Doan Chung-Hernandez

Good morning Christmas. I don’t know if it’s because we’re in California or because it’s Jesus’s birthday but it is a gorgeous morning. I woke up early and finished my book. I’ve been obsessed with reading lately.

We started our Christmas morning off with a family hike.

How pretty is it here!

It was a perfect 3 mile hike around the lake.

My dad was explaining to me that he loves mountains and lakes.

And then my mom chimes in and says she loves cars and money. She’s such a comedian.

We had to stop at least once for a group photo.

And of course I had to get one with my baby.

After our hike we were all so ready for some dim sum.

And tea.

After dim sum we made our way to Ranch 99. Oh how I wish Austin had a Ranch 99.

And then back home we go. I love this photo of my dad that I took.

I also love this photo of my mom checking out my dad be a photo-whore.

Selena and my dad goofing off after dinner.

Lana and Kevin are such a cute couple and this photo describes their relationship perfectly.

So the next morning Ray and I felt guilty for not working out the whole time while we’ve been here so we went out for a morning ride. It was ca-ca-ca-cold.

And when we got back we all went to Star Bucks.

I love my dad.

Afterwords we went out in search of some Uggs for my mom because tonight we are throwing my mom a surprise birthday party. Her American birthday is December 29 and since they are driving back tomorrow we decided to celebrate it tonight. We also got her a couple of Star Bucks gift cards and made the boys make a secret stop by The Cheesecake Factory to get her a cake.

All that shopping built us up an appetite. Pizza is the next stop and Lana knows the perfect place.

Hi dad.

So since we are celebrating my mom’s birthday tonight we decided to do up a special dinner for her, hot pot style. I miss hot pot meals. We use to do them all the time but I don’t ever remember having this grill in the middle of the hot pot. How cool is this.

A total Asian meal. I love love love it.

A special dinner for my beautiful mother.

Ray is tweeting about his first hot pot experience.

Hot pot dinners are fun, interactive, and healthy.

My favorite part of this photo is Kevin’s chopsticks skills in the background.

After dinner we sang happy birthday to my mom.

I haven’t seen her this happy in a long time.

Make a wish.

Look at that, she got Star Bucks gift cards.

And Uggs. Even though she knew we got her Uggs I still wrapped them up because there’s just something magical about unwrapping a gift.

Her hard working hands are filled with blood, sweat and too many tears. I wish I could give my mom more happy days like today.

My mom and dad are leaving today. Boo.

I’m not going to lie, I got my photo-whore gene from my dad.

One more meal before they leave.

My dad stuffed a bunch of quail eggs in his mouth and got scolded my Lana. She’s like, “dad, you better not put those back in the bowl. Now you have to eat them all.”

After lunch my parents and Selena packed up the car and headed south back home and since it was our last night we headed for the city. Ray was determined to get a burger from In and Out but never got a chance since we were so busy all week. Lana heard he wanted a burger so she drove us to Mels Diner for a “real” burger. Ray being too nice didn’t want to say anything and I just thought it was funny.

After Mels we got some drinks.

And after drinks we got some donuts.

And the next day Ray and I packed our bags and headed to the airport. Wow, what a fun and busy week. I miss my family already.

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This is an old video but totally worthy because it’s funny as shit. It’s a video of my mother on a kiddie ride. You could hear me laughing at her the whole time she’s freaking out and I don’t know what the hell my dad is doing. Just a dose of the Chung family.

