September Again - Already!

Next week (Sept. 7) we celebrate our one-year mark as missionaries.  We're starting to realize that there are some things we won't see again while we're here (see the picture of the 'Hungry Ghost' Festival).  We celebrated our 40th anniversary last week, and Ida's birthday--we won't say which one - but it's more than 40!  It's been a HOT summer - and it will be awhile before things cool off, but we made it! 
Much has happened in the past couple of months, as it always does in this line of "work".  We've seen wonderful people--missionaries, members, friends--come and go, and there are little pieces of our hearts all over the world.  The good thing about that is the spaces are filled in with bits and pieces of those we've come to love so much. 
Our attendance at Sacrament Meeting was over 100 last week - which is awesome!  We are hoping the numbers keep climbing...the members of the Church see the benefits of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in their lives and love to share it with their friends.
We're looking forward to Mid-Autumn Festival 2010 (September 23rd this year) - Roland has committed to trying "mooncake".  By the way, I tried durian - and it really wasn't bad!

Feast for some of the hungry ghosts.

This festival falls on the 7th month of the Lunar Year and it is believed that during this month, the gates of hell are opened to let out the hungry ghosts who then wander the earth. They create mischief unless appeased by food, or other offerings which are burned - the most popular being fake money (called "hell" money). The food is placed on the streets and sidewalks in the evening - not in the doorways, because you don't want the ghosts to come to your home!  This meal was on the corner next to our building - and was evidently meant for three.

August "Mormon Morning" at Camoes Garden.

A small portion of the "birthday dinner" celebrants. (Richard and Louise - do you recognize the guy with the orange tie???)

 

One of the SIX birthday cakes!

The pandas are coming - to Macau!  The zoo in Taipa is getting a pair of pandas - hopefully by October.  There are panda displays EVERYWHERE.

The streets of San Mah Louh today.  It's raining - again.

HOT June days and nights...

Macau International Dragon Boat Races

 2010 Winners - Team from Mainland China

Bored at the boat races?

Macau's Praia Grande

View from the Mount Fortress

A Hard Day's Night

(The truck drivers just park on the streets and sleep and wait for a call to go to work!)

We celebrated our 9-month anniversary as missionaries on June 7. Where has the last month gone? We made three trips to Hong Kong – all within an 8-day period between May 26-June 3. We enjoyed meetings with Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve along with Elder Donald L. Hallstrom of the Seventy and their wives; Bishop Burton was in town also, along with other members of the Seventy, Area Authorities, and Mission Presidency. Roland was able to attend a Priesthood Leadership Conference along with other Stake, District, and Administrative Unit leaders on Saturday. Other than the fact that I lost my cell phone in Stanley while Sister Elia and I were checking out the markets when the guys were in their meeting, it was a great time. (I DID get the cell phone back – miraculously. Someone found it and called one of the numbers in the contacts—it was the Sisters here in Macau, and they arranged for an Elder in Hong Kong to pick it up; he gave it to me when we went to Zone Conference the following week.)


We celebrated Mother’s Day – a wonderful outpouring of love from all the Branch members. The missionaries and Primary even sneaked out of the church and heart-attacked our apartment door while we were at meetings! It was so fun to be able to visit on the phone with Trevor, Jacque and children; Tori, and Mom. Sarah and Riley played songs on the piano – our own little recital. They were awesome!  Jake told jokes.  (He was awesome, too!)

We shared some P-Day adventures during May with our Zone – we visited the Macau Science Museum, the Macau Tower, and a wondrous buffet at StarWorld (one of the large hotel-casinos in Macau). We watched a guy bungee-jump off the top of the Macau Tower – very neat to watch, but not on my list of things to do before I die! We also tried sushi at the buffet (not the uncooked fish, but one of the myriad other choices). We can now check that off—it wasn’t really that good, but I didn’t gag.

Our visa expires on June 20, and we’re getting a little nervous. We turned in papers for the renewal quite some time ago, and haven’t heard anything, so tomorrow we’ll trek on down to the Labor office to see if they have any news for us. We hope our next blog post will be from Macau!

Macau from the Macau Tower.  On the left is the Inner Harbor; at the top right (waaaay in the distance) is the South China Sea.  In front are Nam Van and Sai Van Lakes (man-made reservoirs).  The land leading up to the tower and where the tower stands is "reclaimed"--part of the Outer Harbor area.

Macau Science Museum - also on reclaimed land in the Outer Harbor.

School kids lining up in front of their bus - getting ready for a fun day at the science museum.  We had all of them waving at us as they entered the museum!

Eating sushi at StarWorld - you can see how we loved it!

Stanley Bay - Hong Kong

Old Macau house.  We just saw it when we were out walking.

 

May Day! May Day!

