Cloud USA

— Cloud cover by: Stephe, Co-Founder ^@@^

Cloudburst afterparty: Terri, Alisa, Gee, Talitha, and Stephe, in that order. Marie is graciously taking the picture. 🙂

All I knew, as I sat stranded in traffic in my car this past Saturday, 15 minutes late to our third Rain get-together in Atlanta, was that I was so glad that Terri and Alisa had left work and home earlier, and that Gee, Marie, and Talitha had gotten into town the day before.   [No kidding. If I had left work a little bit later, I would have been stuck in that mess too. — Terri  :-}]

The City of Atlanta chose that weekend to rope off I-285 and most of its exits in order to finish roadwork, so it was bumper-to-bumper everywhere. It took me an hour and a half to get to the 운암정 (Woo Nam Jeong) Stone Bowl House in Doraville, whereas on a normal day I would have been there in 25 minutes.

CloudUSAer Talitha had driven in from Houston, and CloudUSAer Gee and her best friend Marie had driven in from New Orleans, and the three were staying at the same hotel just a hop, skip, and a jump down the road from the restaurant. Smart Clouds!

But hey, I got there none the worse for wear, bearing gifts and happy as heck to meet new Clouds and get my hug from Ms. Gee. 🙂

Soon enough, we were neck-deep in good Korean food, awesome conversation, soju bombs, talk about JiHoon, and Rain Goody Gift Bags.  [Ya’ll notice how she just casually slipped her mention of soju-bombs in there?  Yeah.  LOL.  :-}]

(Let’s check out what the gals took home: Souvenirs from the The R2B Return to Base World Cloud Premiere Event in Seoul back on August 14, 2012, special goodies from Rain’s BEST Show concert tour stop in Seoul, a giant The Fugitive Plan B poster from the drama’s Seoul premiere, a Remember Rain Diary from RAINY Entertainment, and a new Black Eagle DVD. Marie took home a goody bag too. This is the first time we’ve done goody bags at a Cloudburst; perhaps, after Rain gets out of the military and gets some fresh events under his belt, we might do it again. Thanks for the pics, ladies!) [LOL.  For me, best part of the goody bag giveaway was Gee’s argument with her best friend Marie, who is ‘technically’ not a Cloud, but who was kind enough to come along for the ride from New Orleans.  Each bag had a ticket in it for a ‘special prize.’  When Gee saw the special prize that Marie got, she tried to con her into giving it up.  It was so funny when Gee finally got exasperated and said,  “What do you MEAN you’re gonna keep it???  YOU’RE NOT EVEN A RAIN FAN!”  ROFL.  SO funny.  :-}]

I wasn’t the only traffic victim, unfortunately… Poor Alicia (Lee24) had been making great time driving in from Savannah, but had to hit the brakes way out on I-75. By the time she and her friend got to the Stone Bowl House, we’d just left to take the party back to Gee’s hotel room and we passed each other like two ships in the night. And though she was also staying at the same hotel, she couldn’t find us there. Talk about heartbreaking! ㅜ_ㅜ

She and Terri had a nice long phone chat the next day, and the important thing is she’s all right (a relief, we’d all been concerned about her). Because of Alicia’s efforts, we’re sending her one of the Rain Goody Bags plus a special gift. Enjoy, dear!  [Alicia, we are so sorry that you missed us after coming all that way.  However, I really enjoyed our lovely conversation about all things Rain on Sunday.  Hopefully, someday, we can have a Cloudburst in Savannah, on your turf, and you can be our host.  :-}]

Back at the Stone Bowl. We closed the place down, of course, got to practice Korean with Halmoni (“Grandma’, the owner) and our lovely servers, formed a convoy up Buford Highway and descended on Gee’s hotel room to blast Rain music, Rain DVDs, talk K-Pop, and generally soak ourselves in our Magic Feet from Korea. Honestly, I’m surprised the cops didn’t get us for disturbing the peace—and it sure would have been worth it, LOL! What a Saturday night. [A great night it was.  I was the first one to arrive, and while I was waiting in our private dining room for everyone else to get there, our server kept coming in and making casual conversation with me.  I imagine she was just trying to be polite since I had to wait for quite awhile by myself and she wanted to make sure I was attended to.  Grandmother and her staff at The Stone Bowl House are always so lovely and so welcoming, but this time it was a little different, because this time I told them about Cloud USA, which I had never done before.

When I finally revealed that we were actually there for a fan club meeting and that the fan club was for Bi, our server got so excited that she ran to tell the rest of the staff, who all ran back in and gushed over him with me–even Grandmother.  LOL.  They did this again after everyone else had arrived and they were super attentive to us throughout the evening.  They were so cute.  :-}]

(I just had to say it in the hotel elevator… the unofficial name of this event should have been The Convention of Black Women for Rain—and Terri. The way everyone busted a gut, I think they all agreed. LMAO) [And she really did say that.  Yes, she did.  LOL.  :-}]

Alisa, Talitha, and Marie—it was awesome meeting you. Gee—it was so great seeing you again. Alicia, don’t despair—we look forward to welcoming you to the next get-together. 🙂

Psssst, everybody… don’t be surprised if we take the next Cloudburst on the road to New Orleans. Just sayin’!

— Stephe @cloudusa.wordpress.com / CloudUSA.org

Posted in Bi Rain, Cloud USA, Cloud USA Activities & Events, Rain's Clouds, usa cloud
Tags: Bi Rain Black Eagle, bi rain stash, Cloud USA Cloudburst Atlanta, cloud usa community, Cloud USA News, Cloudburst get-togethers, Jung Ji Hoon, R2B: Return To Base, rain bi, Rain The Best Show 2011 Korea Tour