This week in Hong Kong. Week 49

Well this week...

   This week had some interesting things occur. Last Monday and Tuesday I didn't get out of bed except to teach a lesson Monday night. Which was a terrible lesson. Mostly because I was completely out of it. I also wore a mask and it was completely disgusting after the lesson. So we went and I bought some medicine. Turns out some of it was kids medicine... Took it any way! Then the stuff I got for my sore neck was fantastic! It was an antisthetic (not quite sure what he meant here but so glad it worked!) so I was really careful with that to make sure that I didn't ruin my voice! 

   Then Tuesday I barely made it through half of personal study. I made it just long enough to finalize stuff for district meeting and then I went and threw up for the rest of the hour. Then I got in bed and asked Elder Powell (Zone Leader in my district) to lead district meeting in my absence. That afternoon we got a call from a member in Ma On Shan and it was Yoshi!!! He somehow knew that I was sick and asked if I was well enough to come down and eat lunch. Elder Chapman said that I wasn't so he said ok and told us to come down at 3:30. So I got dressed and we went down and met him right outside our building and he had some medicine which he said was the strongest in Hong Kong and he had some conjee (Japanese oatmeal but it comes from rice and not oats) SO that was great! I asked him how he knew I was sick because I hadn't told anyone and he said "the Holly Ghost told me to visit you yesterday but I didn't" SO that was really cool! Then Wednesday Elder Daplin was feeling sick and I was feeling much better and so I stayed back with him to rest up and take care of him. Yeah I was not a fan of throwing up for two days but now all is well.

 Then on Friday night our CO alarm went of right at 11:00 when we were getting into bed. So we had to get dressed and open all the windows and go outside and call sister Lam. SO that was a long night. We didn't get to bed until 11:50 that night. we also had to sleep with the windows open which means no AC! That was terrible! it was so hard to sleep. but we got a lot of AC time for the next day so that was good. 

Yeah so those were this weeks adventures. Also Today is not p-day because we get to go to the temple on Friday! which means that we can't buy groceries today and we didn't know about that until after. Also the Tai Wai elders are having two summer missionaries so we have no food and two extra mouths to feed. Like, we don't even have enough rice to just have plain rice. So we will see how that plays out.

Love you all!

Love,

Elder Walker

A video tour of the apartment. it is quite dirty at the moment due to exchanges and a new summer missionary.

Video view off the AU family house

Our friend Mike who has been teaching us Chinese and is going back to BYU Hawaii

Picture off the balcony of a member house from this week 

Members who fed us and the sisters 

Missionary version of screen shots!

Once again Yoshi is there to love and care for our son!

Week 48 from Hong Kong

Hello all,

   Well I am sick again. I hate being sick. It is a terrible cold mixed with a touch of throwing up. But though this experience I am proud to report that I chew my apples quite well.  Really Son? His comment makes me remember how much I love having sons! 

   Nothing major happened this week. We had a sports night activity in Kowloon Tong so that was cool. The surprise was that when we got home we realized that we had locked ourselves out of the apartment. So we called the office elders to come help us out and we waited down in front of our apartment and started playing catch with the football that we had with us. The sad thing happened when Elder Dapline (of the Philippines) missed his throw to Elder Chapman and the ball went into the street and was run over by a huge truck and exploded. So that was sad. Luckily the office elders showed up. 

    Then our ward had a singing competition and that was a good time. We got to hear things that weren't hymns so that was fun. Good time. It was supper long though. Good time to hangout with the ward members.

   I also had a dinner appointment with some members and they were like "I remember the first time you came over here and you couldn't understand or say anything!" so that was funny. 

  I also started learning to read a little bit so that is fun in church and in lessons.

   Sorry this letter is supper boring. I will try to get better and have a more exciting week this next week.

Love you all!

-Elder Walker

LIGHTNING!!! Week 47 from Hong Kong

This week was a great one! we had lots of really interesting things happen. 