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Reading has always been one of my favorite pass-time activities. I don’t really have any favorites but the books that I usually gravitate towards are financial books. This is the book I am currently reading. The title basically explains it all, a book about a 20 year study about the typical millionaire. A lot of people you know could very well be a millionaire, just a modest one that lives below his means and most people that you think would easily be a millionaire aren’t. They’re what the book calls “big hat not cattle.” (I love that expression by the way). They’re pretentious people living in extravagant homes, driving flashy leased out cars and wearing fancy suits but when it comes down to it the bank owns them and they ain’t got shit. This book hasn’t really taught me jack. Growing up with a frugal ass mom has taught me a lot about the secret lives of millionaires and how they really operate. Just take a look at any Chinese person living in a high populated Chinese community, the more impecunious they seem the richer they are, I promise you. The only people I’ve ever known to pay for cars right off the lot in cash is Chinese. This was the way that I thought cars were suppose to be bought when I was a kid. You buy it when you have enough dough to claim it. Make sense right? Every single Chinese person I know that owns a car has bought it with cash, in two to three separate payments so they don’t get audited and it’s the only reason they make house payments but I don’t know a single Chinese that kept making a payment on a home longer than 5 to 10 years, 10 years is pushing it. If you do know a Chinese and none of this applies to them then I promise you they are Americanized. Am I right? It’s the American way to pay for things on credit. We’re trained to be “big hat no cattle.” Take a look at me. The longer I live in American the more Americanize I’ve become, especially living in communities where I am the minority. I’ve own 4 cars in my life. The first two was paid for the “Chinese way,” 3rd car had a large down payment and basically was the beginning of me letting the “American way” put her leash on me. The down payment on my fourth car, the one I currently drive, but share ownership with the bank with, was so shamefully Americanize that I dare not ever tell my mother the real figures. It’s been 3 years I’ve been making payments on this car and my mother still can’t believe that her daughter chooses to “throw money out of her pockets,” and she never fails to remind me every time we meet. The thing is the older I get and the more credit card debt I try to dig myself out of and the more payments I have on material items I share with the banks the more I come to realize that mom’s really are almost always right. So the moral of my long rant is, take a look at your neighbor, are they Chinese because if they are they just might be a millionaire and you should make proper arrangements to befriend them.

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My mother’s birthday past, December 29 and although I called and wished her happy birthday on her birthday I wanted to document it because she’s the bravest, strongest, most beautiful women I know. Not all my good qualities are from her, some of that is all me, but a lot of the good ones are. I am fearless, witty, funny, and cheap all because of you mom. I would be nothing without you, obviously. I love you so so so freaking much and I thought about you all day on December 29th, especially every time I ate. I wish I could of been with you. Your the best mom ever. Happy Birthday!

I love you.

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So during my whole stay at the hospital I kept in contact with my family. They were so worried that they kept contemplating if they should drive down to see me or not. I really wanted them to but didn’t want to push it. I know driving from California is not easy and if your wondering why they just didn’t fly since that certainly is easier than driving, it’s because they they are fruggle, very much like me, or I’m like them. But in the end they ended up loading their car up and heading east bound to Austin Texas. Ahhhh, it certainly feels good to be loved.

My mother cooked for us everyday. I loved it.

I taught my dad how to navigate around on my laptop. He still struggles with it.

I didn’t take a lot of photos while they were down visiting, probably because I was being cared for most of the time. When I was feeling well Ray and I took my parents to Zilker Botanical Garden’s. How cute are my parents in this photo?

My adorable little sis.

Me and Kola. By the way, here’s a better photo of me and my new hairdo. I cut short ass bangs and about an inch off of the front of the sides so it was even with the rest of my hair instead of sloped. Did it all by myself one day to release some anger. It’s only hair, it’ll grow back if I don’t like it right, but right now I’m kinda digging it.

My dad got down on his knees to pose with the flowers.

Me, dad, and Kola stop at a bench for a photo shoot

Our little family.

My mom and Selena.

Taking a stroll.

Me and my sister, but the funny part is my dad in the back ground. He’s picking plants up off the ground and planning on planting them back home.

Now look at him, he’s posing with them. What a goof ball.

I don’t know why he even wants them, they look like tiny birds nest.

Looks like this photo is taken from up top but no, Ray’s just tall, especially compared to little Asian people. I love this photo because while I’m trying to secretly be in their photo my dad is still picking up plants off the floor that fell from the branches of trees.

Don’t know why there’s one dino in the front of the botanical garden, but there is and I kinda dig it.