It's May already - May 1st - Labor Day (in Macau, anyway).  It's a BEAUTIFUL day - I can see blue sky and white clouds, the temperature is just about perfect, and the humidity - well, we won't talk about the humidity... 

We've had some good experiences the past few weeks - two trips to Hong Kong - one for a Branch temple trip, and one for a Multi-Zone Conference.  The temple trip was wonderful; one of our sweet sisters from the Philippines, Jean Berido, received her endowment--and others went who hadn't been able to go for a long time.  The trip for zone conference makes for a very long day when we have to be on the 6 a.m. ferry, but it's well-worth the effort.  Thank goodness the sea was calm for both trips, and thank goodness I brought a supply of Dramamine!

We had a wonderful Branch Family Home Evening activity - "Missionary Night".  All of the branch members received a mission call assigning them to "foreign" missions, and were to report to the Macau Mini-MTC at the appointed time.  They participated in classes to learn how to "find", to "fellowship", to "contact" (we actually had a little call center), and they learned phrases and words in their "mission language" - Cantonese, Indonesian, Mandarin, or French.  Roland cooked up a special missionary meal of boxed macaroni and cheese (YES, we found some at the US Mart!), hotdogs, and floats.  Most of the people here had never had a float, and didn't know what it was - but they liked them!

We mourned with the people of China for those who lost their lives and were devastated by the earthquake which struck the Yushu region of the Qinghai province on April 14.  The National Day of Mourning was April 21.  It was especially heart-wrenching to hear about so many children who lost their lives because their schools collapsed; I'd love to tell the grieving parents about eternal families.
Now for some REALLY good news!  There is a Dairy Queen in Macau!  It just opened this week - and we've been there already.  It's not "quite" the same, but we'll get over it.  Of course we may not ever try the green tea-and-mango or green tea-and-chocolate blizzards, OR the red bean-strawberry, red bean-lemon, or red bean-mint lemon slushes, OR the jelly-grapefruit, orange-carrot, or apple-carrot fruit drinks.  THAT just doesn't say "Dairy Queen" to us!  We may have to tell them what a hot-fudge sundae is one of these days. 
We've been doing some actual teaching - both temple preparation, and missionary discussions, and feel productive most of the time.  It's great to be here!

TurboJet - High-speed ferry between Macau and Hong Kong

    Missionaries in the rain

                                                     

                         DQ - Packing them in!

                                              Tunneling under Macau!

Guia Hill and Lighthouse

Macau - Looking Southeast from our window.

Chinese library on the Rua do Campo

APRIL in MACAU!

Today is April 5 - the Qingming Festival (also known as Pure Brightness Festival or Tomb-sweeping Day).  I think China has almost as many public holidays as the State of Illinois!  The traditional activities of the day are cleaning the gravesites of loved ones and paying respect to them, taking a "spring outing" or enjoying nature, and kite flying.  A neat note on the kite flying:  they are not only flown during the day, but at night.  Little lanterns are attached to the kite or to the string, and while it is in the air, the string is cut, letting the kite go free.  This is said to bring good luck - and to get rid of disease!  The cemetery next to our apartment building is really busy today...
We have had too many days of fog and dreariness - we are hoping April will bring some sunny skies!
We had our Branch Conference yesterday - and it was a wonderful day (we can say that now that it's over!)  Our mission presidency came from Hong Kong, and were kept busy doing interviews before the meetings.  And - our attendance was the largest since we've been here.
Here's one of our recent adventures:  An Indonesian lady (not a member of the Church) has been coming to our meetings since last fall.  She looked pregnant, but said that she was not.  She disappeared for about a month, and when she came back, she had a tiny baby boy in her arms!  Well, she lost her job, and in Macau, if you are a foreigner and don't have a job, you don't have a visa; so she was illegal.  Roland took pity on her (mainly for the baby) and we decided to help her get back to Indonesia. On the day she was supposed to leave, some of the sisters took their only day off for the week to help out, and we got her to the airport at 6 a.m. for an early flight to Jakarta.  We arrived at the airport only to find that the airline had gone bankrupt overnight, and all of their flights were cancelled.  So, here we are with a homeless woman and little baby, all of their worldly goods in a "borrowed" suitcase, and no flight and no where to go.  The transportation authority (after MUCH waiting) got all those who were stranded into a hotel room across the street from the airport and tried to help.  I'm sure it was because there was a baby involved, but some of them got papers in order fairly rapidly and were arranging a flight - until they found out that the lady's passport and baby's travel papers were at Immigration, because she had overstayed.  Things came to a screeching halt, and the authorities came to take them into custody until a flight could be arranged.  Roland's advice to her was to let the baby cry, and that might spur them on to do something quickly.
In all of this, our heroes are our sweet Indonesian sisters, who helped her after the baby was born with money for diapers and formula - money that they could ill-afford to give since they send every extra pataca they earn to their own families back home. They helped her care for the baby, and before she was to leave, arranged to spend their one day off helping her, and helping us get her to the airport. They took up a collection so there would be bus fare to get to their province once they reached Jakarta, and one of them even gave her only piece of luggage so they'd have something to travel with. What a lesson to us this is in charity - the pure love of Christ! Note: We heard that they DID in fact get on a flight, albeit several days later.
We continue to enjoy interesting things here in Macau. (See pictures below.)  One day we were in one of the markets (the "markets" are just sections of town where there are lots of little shops and stands in a three or four-block area - just foot-traffic, no automobiles - but the scooters go through!), and we heard music coming from nearby.  We saw that a place had been cleared, a "loft" cleaned out, and a Chinese Opera was going on.  What a treat to watch and listen.
In all of the parks, plazas and little "squares" or gathering places there are always groups of men playing chess or card games.  Some of the games must get pretty interesting (or the stakes are high) because of the number of spectators they draw!
We are looking forward to General Conference - I know, it was last weekend! Thanks to the wonders of computers and internet, we can get it here in our apartment, but since we are 14 hours "ahead" of what's happening there, we have to wait to view it. Our Branch will receive the DVD's sometime this week (hopefully) and we will watch the sessions as a Branch this coming Saturday and Sunday. I will have to admit that I sneaked in the Saturday Morning session yesterday while Roland was at the church getting ready for meetings!
We are two days away from the 7-month mark in our mission - hard to believe!

