A CepStar is Born

We are very ecstatic and joyful to announce the birth of a beautiful baby girl Cepler on August 29, 2010 at 11:28 pm.  She's a gorgeous little lady who weighed in at 7 lbs, 4 oz.  Height is not yet determined.  Mom and baby are doing absolutely perfectly.  They have a beaming father/husband.  Mom absolutely dominated labor. 

Information about a name will come later.  In the meantime, we're all going to recover.

Love,
Seren, Craig & Baby Girl Cepler

The Best 30th Birthday EVER!

Well, I've reached a milestone- I turned the big 3-0 on Friday, April 9, 2010. Thanks to my wonderful husband, my birthday celebration extended about five days.

It really began on Thursday, April 8 when my parents came to town en route to Asia. They were to fly from JFK to Hong Kong early Friday, so they slept over in our apartment on our incredibly comfortable Aerobed on Thursday night. What a treat to have my parents hand-deliver my father's home-made birthday card!

My actual bday was a rainy but fun day. At school, I helped chaperone a chorus trip, and my colleague invited the chorus to sing happy birthday to me. It was the most beautiful rendition of the tune I'd ever heard, harmonies and all! Those high school singers are talented :) Thanks to Facebook, and the fact that I'm 'friends' with many of my colleagues on Facebook, a number of teachers knew it was a my special day and wished me a happy birthday in the hallways. A few students overheard and so my two afternoon classes sang to me at the start of class. It was very cute. Play rehearsal was just fine, and then Craig and I went home and I opened my birthday cards from my in-laws and from my grandma and checked my voicemail and my Facebook page. How well-loved I felt listening to and reading kind birthday messages from friends near and far! For dinner, Craig made the most delicious baked ziti with whole wheat pasta- I mean, this was one delicious dish! Dessert? An ice cream pie he had made with two of my favorite ice cream flavors (with crunched Oreos between the layers of ice cream).

It was a lovely 30th birthday, and the celebrating continued...

Saturday night, Craig took me out for a surprise birthday dinner. He told me that he'd be wearing a suit and that I should dress accordingly (this proved a bit of a challenge with my new shape, but I found a nice ensemble). I didn't know where we'd be dining that night until we walked into the Four Seasons Hotel on 57th Street: Craig surprised me with dinner at L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon, a gorgeous French restaurant. Not only was the food magnificent (as attractive on the plate as it was delicious to the taste), but it was such a treat to be treated to such impeccable service. We knew were were someplace special when we overhead a gentleman at a table nearby announce to his dining guests that was the newest and youngest member of the Board of Trustees of the Rhodes Scholarship Foundation (or something like that). The birthday dinner was truly a special treat!

Sunday, April 11, after celebrating our friend's engagement at a low-key party nearby, we invited friends over for ice cream sundaes! How fun to celebrate my birthday with yummy sundaes and good friends :) But wait, there's more... Craig further surprised me (sort of) with tickets to see Ben Folds in concert at NYC's Town Hall on Tuesday, April 13. What an incredibly talented performer Folds is!

And did I mention the beautiful blue Sapphire necklace Craig bought me for my birthday? I wore it all weekend- I'm wearing it now as I write about the fun birthday I celebrated with my wonderful, loving, generous husband.

30 sure is off to a pretty fantastic start!

The Next Step

The blog has been down, but now it's coming back to life because WE'RE HAVING A BABY!!  Due September 4.  Maybe we'll be good about updating the blog.  I hope.

Love,
Craig

Epilogue to New York stories

Remember how I helped out our Korean dry cleaner by translating a message for one of the dry cleaner's customers? Well, when I contacted the dry cleaner again recently about Craig's shirts, the woman on the phone told me that she told her other customer what I suggested she tell him. She reported that everything is now resolved, and that the customer remained her customer. She thanked me for my help. I was so happy to be of service!

A couple of New York City stories

1. Stereotypical though it may be, our drycleaner/tailor here on the Upper West Side is Korean. I stopped in the other day to tell the couple who own and run the shop about our recent trip to Korea (oh, and also to have a dress altered). We chatted in Korea and English and I enjoyed discussing my visit to their homeland with them.

Before I left, the woman asked me for a favor. She had a problem with a customer’s jacket and she was initially unable to successfully explain the situation to the customer. After telling me the story in a mix of Korean and English, I ascertained what she needed to convey to her customer. I wrote down a few sentences in English that she hopefully will use to effectively communicate with her customer. I hope I was helpful. I was thrilled to be able to use my Korean to help a small business owner.