Afterwards we all went to the mall. Hey Austin does have a mall. Ray and I have been trying to figure that out since we’ve moved here.

Coming here was risky because my dad loves to take photos inside the mall, especially during Christmas time. I think it’s all the decoration and lights that put him in the spirit.

And just like that they’re heading back but before they do they make a stop at H.E.B. for some water. I begged and pleaded for them not to go but in the end I got tired of begging. My mother had things to do back home. It’s not often I get to see them. I love them so much for coming all this way to see me and I love that my mom is such a mom and cooks, cleans, and takes care of me. It was nice.

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In case your wondering, I’m not in the photo it’s because I was taking the photo. Story of my life. For Thanksgiving this year Ray and I flew to California to be with the Chungs. Flying was an absolute disaster going both ways. Do yourself a favor and don’t ever fly United. Our flight was canceled without any notice. However we were able to catch flight 88 which actually got us there 15 minutes earlier. Kinda weird because 88 is our number and for some reason it always finds it’s way into our lives.

My mother lives in the kitchen.

My dad got Ray some T-shirts from China. All of which are too small.

Lana and Kevin couldn’t make it for Thanksgiving because they were flying to Arizona so we celebrated Thanksgiving with them a few days before.

Chilling on the couch with full bellies.

In his spare time my dad likes to pretend like he’s 14 years old and listen to music on his on his headphone while watching the video on his little television alone in his room.

My mornings are spent with my dad. One morning him and I went jogging. I didn’t bring any jogging shoes so I went in my boots. True story. On this particular morning my dad and I went on a very long bike ride. It had to be something like 45 miles. All I know is we were far, far from home.

My dad led the way. He took me down dangerous roads that most dads would think twice about taking their child, like the freeway. But the danger was well worth it because soon we came upon a small hidden bike path that went for miles and miles and miles along a canal.

My dad is adorable.

Like I said, my dad led the way so taking a photo of his backside was my only option.

We took a couple of breaks along the way.

Alright, so after like 20 miles or so we reach the end of the path and all that is in front of us is a tall dam across the street. So this is the end of the road, that is until my dad spots people hiking up the dam, and then he takes a closer look and yes, there’s people up there, walking and jogging. My dad being the curious monkey that he is wants to check it out but he needs the green light from me. “I really want to go up there, but we’re already so far from home, no we shouldn’t go up there huh?” he says to me. Honestly, I didn’t really want to go up there. I was tired, hungry, far from home, I knew my mom and Selena was probably at home thinking we’d be home any minute now, and we still had at least 20 miles to ride back home. But my dad has never been this close to the dam so if my dad wants to go up that freaking dam then we’re gonna go up that freaking dam. I grab my bike and say, “come on lets go,” and ride across the street toward the dam. “Huh, we’re gonna go,” my dad was so excited. We took a photo when we reached the top of the dam.

I know it doesn’t look like it but we were pretty high up.

We road for miles and miles on that freaking dam.

And then my dad notices a lake and a park to the left and of course he wants to go check it out. “Wow, it looks really pretty over there. I want to go see it. Do you want to go see it?” No I don’t want to go see it, but I say, “yeah, dad lets go check it out.”

My dad is the biggest photo whore ever. He wants me to take photos of him every time we reach a new destination so he can remember all the places that he’s been. My dad’s been to a lot of places. I think he’s on his 3rd or 4th passport. His last trip to China got prolong because he had to order more pages for his passport.

He’s a poser too.

We take more photos.

My dad is the swan whisperer.

We take our bikes down further and come upon a beach, man made obviously, but there was sand and everything.

We stop to take photos and then to sit on the beach and talk about life.

My dad tells me that today he’s really happy and if it weren’t for me he wouldn’t have came this far. I’m sure he would of eventually found it but it was nice to hear.

And then we head back home.

We stop for one drink break and this is where I make the mistake of telling my dad that I like to ride fast. I told him that because I wanted to get home as soon as possible. He rides fast the whole way down the bike path, so fast that he’s literally like 500 yards in front of me. Hello, my dad is 64 years old. What the fuck!

