North Virginia

 Hey All! How was everybody's 4th of July? Jamie and I had a great weekend because we were starting a new adventure. I will tell you guys more in this blog, but before that, allow me to update how things were going with us. :D 

The title of this blog named North Virginia, it's where we have been living in for the past 7 weeks. We moved here after Jamie graduated from college, he is doing his internship here. :) North Virginia is certainly a very beautiful place, it has so much green and many modern buildings. We enjoyed our time here and would like to stay longer if we could. But since it's close to D.C. housing here is very pricey. After considerations, we decided to move to elsewhere and hopefully someday after years we will come back.

Nevertheless, we had great time in North Virginia, we went to Gay Pride in D.C. and got to know many good people. We finally met our friend, Ed, two weeks ago. Ed invited us to his house and made dinner for us. His house was the most beautiful and comfortable house I've ever been to, Ed has really good taste decorating his place. Jamie and I were so amazed, from the moment we walked into his house. There were Big windows connected from the ceiling to the floor in the living room, flowers and candles brought fresh sense to the house, nice book shelves and other elegant furniture.. It's just beautiful. Ed let me take some pictures and here are them. :)

Ed is such a gentleman, meeting him was truly a great experience! He is easy going and smart, talkative and has great sense of humor. Ed is talented too! The food he made for us that evening was so delicious that we felt we were in a 5-star restaurant!

Even the plates are pretty

Ahhh.. I am hungry again!

We had our dinner on the back porch, Ed grilled some chicken for us. (As you can see the picture above ^_^) I knew I should have held back a little more so I wouldn't be like a pig, but yes I was like a pig. Ed was just too nice and I felt very comfortable around him and forgot my manners. ;) The food was awesome!











Jamie and I also brought dessert as we promised that would be the thing we took care of for our meeting. We baked some yum yum brownies.




 

And we made a terrible mistake by bringing brownies!!
Ed has a glucose intolerance and he told me about it before.. I honestly didn't know what he meant but didn't want to be looked too dumb so I pretended I knew what that was.. :'( Ed couldn't eat the brownies we made! I kept apologizing but still felt bad.


After diner, Ed played some Irish music for us! That was really awesome! I like how happy and refreshing Irish music sounds like. *Sigh* I am a huge fan of an Irish boy-band, Westlife. Although they aren't boys anymore and the members in the group are no longer together. I still like them and listen to their music all the time. teehee

Westlife - Shadows
Westlife - Something Right
Shane Filan - Everything's Gonna Be Alright

Another friend we've been hanging out is Mike. Mike and my sister, Chelsea have been talking and are going to see each other in person in September. We are all very looking forward to it. ^_^

Mike took us to a Mongolian restaurant last week and gave we a chance to use chopsticks!! Oh dear, I hadn't used chopsticks since I came to the US.. I had used them my whole life, but don't really use them here in America. The moment I picked up chopsticks and held them, was like riding a bike, I knew exactly how to use them! It just came so naturally! I was so excited! ha ha..

Jamie was so awkward using chopsticks. ha ha..

But he still looked cute. ;)
 


Mongolian food was great. :D I'd had them before in Taiwan. They tasted a little different but they used the same way to cook the food. It's interesting American one added eggs in it.

We also had some Frozen Yogurt after dinner. It was fun choosing our own ice cream and toppings. (The best part was to have some samples of all the flavors of ice cream.. ha..) Nah, I didn't try all the flavors, that'd be too embarrassing.

Topping part was just too evil.. Even though I passed the ice cream challenge, didn't get too much of it, I still failed on this topping part... Those sweets seemed to be waving at me, especially gummy bears. In the end when I ate my Frozen Yogurt, I was almost like eating chocolate and candies. :P



We then went to Mike's apartment, it's an one bedroom apartment. ^_^ Mike recently moved here because it's closer to his work. The place was nice and comfy. Mike has many toys and video games! ha .. And I played a video game for the first time after high school. It was SO fun! I just hit all the buttons and didn't know what I was doing.

 



Mike's friend made that Bullbasaur for him, it looks awesome, better than Pikachu.


We played some Street Fighter, Mike of course beat Jamie and me very easily, but I still kicked Jamie's ass. ha ha Let's just say he's losing for me because he loves me. ;)









So our next destination :) will be New Jersey!
Jamie and I actually visited New Jersey this past weekend, that's how we celebrated 4th of July. ^_^ We met our friends, Andrew and Corey, another married gay couple. They will be the people we will be living with, along with their friend, Melissa, a very funny NewYorker!
It was very nice of them to offer us a room to stay after seeing my post on Facebook. Andrew reached out to me and helped. We are very happy to go there and start something new. ^^ Jamie is going to miss Virginia though, here's where he grew up in. But he said he has a good feeling about New Jersey. :D

So yeah, this week is the last week we are in Virginia, I thought I would write a blog. Thank you for reading this and let's hope things will go well.





