The Apple Doesn't Fall Far

I don't remember ever mentioning it to her.

It's a strange feeling, as a parent, when your kid reaches the age where he or she or they can purchase and consume alcohol, assuming your child has decided to drink. Having allowed our kids to consume the odd sip of beer or wine (or, rarely, a tiny glass of bubbly on special occasions), they've never made a big deal about it, and have even felt comfortable reaching out to us if they had partied a bit too much with friends, and needed to be picked up.

We don't judge. We were young, too.

Now that Kid 1 is home for the summer, she's been earning money by working at an optometrist clinic. Having been away at college, we've known for years that she's developed her independence and seems to thrive in a work environment.

Occasionally, after a busy day at work, she'll swing by our friendly neighbourhood LCBO to treat herself to a beverage or two. We've known that she has an affinity for rum and for alcoholic spritzers, but on one occasion, about a month ago, she came home and had to show me her latest choice in alcoholic drink.

"Did you ever have this in Korea?" she asked as she withdrew a bottle from a paper bag.

It was soju.

In case you're unfamiliar, soju is a distilled liquor, almost similar to vodka but made, I believe from fermented rice. It's available straight (unflavoured) but comes in a variety of flavours, such as lemon and other citrus fruits.

DW and I used to drink it often when we lived in South Korea, from 1997 to 1999. Back then, lemon seemed to be the only flavoured soju. In 2019, when I made a solo return trip to Seoul and our home-away-from-home city of Chŏnju (Jeonju), I discovered a grapefruit flavoured soju that was quite tasty.

Kid 1 was holding a bottle of apple-flavoured soju.

I explained to her that DW and I used to drink lemon soju often but apple wasn't available when we lived in Korea.

"Oh, I have a lemon one, too," she said, "do you want to have some?"

"Sure, I'll have a sip."

Kid 1 poured two shot glasses: one for each of us. We decided to open the apple bottle first, as I hadn't tried it before.

"Geonbae," I said as we clinked glasses. It tasted like candied Granny Smith apples, both tart and sweet.

Kid 1 only takes small portions from the 360ml bottle. It takes her a couple of days to complete one. I didn't tell her we'd consume a few bottles, each, in an evening, back in the day.

She's far too responsible, anyway.

About a week later, she offered me some of her lemon soju and it brought back lots of memories, many of which I wrote about in my novel. Good memories and not-so-good memories.

It's funny how she's discovered soju without either parent having mentioned it or introducing it to her. I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.