2. Only in New York City is a doorman paternal... I neglected to check the weather report (am I really my mother’s daughter?!) before dressing for school on Friday morning. I’m apparently in denial that summer is over as I put on capri pants, open-toe shoes, and a short-sleeved shirt to wear to school on Friday (Sept. 11).

When I entered our building lobby and saw that it was raining outside, I paused. Should I go back up to our apartment on the tenth floor to grab an umbrella?

As I stood in the lobby contemplating the time it would take me to ride the elevator up and back down, the doorman said to me, “You can’t wear that today.” “What?!” I asked, shocked that my doorman was offering unsolicited fashion advice. “At least change your shoes,” he continued, “it’s cold and rainy today.” Then I realized that the doorman was looking out for me, dressed for 75 degrees and sunny but confronted with 50 degrees and rainy. “Thanks,” I said, appreciative of the concern, “but I’ll be fine.”

And I was chilly all day at school. Maybe next time I'll accept the doorman's dressing advice.

Paris & Finland

Enjoy.

Slideshows:




Albums themselves:

Around the World - Paris

Around the World - Finland

Why THIS was the summer for our trip (from Seren's perspective)

A new school year begins tomorrow (Thursday, September 10, 2009) and I've spent the past two days at school getting ready for it. I realized that this past summer was THE summer for this trip for so many reasons. From my professional perspective, it was just perfect timing. It is the first time in my five years teaching at White Plains High that I am not teaching a new course. I have the same course load as last year, which alleviates a great deal of summer planning. I have curricula, lesson plans, materials, and ideas from my previous years (plus the confidence of having four years of teaching under my belt), so I could really enjoy our travels and not have my mind in my curriculum building.

Have said that, I have been working my tail off since Monday night preparing for the new year, but it's small price to pay for ten worry-free weeks of travel. Anyway, lesson planning late at night is a good way to deal with jet lag.

Speaking of my teaching....I've said that the best part of being a teacher is having the schedule: built-in vacation and summers off so I can do things like travel around the world with my husband. Perhaps I overuse superlatives, but I could also argue that the/another best part about being a teacher is the fact that every September offers a clean slate. How wonderful to make a fresh start every fall. As my 'roommate' and I set up our classroom and I prepared lesson plans and teaching materials for the first few days of school, I marveled at how great it is to have the chance to improve on my work with such regularity. Every Labor Day, while ridden with nerves and anxiety, offers the hope of a great school year. As my colleague says, "Every year we get a 'do-over'!"

Anyway, this was THE summer to travel and I am so glad that Craig and I seized the opportunity.

Our Israel Photos

Are all here:



Also here.

Others to get posted as we can do it.

Most popular tune everywhere...

Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours" [Here in Korea!]. We heard this song in nearly every country (in English). It was hilarious.

We also saw the movie poster for them Pixar flick "UP" in nearly every country. It was funny to see the poster with the same image (see below) in different languages (Hebrew, French, Korean, Chinese, Thai, Aussie English). It was clearly THE flick of the summer.

Fun with Dingos

Reef Videos

This is likely the last post. These are videos from the our day on the Great Barrier Reef. Pictures will eventually follow.

Tectonic Plates

So when we got married, we registered for a nice set of Villeroy and Boch plates.  We thought they were very pretty.  They are now our meat set.  Soon after picking them out, we found out that our friend Aliza had those plates too.  Then after we got married, we found out that our friend Jenny has picked them as her dairy set.  It was all fun and we had a good time.

Upon arriving here, we learned that the same set is the Rogers' meat set.  More than that, they are Tammy's (daughter #1) dairy set and Jo's (daughter #2) meat set.  It's quite the small world, platery speaking.

In case you want to join the club, this is the set.

And now, to bed.

"I have always depended on the kindness of strangers"

My last project when I lived in Korea in 2003 involved directing a production of Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire" (in English) with students at Dongshin University in Naju. Blanche DuBois' final line in the play is the powerful "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers." I find the line quite meaningful, particularly in reference to my travels. Our experience 'seeing the world' this summer is no exception- our experiences were enhanced and facilitated by the kindness of strangers and friends.

So, thank you to those who helped us on our journey.