Some people told us we are looking more and more alike. How can that be possible? ha ha But I really like that idea, thank you.


Before I go, here's an article I enjoyed reading and thought I'd share.
Answer Life’s Hardest Questions With Help From Toy Story


Take care!
Love,
Teddy

They are Proud of the Way they Are.

This past weekend was 2014 DC Gay Pride festival, Jamie and I went there and had our first time gay parade. We marched with our friends from Affirmation : Gay and Lesbian Mormons. It was one the the best experiences I ever had in my life. ^_^

A lady saw Jamie's T-shirt and asked, "Who's that crazy boyfriend?" Four people that heard that all responded to her before I had a chance. lol

There were a lot of things I'd imagined before I came to America, one thing was to get to know other gay Mormons. It was a very daring anticipation that there would have other gay Mormons, I looked it up online and beyond surprisingly I found several groups and started talking to other gay Mormons.

It's really good to have a group like Affirmation that lets us know we are not alone and we have supports. :) Especially hearing those stories and experiences from people helped me grow a lot stronger in this journey.


The parade was in the afternoon, Jamie and I drove to one of the metro stops and  rode to the heart of DC to meet our group. The spirit of the festival immediately dawned on us, people wore special custom (or didn't wear anything lol ) were on the train chatting; rainbow symbols were everywhere decorated on people.

It was said, closer we got to our destination, more people were on the train. By the time we left the train, we were barely able to walk because it's too crowded.




We tried to find our group but it was like finding a needle under the sea. However, our friend, Mark, caught my eyes because he was in his white shirts and tie - Mormonism's signature. Affirmation people were finishing up the signs; children also helped, putting up all the colors.









My mind was absolutely blown away when we started marching,"This city is crazy! I thought, "Crazily awesome!" It was very touching that so many people were celebrating the festival, it almost felt like all of them were proud of us being gay, they were celebrating our lives with us. They shouted "Happy Pride" and waved at everyone that's marching. My cheeks were so sore due to non stopped laughing.

You are all very welcome to visit my Facebook page to see more pictures.

https://www.facebook.com/MingandIpotogether

Gallery

I wondered what was in everyone's mind at the festival.
If my sister Chelsea was there, she might be counting how many cute guys there had. I am now going to "display" my collections for her sake.

You can't say no to cute college boys. 

Or Huskies?

More Seasonings? 

For some reason this gentleman told me he would be there all day and welcomed me to go back to find him.

I believe my friend, Quinn has one same tank! 

Bears? Perhaps. 

What about Her?

ha ha I hope ya'll find your favorite boy(s). ;) If you still couldn't find one... 

Here has a bunch!

Looking at these pictures really makes me happy! (I don't only mean the ones above. :P ) That day was full of glee! You couldn't believe how happy everybody was.

Happy Faces

 

 

 

 

He seemed to e telling me he's married. ^_^

Sassy!

Second Day of the Festival

Today we had our sister Jeanette accompany us! Jamie and Jeanette were like elementary school kids going on school field trip. Super cute.

Many organizations held booths at the festival, Affirmation had one too and was giving out free Hugs! I loved the whole free hugs idea, a simple hug really could express a lot of love and support. 

I felt a little shy though.. :') thankfully, people were kind to me and were willing to come over to hug me. Our friend, Brandon, held my arm high and shouted, "Free hugs free hugs!" Some people smiled at us and came, some people refused to have eye contact with us in case it got awkward. I felt I was on the mission again. :P

Many people asked me where was I from, two people thought I was from Japan, one said I was from Korea; a group of South Asians shouted at me and said I should definitely hang out with them and gave me candies; two gentlemen said, "Oh my gosh! Cute Thai!"and came over to hug me and gave me their numbers. :P Nobody realized I was a Taiwanese.


There were many cool people at the festival, very daring. Not only guys were topless, but also some of women. People holding hands were very common. I was glad to see how happy they were for the way they were. Undoubtedly Jamie and I will be going to Pride again next year, and the years in the rest of our lives. ^_^

I hope you enjoy this blog, and again, you may see all the pictures on my Facebook page. :)


 Thank you for readying it.

Love,
Teddy