The months had dragged on slowly and the school year seemed to never end. Eventually, passports were made, flights were paid for, conversational Korean was learned, school was out, and suitcases were packed. 

Our parents had arranged for us to arrive in Korea two days before the concert so that we would get the chance to adjust to the new time zone. The flight would be leaving today at 2:30. The moment I had been waiting for was only hours away.

I sat impatiently near my front door, waiting for Kira's red van to pull up and take me to the airport. My mother was hugging me and wishing me good luck. My father made sure I had enough money on hand to sustain me through the trip and my siblings were upset that they couldn't tag along. My younger sister had a crush on Jisung and requested me to bring back something from him. I promised her I would try my best. 

The doorbell rang and I was smothered in hugs and kisses on my way out. Kira and Sydney helped pile my suitcases in the trunk of the car and Kira's mom drove us off. With permission from the driver, we blasted K-pop from the speakers and sang along at the top of our lungs. We had so much energy that it was practically tangible.

Kira turned around to face me and Sydney in the back seat.

"Okay, so I've got a list of places in Seoul that we need to visit while we're there."

"What do we got?" I asked.

She pulled out a paper from her backpack, "I looked these up on Google. The one I put down for our first visit is the Gyeongbuk- I mean Gyeongbok...gung. Yeah, the Gyeongbokgung Palace. Number two is the Chang...deokgung Palace. Number three, the Bongeunsa Temple. Number four, the Bukchon Hanok Village. Number five, the Jogyesa Temple. Number six, the Myeongdong Shopping Street. Number seven, the Bukhansan National Park. Number eight, the Cheonggyecheon Stream. Number nine-"

"How many do you have on this list?" Sydney raised an eyebrow.

"Twenty, but we don't have to hit them all. Some of them cost money, so we'll have to narrow down the list later."

"They all sound amazing." I sighed, "This is a dream come true. I really can't wait to get there guys!" 

"I know right? This'll be my chance to find a hot Korean boy to marry." Kira winked and we laughed.

Kira's mom turned to us for a quick second as we reached a stoplight.

"You better come back with a Korean boy's number or I'm going to be severely disappointed with all of you."

We laughed and promised that we'd obey the order wholeheartedly. It would be our main social goal. 

The car pulled up to the Fresno airport and we unloaded our luggage. This wasn't my first time flying, so I was somewhat familiar with how things would go. We handed in our luggage and then walked over to security. Kira's mom wasn't going to be let in past that point, so we said our goodbyes and got in line behind many others.

"How long is this flight supposed to take again?" Sydney asked.

"My mom said about 16 hours," I answered.

She groaned, "At least I brought my drawing stuff with me."

"I just brought a book."

Kira looked at me, "Which one?"

"The Michael Vey one you're letting me borrow."

"Ah, almost done?"

"Yeah. It's freaking amazing!"

She smirked, "Told you."

I stuck my tongue out at her playfully and we laughed a bit. I knew the flight wouldn't be too horrible; we had each other to keep ourselves entertained. There were very rare moments when all of us couldn't think of anything to talk about. 

Sydney smacked both of our arms frantically, "Guys, guys, look."

She somewhat slyly pointed to a security guard.

"He looks like Haechan."

We stared at him for a while, waiting for the man to turn around. When he did, Kira gasped.

"Dude, he totally does. That's scary."

I laughed a little, "Man, I wish it really was him. That would have been hilarious."

"Maybe it's his secret twin brother," Sydney suggested jokingly.

After 20 minutes, we got through all of the security and luckily nothing was confiscated. All we had to do was wait another 30 minutes for us to board our plane and take off for Korea. We passed the time by making up funny stories about why some of the people were here at the airport. I noticed a lady wearing a leopard print jacket and leaned back in my chair.

"This woman had always looked up to Cruella Devil ever since she was a young child. She's the head honcho of an underground pelt smuggling company, but recently got caught due to her ex-boyfriend. He sold her out to the mafia because they had some of the finest chocolate ever crafted in the cosmos. She's trying to move to Wakanda where she will successfully become America's Next Top Model."

Sydney and Kira laughed.

"What the crap was that?" Sydney asked.

I flipped my hair in an overly dramatic way, "My incredible imagination. Where you amazed?"

She shook her head and I frowned, "Now it's your turn, Kira."

Kira looked around for a while.

"See that Asian guy in the corner with the guitar? He's going to meet up with a professional guitar player and become his apprentice so he can join a band. This'll be the only way he can make money for his two kids. His wife recently died of a terminal illness and he hasn't found a stable job since. Playing music has been the only way for him to cope with her passing."

Sydney and I slowly turned towards Kira.

"You know..." Sydney said, "The point of the game is to be funny."

Kira shrugged and flashed a bright smile, "I know."

Sydney shook her head, "Fine, my turn. That baby over there in the stroller is on a top-secret mission. The parents don't know it, but he's the James Bond equivalent of newborns. The secret baby society sent him since he's their best agent. He needs to overrun our airplane so they can transport binkies to the less fortunate babies all around the world."