Thanks for the family and friends who offered travel advice. Thanks to our parents for being supportive of and excited for us. Thanks to Craig's mother for being our travel agent. Thanks to Leah and Zac for loaning us travel backpacks. Thanks to Hildy for bringing our books and things home from Israel. Thanks to our Pardes friends for making each Israeli Shabbat and our experience at Pardes special and wonderful. Thanks to Max/Mordechi and Lee for a fun lunch with the girls. Thanks to Pascale and her family for having us in their home for a Shabbat dinner in Paris. Thanks to David who traveled from Nice to meet us in Paris. Thanks to the Ceplers for taking us out for a delicious meal when our time in Paris overlapped. Thanks to Kate and Jen for taking us out on our first two nights in Korea. Thanks to Sukyoung for showing us the top of Namsam Park and the Seoul Tower. Thanks to Neil and Annette for meeting us late at night because it was the only time they could spare in their busy schedules. Thanks to my host family for opening their home to us and showing us around Naju and Gwangju for three days. Thanks to Dr. Lee for taking us around Damyang and the Bamboo Park. Thanks to Mrs. Lee for cooking us a delicious dinner. Thanks to the many kind and generous Korean strangers we met who offered us directions, food, drinks, rides, help and smiles. Thanks to the Epsteins for hosting us for a Shabbat dinner in Hong Kong. Thanks to Elaine and Joe for taking us around Kowloon. Thanks to Chabad of Bangkok for boisterous and fun Shabbat meals. Thanks to the front desk of the Buddy Lodge for overnighting our passports and my iPod to Koh Samet. Thanks to the Cantor and his wife for inviting us over when we first arrived in Sydney. Thanks to the Levinsons for establishing a special friendship with the Rogers. Thanks to the Rogers family for opening their home and generously being our guide in Melbourne. Thanks to Ros and Richard for being warm and kind hosts, and thanks to Jo and Darren for being our travel companions and tour guides.

I am certain that I inadvertently omitted others who facilitated our journey. The truth is that Craig and I are lucky to have each other, but we relied on the kindness of others to make this trip the dream-come-true that it has been.

Thank you.

Numbers

Sadly, the end of our trip has arrived. With that sad fact in mind, I decided to compile some facts regarding this experience. For those who like numbers, here we go:

68- Total number of days we are away (June 28-September 3)
21- Hours of flying time (not including our layover in LA) it will take us to travel from Melbourne to New York
16- Different beds in which we slept (excluding red eye flights)
15- Different airports through which we flew
14- Total number of flights, including 3 domestic flights (2 within Australia and 1 within the US)
10- Articles of custom-made clothing (I count suits as two articles: pants/skirt and jacket)
8- Packages we (had) sent to the US during our trip, including three by vendors/shop keepers
7- Countries we visited (excluding the UK and Finland where we merely had stopovers)
7- Languages we heard (and often spoke) in our travels
6.5- Currencies we handled (the half is for Cambodia, where the US dollar is most commonly accepted and distributed, including by Cambodian ATMs. We did get a hold of a few Cambodia Riel, though)
6- Different airlines we flew
4- Underground subway systems we rode (we did use other public transportation systems, but only four underground subways)
4- Continents we visited on this trip (6 total in our lives- we previously visited South America and Africa)
3- New Visas in our passports
3- Massages we enjoyed (one foot and leg, and two total body)
2- Times we changed our trip while traveling (we added a day in Thailand, thus landing in Sydney a day later than we'd originally planned, and we added a day in Australia thereby omitting the day layover in LA--- thank you to our travel agent for helping with this!)

It's really been a dream...

The End of the Road, by Craig

It's 1130 pm on Wednesday night in Melbourne.  Seren is packing.  I'm researching GST refunds and baggage allowances.  We've tracked many miles/kilometers over the last 9 1/2 weeks.  It's been lots of fun and more of adventure than I've ever had in my life.  I've seen quite a diversity of life and nature. 

Today, we went to the Melbourne Holocaust Museum, Jewish Museum, the Melbourne Synagogue, ate lunch in Federation Square, visited the Immigration Museum (Seren did the tour, I did some ultimately-fruitless research in the library) and jump-started the Australian economy (even if it never hit the recession according to today's news).  Afterwards, we went for our last fish and chips and beer meal with Jo and Darren, with Danzi and Jamie joining us for the latter part of the meal.  When we got back home, the Rogers presented us with a beautiful Aussie challah cover (it says Shabbat Kodesh, I think, and has a koala on it). 