   The first was that our dear friend Elder Powell dropped the shower head while he was in the shower and he was the last one to shower that day. Which means that once I got in the next day we had forgotten all about it. The problem was not too bad though some water just came out the sides. Then when I had the shampoo in my hand the shower broke completely and got really loud and shot a lot of high-pressure in to my eye which caused me to throw the shampoo in to my eye and yell. My roommates said it sounded pretty funny. but it hurt and the shower was completely broken. So now every time someone showers the whole bathroom gets completely soaked! needless to say we are going to buy a new one today. 

   Then Saturday morning we went over to our new mission leaders house for correlation meeting. He speaks perfect English and we had the Mandarin elders there so we had the meeting in English. Which was fun. He also had some snacks out for us so that is always a good thing. We all had a good laugh when I told him about one of our less actives who is thinking about buying an 18 year old girl for his wife, and another less active that said that he didn't like feeling happiness and loved having sorrowful feelings. Then when the Mandarin elders started reporting they did it in Mandarin which was lame because the whole rest of the meeting was in English for them. So I turned to the sister sitting next to me and said "ohh they have a secret investigator" and the elder that was not reporting switched back in to English. So that was a fun meeting. 

   Then on Saturday night we had the most fantastic lightning display I have ever seen in my life! It was so cool! I got a great video on my camera but I can't send it home so I guess you will have to wait another year. It was super loud and I am pretty sure it hit the building right next to ours. It was super loud and bright and awesome! If I understood right it was a "tropical storm" which is if I remember right a hurricane before it becomes a hurricane. Don't quote me on that though.

Gordon was able to send the video so here it is!  I love hearing his voice! I'm told this is the Southern edge of Typhoon Nepartak that hit Taiwan.

   Then on Sunday we all gave talks in church. That was fun. My trainee was very nervous but he did a great job. We got several compliments so that was nice.

   They also changed the rules a little bit so that we can start learning characters. I am starting very slowly because speaking is much more important that reading. And reading Cantonese is like a whole new language anyway. The grammar and way of pronouncing the words is different so as they say here "slowly, slowly walk".

Love you all! 

Love,

Elder Walker

The Chan family! 

One of our favorite less actives that we eat with a lot.

cool building

The sky was super polluted so the sky was red.

Week 46 from Hong Kong

Dear Everyone

This week was a nice and eventful one. We had moves and I am still here! so that will be 10 months by the end of the move. 

   Last Monday I had a fun experience. We took some of the missionaries who are dying (Going home) out to a pace that is referred to as KBQ or Korean BBQ. It was an endless buffet and it was sweet! I will attach pictures so that this makes sense, but it was an endless buffet, and the way that it works is that you take your plate over and get as much raw meat as you want and then you take it back to your table and cook it right on your table which has a sort of sunken skillet in the middle and then three people cook on it at once and there is all sorts of fun things to eat while you wait for your meat to cook. So that was a blast!

   This last Thursday we said our final good bye to Elder Merrell. That was sad. We still miss him. He finished his service and is back home now. So Yoshi and a recent convert that we are all very fond of took us out to breakfast. That was really fun. That morning for workout we did an egg toss. Now that sounds strange at first and that is because it is. There is some symbolism in it but we mostly just did it for fun.

   Then we did a final missionary tim tam slam! We used some of the leftover hot chocolate my parents sent me for Christmas. So it had  a little minty taste to it so it was really nice.

   Then the first of July is a Holiday here. It celebrates England leaving Hong Kong for good. So that was kinda fun. There are not any huge traditions that I saw. 

  

   Today is the 4th of July so I have on my American Flag tie and light up pin. So that is fun. I also wore it to church yesterday... minus the pin. haha it is really fun.

Love you all and hope everyone has a safe 4th! 

From,

Elder Walker

Final breakfast with elder Merrell 

This one requires explanation. we were trying an object lesson in which you put an empty tea bag on your hand and then some one sets it on fire and it floats away before it burns you. But it burned my hand and we were trying to make it work before we used it for real and we couldn't get it to work so we left this for our roommates to find. It was funny. I can remember some missionaries doing this in our home when the boys were little.

TIM TAM SLAM!!!

Final picture of the district with those people in it.

KBQ

  KBQ