A Time to Dance: I which I try a lot of new things and reverted back to my old eating habits after awhile...

Today was quite an adventure, let me tell you! I woke up around 6 AM, wide awake, so I got up and hopped on my computer and started IMing with several of my friends back home, where it was around 5 PM. I talked a bit more with Laura and Rebecca, who had arrived with Luke last night. I met two of the GEO missionaries, Megan and Lynette, and we kind of went over some orientation. We learned a lot about etiquette with eating, conversation, and things like that. It was fascinating, and pretty helpful.

Today was the Siu Leun school's graduation, and the president of the Lutheran Church Hong Kong Synod was here. After the graduation, we got to meet him and chat a bit. It was very cool. He said that because of the GEO missionaries and our presence here, enrollment in the school is going up quite a bit! I knew western English speakers were pretty important here, but I never realized just how much influence simply being here would have. It's pretty remarkable, actually. I am so grateful to be given this opportunity to serve the Lord. I can't wait to really get started, to teach English and interact with the children and young adults.

After we met Rev. Yung, Ken, Albert, and the GEO missionaries took us to lunch at a rather nice restaraunt, for yam cha. I tried a lot of the food, and it was extremely delicious. It's nothing like American Chinese food, and I even found myself eating barbecue pork, and I am NOT a pork fan. There was a very good brown sugar bread that made me want to ask the recipe to send to Dad. :D It was soft and quite good. I tried several new things, many of which I don't even remember, and ate more than I have in a long time at one meal. Megan, who sat next to me, poured me tea a lot. In Chinese culture, you must pour tea for someone else before you pour tea for yourself. It was Jasmine tea, and it was better than almost anything I've had in the States. I wasn't at all opposed to drinking cup after cup after cup. They're tiny cups, not like American coffee mugs, so it wasn't too terribly bad. I hope!

We also got to ride in a taxi and take the mass transit home. I just want to say that the Octopus Card is absolutely brilliant. You don't even have to take it out of your wallet, due to the microchip. You just put it up against the scanner and you're good!

After lunch, we showed the new arrivals the grocery store and laundry. We did some more grocery shopping, and I decided to be adventurous and I bought some drink that I totally didn't know what it was. It's like, Mandarin and Plum juice, only not like American juice. It's very hard to describe the taste, but I do like it. I also bought some tea from a tea shop. The owner is a mother of one of the students at this school. She recommended a multi-pack of tea in the cutest little tins. So I bought it, since it was pretty cheap. $28HKD, or around $3.59. It's loose tea, and I haven't found a diffuser yet, so I bought some bagged tea at the store as well.

After that, we headed to the beach where I dipped in my toes, and we walked around this park-like area. It was very beautiful. We then headed back to get dinner with Roper and Rachel, where we went to have Hot Pot. I... didn't like it. At all. I did try a pot-sticker like dumpling and it was good, but then I grabbed one with shrimp and it was all over. I can't stand shrimp, and it's in everything here! I tried a couple other things, but I just couldn't really acclimate them to my palate. So I just kind of sat there, drinking honey green tea and not eating much of anything. I was strongly reminded of my inclinations when I was in High School. I remember many a time when I would go out to dinner and not eat anything. Oh well, at least I tried, right? My camera battery died during our walk, so I couldn't take any pictures of the huge shrimp at Hot Pot. Oh well. It's charging now so I'll take lots of photos tomorrow.

Church at Holy Word, in Chinese. We'll have a translator, but sometimes you can't hear. Hopefully it won't be too bad.

Since it's the American Independence day tomorrow, we plan on getting Pizza and totally celebrating. :D We'll be celebrating before most of you are waking up, though! Hopefully I can post some pictures in the evening, when you all are waking up, so you can get in the Independence Day mood. ;-)

Pictures!

That orange thing by my chopsticks? I was told it was some kind of cake, so I eagerly took a big bite. And promptly gagged.

The only thing that makes me gag quicker than shrimp is coconut. I really hate coconut cake. That was about the only thing I really detested.