AHHH I'M IN CHINA!!! (First email from China)

Hello friends and family.

Well here I am. I'll just jump straight in. After our 24= hours of traveling we arrived in Hong Kong. We got our luggage and got through customs. Then we were greeted by the Assistants to the President AP's. Two were from the UK and the other was from the USA. We took a picture with the president and loaded the bags into two huge vans. However there was not enough room so the AP's took us to a bus station where they handed us some fliers and said "pass these out on the bus" So we all made an attempt on the 20 min ride to the temple and Patron Housing in Kowloon Tong. My attempt was in vain. Then we got off and spent the night in the smallest room I have ever slept in. It was about the size of a large bathroom with 8 beds in it and all of which were full. We had some natives with us in our room so we made an attempt at talking to a few of them to no avail.

The next few days were spent receiving additional training. Then we were assigned our senior companions and our propositioning areas. My area is called Ngau Tau Gok. If you look at it on a subway map it is between Kowloon bay and Kwun tong. My companions name is Elder Phung. He is from California but he grew up speaking Cantonese at home so his Chinese is incredible. Mine is awful. By some grace of God most people can Kinda understand me. For those of you who understand mission lingo I am Brother Smiths (Half Korean Guy) grandson. Anyway on my first day we had 2 teaching appointments. The first guy did not show up which was both sad and reliving. Then we taught a Woman and her son. I still can't get over how small every one's house is. If you're in the US and your house feels too small just clean it and throw way a lot of stuff you don't need it, then your house will feel HUGE.

My Grandfather (Grandpa R. Michael Walker) served in Taiwan and his name was 伍 which sounds like wu in Mandarin. However in Cantonese it sounds like mh. look up some one counting in Chinese when they say 5 that's my name. Cool.

Ok a little about our apartment. The floor space is about as large as a normal high school classroom. but with two rooms one is an office and the other is a bedroom and an office. We live in Kwun Tong on the 7th floor. And it cost the Church in US money... that's right one Million Dollars. Crazy.

The weather here is hot and Humid about 87 degrees and 85% humidity. We are required to wear our suits when we go out... until April. I Have one dark Black suit. I'm pretty sure that it is going to die. Luckily there are lots of places to get suits really cheep. we are also only allowed 10 hours of AC a day so we use it at night in the bed room so we can sleep.

Walking down the street is incredible everyone walks FAST and if someone is in your way you just nudge them. Lots of people do silly things when they walk near us. It is funny. Sometimes they pick up their kids and run and sometimes they just cover their face. Once we were street contacting and I opened my black case that we carry around to protect the pamphlets and Books of Mormon we give out and it showed the Book of Mormon and he just turned around and started running. Very funny.

My German also came in handy that was nice. I saw a Chinese lady with a shirt that said DEUTSCHLAND on it so I started talking in German and we chatted for a while. We teach English classes on Wednesday nights for adults so I told her that if she came I could help her with her German.

So we were supposed to meet with President Nelson of the 12 but after he landed a boat hit the bridge that connects the airport to Hong Kong so he couldn't come. Massive bummer.

For this weeks Chinese oops: the words for chat and menstruate are kinda close to each other so when I called the bishop I said "Hey would it be ok of we come over so I can introduce myself and menstruate." the conversation then turned to English.

Love you all,

Elder Walker

OK pictures time!

Last meal in the USA