Later that day we head to my oldest sister’s home so we can spend time with her and my niece, Sianna. Sianna made a turkey out of food. She’s a creative kid.

The next day Jeff, my sister’s husband comes over with their daughter Sianna for Thanksgiving.

Lots of Chinese food this year.

I love my family and miss them everyday.

I love tofu too.

I made vegan lettuce wraps. Thanks for the recipe Bea. It was the only dish that was completely demolished.

My dad was happy Jeff came, even though Lien didn’t.

The girls after dinner.

Saying good-bye to Jeff.

And the next day we flew home. What a great trip. We have so much to be thankful for. Hope ya’ll had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

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Thalia, the Memory Lane chick, surprised me at 11:00 the next morning and said I had to be out of there by noon. I guess it’s a good thing I woke up early to clean. Thank God for my mom and sisters; they were amazing with all the help. We packed up the car and everyone parted ways. Later a bunch of us met back up in our itty bitty apartment. I’m certain that was the most people our apartment will ever hold at one time. My family soon took off to catch their flights back home and my friends and I just decided to play it by ear, considering the long weekend we just endured. We all walked over to Kona Grill, just down the street from where we live, to grab some food and drinks.

Although my family had already taken off I still didn’t know how the hell I would manage the sleeping arrangements. Finding a place for everyone to sleep in our tiny ass apartment was like watching 30 clowns step out of a smart car. Seriously, there was me, Ray, Jackie, Bea, Guav, Val, Becky, Monica, Heather, and Jen and our apartment is maybe 750 square foot. I’m the type to just say fuck it, we’ll make it happen because there’s no way Ray or myself would ever ask our friends to go get a place.

But luckily my friends decided to rent a hotel close to the airport so they could hop on the shuttle to catch their flight in the morning. After drinks and food, what else is there to do but to get tattoos.

We’re a couple of bad ass chicks, so we decided to get a tattoo to show how bad ass we really were.

Actually, we’re not really that bad ass. All of us but Jen, decided to get a tattoo, an eternity sign, to symbolize our friendship.  I think I was the only tattoo virgin and that is why I volunteered to go first. Seriously, who wants to be a virgin? Let me cleanse myself of that purity.

My new tattoo. I love it. Now normally I would be a little more weary of who tattoos me and what the tattoo is going to be, which is why this is my first tattoo. But I have always loved the eternity sign because it looks like a sideways 8 and the number 8 is my all time favorite number, hence 08.08.08. This tattoo has meaning to me because it represents the friendship between my friends and I and that bond that can never broken. Also, it’s pretty retard and fuck up free so it makes a perfect first tattoo to get on the spur of the moment.

Jen didn’t get anything because she’s in the process of finding salvation and Val got retarded stars. No joke, they were retarded stars.

The next day I picked Becky up and dropped her off at her friend, Autumn’s house since she wasn’t leaving for another week. Bea’s a crawdad freak, well not really but she certainly likes to eat em. So where else to go but the Boiling Pot.

Poor Guav is only able to eat corn and potatoes and then works diligently for Bea pealing the shell off each crawdad, like a kid in a sweat shop, only white, and grownup and working for an Asian, the way all sweat shops should be ran.

The next day we all drove up to Dallas to Ben’s humble abode. He has the cutest twins ever, a boy and a girl and they’re both hyper as fuck.

But, I guess so are the grown ups.

We also went shopping because Bea has the coolest job ever; she gets to shop for a living and no she’s not hiring.

Then we all went out to eat with Kuya Ben.

And of course his twins, Lyric . . .

And Cloe.

Val at our house.

Val Is Funny from Doan Chung on Vimeo.

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Well, not right after but eventually. We had to mingle first and get everyone liquored up enough.

Mr. and Mrs. Hernandez. I’m a Hernandez now, I have a hard core Mexican name. If my grandmother knew about this she would roll over in her grave, both of them; I’m sure.

