and proceeds even slower now.

Little by little she moves the sand, until ... The chopstick crashes down from it's once upright position, ignoring her screams of "Nooo!"

This is the loudest I've ever heard her gotten.

I raise my hands in a victorious pose and exclaim "Yeeeeeah!" Laughingly over her crouched down and lowered position.

She *sighs* and hangs her head in defeat.

Not even attempting to console her, I start celebrating like a little kid who has just received the best Christmas present ever.

She looks at me exasperated at my less than humble figure.

I lower my body and reach out to help her stand.

She flings my hand away and start's negotiating, "Wait Wait Wait, Let's play one more time?"

Not being a generous winner, I say, "Gosh, Come on" and reach out to help her up again.

Wagging her index finger, she puts her goodlooks to use and pleadingly asks, "Come on. Just one more time"

'It is super effective but I will not succ.u.mb to her mental torture'

"No way!"

This time she looses her joking smile and seriously sincerely says (she doesn't ask), "Let's just play one more game"

Resigning myself to always concede to her demand, I nod my head and say "okay"

This restores her smile and she eagerly starts helping me restore the sand tower.

"You owe me a wish" I remind her. "This game is for another one"

Wiping sand of my hands. She puts the chopstick in the completed mound

Reading myself to start the game again, "Rock-paper-scissors"

I win again, throwing paper while she throws rock.

She just laughs at how unlucky she is today.

I hum the tone of jaws, "Dun dun dun" (I haven't watched jaws so thats as close as I get"

Reaching forwards I start the excavator once more.

The game this time is rather anticlimactic as the same result occurs and I win again.

She tries to protest again, "No fair, let me go first this time. One more game"

We played three times in total with the final score being ... 3-0

It was a ma.s.sacre!

I guess Hora is my personal genie now.

....................

As the sun rose, visitors came to the beach in batches of twos or threes. Idling on the beach, I take a bottle of water, opened the cap and handed it to Hora. I then proceed to open up a two deck chairs, and put them under the umbrella.

"Dypa, would you like to swim?" Hora asks out of the blue as she is laying comfortably in the chair.

Excited, I ask, "Did you bring a swimsuit with? There are some good one here for sale."

Smilingly, still from her reclined position, she reaches for her backpack and shakes it. "My swimsuit is in my bag"

Over the moon like crazy, I howl internally.

Do you really wonder why? What man does not find himself crawling before the feet of beauty.

Since time immemorial , men would wage war for beauty.

The mythological figure Helen of Troy was thus said to have been the face that launched a thousand s.h.i.+ps and burnt the topless towers of IIium.

If Helen were to be compared to Hora, I can only say the following; "I would burn the entire earth to a state of nothing but ash."