Christmas! Week 71 from Hong Kong

Hello all,

   Well I hope everyone had a very merry Christmas. We had a great one here in Hong Kong. I have some great pictures so at the end if I have time I will jump on another computer and send them out. (we are in the Apple store and some genius designed a computer that doesn't have a USB port. Thank you Apple) 

   Last p day we went to the Island to see some of the Christmas lights. However it was the middle of the afternoon so there were none. We got some pizza and rode the ferry. So that was a lot of fun. While we were waiting Elder Darrington talked to a few people from Mainland and at the end they wanted a picture with us so I will have to attach that. I love going on the ferry it is so much fun!

   Then we had a our Zone Christmas party that was fun. We had a breakfast turkey. What is that you ask? It is a turkey marinated in syrup. Turned out pretty good. We also had pancakes and other breakfast foods. Elder Taylor and I were in charge if the syrup, so we made Maple, vanilla, and strawberry flavor. They were really good and the strawberry was definitely a hit. 

   We also celebrated Festivus. That was great. If you don't know what that is then you have to watch more TV.

   There was also a member of our ward who had her wedding. That was fun. That was the first wedding I have been to in a long time where I didn't have to take pictures haha. That was fun. She is a RM from Temple Square and her new husband is a non member so that was a little sad, but the wedding was great so that was fun.

   That brings us to Christmas. We had all our gifts under the small tree my parents sent me. We woke up Sunday morning and opened them in our PJ's family style. That was good fun. Elder Taylor and Garcia had a blast. I am very excited to spend next Christmas with my family. 

   We also got some fun news that we will be getting iPhones in about February. That will be really useful. That way we will be able to be in contact with people much easier. No one uses proper texting here because it is just too expensive. We will see if that really happens though. 

Love,

Elder Walker 

new mission vehicle!!! haha jk

Please ignore my loud voice on the videos!

A message for Grandma's and Grandpa's.

Elder Walker reciting a scripture in Cantonese to see if we could guess what it was.

A short video talking about their exercising. Little brother Jensen is a distance runner so he was a bit surprised to hear that they run about a quarter of a mile! 

random people at the ferry dock

cool shot from the ferry

festive display in TST

Elder James reciting the Grinch from memory at the zone Christmas party 

Festivus for the rest of us 

Wedding

Can you see the tiny tree behind all those gifts?

Christmas Socks

The room right after skyping home.  He was able to use a member's tablet at the Church.

Merry Christmas!!! Week 70 from Hong Kong

Hello all,

   Well this is my mass letter before Christmas. So MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! Hong Kong is much much more pleasant to live in in the winter. The weather is bearable now. So that is great! 

   This week wasn't super exciting. I did get to go on an exchange with Elder Darrington. He is one of the Zone Leaders here and is also a Mandarin Elder. Which means that teaching together was a bit of a stretch. I was surprised at how well we were able to teach together. Both of the lessons that we taught together were to people who could understand Cantonese. So that helped me out a lot. I started one of them in Mandarin and introduced myself and explained that I don't really speak Mandarin. She looked very confused so I just said it in Cantonese and then she understood and we laughed. We also went on a very long bus ride to a place way up north that I have never been to before. Like it was far enough away that I saw stuff growing out of the ground! We got of the bus and walked into the village. There was no sound from the road, no sound from people. The whole place was really really creepy. We didn't see a person the whole time we were there. There was just very skinny sick dogs. We walked around a corner and got that "Get out NOW" feeling so we both looked at each other because we were both feeling it, and obeyed and got out fast! So that was really really scary.

   Then this Wednesday we had our ward Christmas party. They had all the missionaries sing songs and things it was really funny. There were also a lot of potential investigators there so that was awesome! 

   Last night there was a choir performance of various selections of "the Messiah". It was REALLY good. I was very nervous because I have been to a few Chinese choir things before and usually they are pretty bad. So I was very happy with this one. It was also a lot of fun because I was able to see some of the members from Sha Tin so that was a lot of fun catching up with them.

   Everyone in my apartment got their packages from their families. So we put all the wrapped gifts under our tree. I am so excited for Christmas! It is just the best. The only bummer about having it here is that there is no real Christmas cheer like there is in the states, unless you go to a mall. It is really strange to think that next year I will be home for Christmas. 

   One last time. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

Love,

Elder Walker

This is elder Taylor and I at the Christmas Party with one of our investigators. 

The following pictures are the ones I pulled from their ward's FB page.  Fun to see their chapel, stage, food and people!

Week 69 from Hong Kong

Hello all,

   This was quite an interesting week. We had a lot of really great things happen, along with some not so great things. 

   To start off the week we had a really great time at Zone Training. Everything had a nice Christmas theme, so that was lovely. All of the trainings were really really good. I am really excited to be working with this new set of leadership. 

   We also had a very interesting experience with an investigator named Lisa. She was scheduled to be baptized on Christmas day. However she ran into some trouble with her parents not liking her joining the church. Remember that she is 33 years old. So we couldn't get in contact with her for a few days and we were really worried about her. So we said a prayer and during the prayer she called us! We were really excited. However the problem came when that phone call was about an hour long and she was telling us how much she hates us the whole time. This was really out of nowhere. Usually her lessons are really funny and we have a good time and all of the members really like her. So we still had a lesson scheduled with her for that Friday so we said look if you want to talk we will be there. So we were pretty sure that she was not going to come. But she came!!! With a cake!! So we ended up having a really good lesson with her. We will have to see what happens. 

   On a more worldly note, Elder Taylor broke our shower this week. I don't know why but there is often some kind of issue that happens with him and the shower. haha This week it was when he turned off the water but the water did not stop it just came out full blast. So we had to call the office and get them to call a repair man. so in the meantime anytime we wanted water we had to go up to the roof and turn it on and off when we were done so that we did not use a LOT of water. I will attach a video. It was quite the experience. 

  We also had our interviews with President Lam. I always love those he is the best. I would love to just listen to him tell me things and stories all day long. 

  That is all for this week!

Love,
Elder Walker 

sticker I got this week!

Video of Gordon and Elder Taylor explaining the shower situation

It makes me laugh that almost every video starts with "okaaay"

All the roomies on the roof showing the water pipes and the view

some random lady on the street who was so surprised that we spoke Cantonese she wanted a picture with us. I said I wanted one too. I do not even know her name.

pipes on the roof at night

view from the top of our building 

Week 68 from Hong Kong

Hello all,

   Well judging by my inbox I can see that everyone back home is "busy". 

   Any way, this week was nothing special really. I had to do a lot of paperwork closing the last reporting period and opening the December one. I did not think this much paperwork would be involved in missionary work. So that was fun in its own special way. 

   It was Yoshi's birthday this last Friday. So I got his phone number from the missionaries that serve in his home ward. Turns out they completely forgot! So they made me promise that I would not call him until after they did. haha so we called him and sang to him. haha that was fun.

   We also got to give one of the new sisters a blessing. I guess she had something wrong with her foot. That is dangerous because foot problems will put you out of this mission. She will be fine though. 

   I also wrote a letter to Elder Taylor's parents. That was fun. I knew my parents would enjoy something like that, so I figured so would his. 

   We somehow got conned into making Yorkshire puddings for this upcoming zone training. The only problem that we will have is finding muffin trays. If we can't we will go to the backup plan. Which is bananas. They are cheep and easy, and they won't ask us to make stuff for the zone again. So really it is a win win. 

   That's it for this week. Hope every one has a great week next week! 

Love,

Elder Walker

This is a very common grocery store. We buy food here. neat huh?