Then she pointed to a tall, muscular man not too far from us.

"That man is a bionic super suit with a baby inside from a different secret baby society sent to stop baby James Bond from delivering the binkies. He wants them all to himself."

The man turned around and looked at us. Sydney had accidentally been too loud. 

We struggled to suppress our laughter and pretended to act natural. It grew harder to stay still as each second passed. Eventually, he assumed he had heard nothing and walked away. Once he was out of earshot we roared with laughter. My stomach started to hurt, but I couldn't stop.

"Man, that was close," Sydney said as she began to get a hold of herself.

A woman's voice announced over the speakers that our flight was now open to the passengers.

"Here we go guys," I said.

We grabbed our carry-ons and walked over to the line leading to our plane.

It was a rather nice plane compared to the ones I had been on previously. Clean, spacey, friendly flight attendants, not so creepy fellow passengers. I ended up getting the window seat which was a major bonus. Nothing quite beats the view of looking out over the Earth from hundreds of miles in the air. I attempted to take a few pictures from the window as we took off, but none of them quite captured the scene the way human eye could. I wish there was a way to fix that. 

After a few hours of reading and throwing things at Kira and Sydney, I got really tired and took a nap. My dream consisted of chucking pumpkins to defend myself against an angry grandmother goblin who didn't appreciate that I had sold a popcorn necklace to her granddaughter, embarrassing myself on stage because I had forgotten the dance moves to "BOOMBOOM" by Seventeen, and playing hide and go seek underwater in a relative's secret aquarium. 

I opened my eyes slowly when I felt something on my face.

"Crud, you woke her up," I heard Sydney say.

I looked at Kira who had her finger on my nose.

"What are you doing?"

"Nothing," She smiled.

"Uhuh. Sure," I laughed a little, "Get your hand off of my face, you weirdo. How long was I out?"

"A couple hours more than us," Sydney looked at the time on her phone. "We have maybe three more hours before we land."

"Three more hours?" I groaned.

Sitting in these chairs started to become torture. I wanted to go do something active for a little while, which was really saying something since physical activity tends to be a less frequent choice of entertainment for me. 

As if by magic, we managed to keep ourselves occupied for the last few hours of the trip. I thought it would have been a painful process, but with Kira and Sydney, nothing can be boring for long. Everything turns into games and jokes.

When the pilot announced that we would start our descent, I felt like praising the Lord. We danced in our chairs and quietly chanted about Korea to the tune of "We just got a letter" from Blue's Clues. Our energy was starting to resurface and I was worried that we might scare the other passengers with our fangirling, though they hardly seemed to care.

The plane landed and we practically ran off. The sight was amazing. It was 11:47 at night and all of the city lights were twinkling like stars. Seoul was beautiful. If New York City and Dali, China were to have a baby, it would be Seoul. The buildings were tall and industrialized, yet gorgeous and flowed with the nature around it, all the while expressing Korea's unique culture. 

After claiming our baggage and leaving the airport, we hailed a taxi and Kira told the driver the address of the summer home. She was the most fluent in Korean out of the three of us.

I had always admired the structure of Asian buildings. Getting to see them in real life instead of on a 2-dimensional screen was mind-blowing. I wanted to stay here forever. Two weeks wasn't going to be enough for me to get my fill.

After another hour of driving, we reached the summer home. It was amazing. I almost wanted to call it a small mansion instead of a home. We squealed as we ran up to the front porch. The owner, who couldn't have been more than 67, opened the door and we bowed.

"Eoseo oseyo," the man said and gestured for us to come in.

He introduced himself as Gwon Eunkyhung. 

Kira bowed, "Mannaseo bangawoyo."

We then introduced ourselves in our Korean names which we had made in the early stages of our K-pop obsession. Kira was Ki Minseo, Sydney was Kim Nana, and I was Park Jisu.

Mr. Gwon was very polite and complimented us on our Korean. He handed us our copy of the house keys, gave a quick tour of the place, and explained the rules for housekeeping which he had printed out on a piece of paper and left on the kitchen counter just for us. I couldn't understand some of the things he said, but I was at least able to tell which room was what. When he was done, he left and we were on our own. We ran to our rooms and jumped onto our beds.

"Guys!!! We made it!!" Kira shouted.

We danced and shouted and partied. A bit of unpacking was done, but not all of it. Despite sleeping through most of the plane ride, I felt tired and I could see the others were too. We got ready for bed and set alarms to wake up at 7:00 am so we could start checking out the sights Kira had written down on her list. Our fantastic adventure would begin tomorrow.

I sprawled out on my bed and, at first, it was hard to calm down. My thoughts were running too fast for me to relax. Seoul was overwhelming me.

This trip was going to the best one I would ever take in my life. I could feel it. Something about Korea was special, very special. It was as if we had connected to each other within this short amount of time.

Then suddenly, a wave of exhaustion fell over me and I managed to finally sleep.