Don’t let our innocent faces fool you. We have been known to be completely insane and reckless. Hahahah. I love these girls and I couldn’t tell you how rad it was to have all four of them here. It’s been a while ladies since we’ve all been in the same room at the same time, ages actually. And now were all here together at my wedding!!! Jen, Heather, Me, Monica, and Becky.

Taking some time out with my little niece.

Me and my big sis, Lana, aka Lulu.

The happy married couples. Tell me guys, is it true that after marriage you guys get no more blow jobs? Because I’m really looking forward to that.

That Toph is a weird one. I’m sure he was dropped on the head one too many times as a child.

Everyone should have a friend like Jack. But with that being said, it’s just not possible, she’s one of those souls that just can’t be duplicated. Which is why she’s my angle and I love her like a fat kid loves cake, but a lot more.

Smile Jen. No salvation for you tonight. Tonight we party.

Oh no, what is Kuya Ben doing.

Sure is a lot of big Mexicans in this photo. I’m feeling out numbered and a little borderline midget.

Broom and his lovely girlfriend Penny Kim.

My sister just recently got married to Kevin and I couldn’t tell you how happy I am to have him as a brother inlaw. They’re perfect for each other. Just look at his serious face.

Jackie I don’t know what Dirk’s been putting in your head but he’s got it all wrong. Golden Dragon for life! Fuck Wachoiva.

Kevin and my mom. Whatcha writing there mom, it better be good; it’s going in my scrap-book.

Oh Marci, if only we had stayed in San Francisco we would totally be BFF’s by now, having sleep overs, contemplating on ways to torture the boys, baking, cooking, having long, deep talks about money . . .

Val and Guav, Um, Lo Ciento, no habla Espanol. Perdon.

BFF’s. If you guys were here so I would hug you so hard it would turn your butt-hole inside out.

The Semmlers, Issac, Tiffany and Chris. These are our game night friends and apparently our only friends here in Austin so be extra nice to them people; we’d like to keep em around, at least long enough to find their replacements.

Kayla and Kimmy’s daughter, sorry, I forgot her name. Peace be with you too.

Beau and Jackie, here’s the keys to the back of my truck. I kid, I kid. But seriously, the car’s parked over there.

I love my sister’s, no matter how dysfunctional you guys turned out. I don’t know why I turned out normal any you two have slight down syndrome maybe God loves me more than you.

A few of my favorite people, yes that includes Kola.

After much mingling we had our first dance as husband and wife. The reason why we’re laughing here is because Jackie rushed up from her table to go find the camcorder and fell flat on her ass.

Ray had problems taking off my garter. Bite it like a little money baby.

Selena caught the bouquet and Beau caught the garter.

Chris gave a surprisingly nice speech. Awe thanks Chris. Honey, listen to your best friend, save the money and I’m always right.

Bea and Jack also gave a really nice speech/skit.

Lana gave a kung fu panda, I’ll kill your family speech.

Beau and Becky also gave a speech, but for some reason I’m not able to find any photos of that. After all the speeches it was cake time. Yes, that is a ninja and a Mexican wrestler, and yes those are our wedding cakes.

The ninja represents me and the Mexican wrestler is Ray. Oh, and this is our vegan cake. Not the prettiest but I definitely think it tasted the best.

We’re feeding each other with a knife, yeah, that’s real smart.

Just look at our anxious little audience. I feel like a celebrity.

We had originally wanted to smash cake in each others faces but I guess when it came time to do it, it just didn’t happen.

We even manage to get a little dancing in.

Here’s my sweet air guitar move

I don’t know how it all started but somehow we all manage to got almost everyone at the wedding to take not one shot but several shots.  Here we’re passing out shots.

A toast!

And soon after that it seemed as though we were all liquored up enough to go pool jumping.  I’m pretty sure it was me who screamed, “Lets go pool jumping!”  And like sheep they all followed me.

We even convinced Amet and Anthony to jump.

Sexy Ass

And played chicken.  I play for keeps.

And then we all just hung out in the hot tub.

Tell me this wasn’t the best wedding ever.

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