This has been a great time.  For some final inventory which Seren will likely expound upon: I used four deodorants, finished one toothpaste, bought one set of q-tips on the road (Melbourne; and remembered that generic q-tips are never the way to go), bought lots of clothing and drank quite a few beers.  And we took probably 2000 photos and posted on the blog more than 160 times.

We saw Korean baseball and Aussie Rules Football; ate Korean sashimi and Aussie and Israeli sushi; sweated in the Dead Sea, Hong Kong, Cambodia and Thailand; went to spas or got massages in Israel (the Dead Sea), Korea, Thailand and Cambodia; drank Israeli, French, Korean, Cambodian, Thai and Aussie beers; used Aussie q-tips; got rained on in Israel (no more than 4 total drops of rain), France, Korea, Thailand and Australia; and had fun everywhere.  We did more than we could ever have imagined.

But alas, the real world calls and it is time to return home.  Until next time...

Love,
Craig

Jodie Foster at WPHS

Joanna emailed me that Jodie Foster is filming a movie at White Plains High School. Well, I just checked my WP email in preparation for the start of the new school year and found an email from the head of the Fine Arts Department in WP. He is looking for me to recommend students to serve as extras in the film. How fun! Perhaps I'll get Jodie to talk to my theatre students about life as a pro!
Never a dull moment...

All good things must come to an end....

We have had a most wonderful time in Melbourne! The Rogers have been so fun and helpful and kind and we are having a ball exploring Melbourne both on our own and with them. Today, for instance, we went into the city, checked out the Melbourne Museum and the Old Melbourne Gaol solo, and then went to Philip Island for the Penguin Parade with Jo and Darren- we had a blast!

Anyway, tomorrow (Wednesday) is our last full day in Oz. We plan to see the Holocaust Museum, the Jewish Museum with Ros before we go into the city alone. We'll meet Jo, Darren, and maybe Danzi for dinner. Then we'll pack and get ready for goodbyes.... All good things must come to end, I suppose, but I'm not super keen on returning to reality just yet.

One funny note about today: Adjacent to the Old Melbourne Gaol is a recently-used jail that we were invited to tour. The tour was not a history lesson, though. Essentially, we experienced what it would be like to get arrested on the streets of Melbourne. We were treated roughly, required to follow directions just so, and put in cells. The experience was funny because it was quite realistic. The jail cell was in use up until 1994, so we are not talking Alcatraz here. It was funky, but the history part of the Old Melbourne Gaol was more interesting, to be honest.

The highlight of the day was without a doubt the penguins, and I know Craig already wrote about it. Perhaps they would be better than 'roos, especially since they spend so much time out of the home/burrow and in the sea...

Hope all is well!

love, seren

We Deserve a Nobel Peace Prize

For this:

N. Korea Reopens Border With South Korea

SEOUL — North Korea restored regular border crossings for traffic going to South Korean factories in the North on Tuesday, while its leader, Kim Jong-il, reiterated his government's call for a peace treaty with the United States.

We'll take the credit for opening the doors of diplomacy.  You're welcome world.

Love,
Us

(from the Nytimes on 9/1/09)

The March of the Penguins

And the rest of our day.  We started at the Melbourne Museum where we saw exhibits on Aborginals of Australia and the development of Melbourne.  Next, we went to the Old Melbourne Gaol (now spelled "Jail") where we toured the Melbourne equivalent of Alcatraz.

And we followed that off with a 2 hour drive with Jo and Darren to Phillips Island for the Penguin Parade.  About 45 minutes after sunset each night, approximately 500 fairy penguins march from the ocean to their burrowing holes in the ground for a few days.  There, they mate and molt.  And they are adorable.  Much more adorable than Burgess Meredith penguin.  This parade lasts for almost an hour and we were able to enjoy the penguins' daily march.  Seren was ready to eat them up.  I had to remind her that they probably don't taste so well.  Unfortunately, we were unable to take any pictures because camera flashes scare the little guys, but this is what they looked like:

Anyway, tomorrow is our last day and we'll enjoy it with some more museums and shopping and fish and chips.

Love,
Us

MELBOURNE

I was warned before we came here that Melbourne is pronounced like "Melbin," and I have now realized that this is because the Aussie accent is in some ways similar to a Boston accent.  That is, both accents drop "Rs."  So, just as I would never call Boston Harbor "Boston Harbaa," I will also return to call Melbourne "Melbourne."

Maybe.