Chinese Opera at the market

Guys playing cards/chess in the park

Lou Lim Ieoc Garden-across from church.  This is a classical Chinese garden--narrow pathways winding through groves of bamboo and flowering bushes, molded concrete "mountains" and a large pond with golden carp and lotus flowers.  There is a nine-turn bridge, zig-zagging across the pond (according to legends, evil spirits can only move in straight lines).

February 23, 2010

We survived the Chinese Lunar New Year!  What an awesome celebration - and the party continues!  (We still wake up to firecrackers every morning...)

On the Lunar New Year's Eve, we watched fireworks from our apartment window.  Macau was really putting on a show down by the Macau Tower.  We looked out the windows on the other side of the living room, and the show from Zhuhai City (Mainland China) was even bigger!  We just walked from one side to the other, oohing and aahing at the wonderful views.  One of the best things we did was to go down a couple of days later to an area by a reservoir where there are fireworks stands - a couple of blocks worth - selling every kind of rocket, firecracker, fountain, spinner, cherry bomb, sparkler, etc. etc. imaginable.  A little way further is an area to set them off - fireworks launchers mounted to the fences and towers for the rounds of firecrackers and all!  We watched as tiny kids and old people alike set off fireworks to their hearts' content.  Everyone was smiling and having a great time, in spite of imminent danger--some of the kids got so excited that they pointed their Roman candles in every direction, including directly at anyone nearby.  Roland got excited about the huge rolls of firecrackers that were draped around a fence about a block long, then ended in a tripod tower.  It was one of the loudest things we've ever heard, and the explosion at the top of the tower at the end was HUGE! Smoke a red paper flew everywhere!

On another note, we didn't give laih sih (red envelopes), but we did get one! So, here goes the Year of the Tiger - San Lihn Faai Lohk - Kung Hei Fat Choi!  Happy New Year! Happiness, Good Fortune!

March 1
I didn't get this finished in February...We found out that the end of the New Year celebrations was yesterday - the Lantern Festival, which is held 15 days after the Lunar New Year.  Lanterns are put up in all the public places and businesses to "break darkness, illuminate the land, and bring brightness and hope to people."  We are all for that.
Everything in Macau is damp, musty, and foggy.  Will we ever see the sun again?
We had a Mission outing to "Big Buddha" in Hong Kong on Feb. 18.  It was a freezing cold day, but we enjoyed the experience - even the vegetarian lunch at the Po Lin Monastery in the village at the base of the Buddha. 

We're going on six months - and still loving it!

        

Pictures, L to R and Top to Bottom:
The lobby of our apartment building - decorated for the New Year.
Band performance at Senado Square.
New Year's decorations at Senado Square.
Fireworks booths at Nam Van.
Big Buddha - Ngong Ping, Hong Kong
Macau at night from the bridge to Taipa

January in Macau!  The Christmas season is past, as well as the Western New Year.
Our Christmas celebrations were few, but sweet.  We went out caroling as a Branch several times - to public parks and gathering places.  Most people smiled, and nodded or waved; some were not aware of what we were doing, a few disagreed and turned away.  Caroling on a sunny Sunday morning is something everyone should do at least once!  We had a big ham dinner for our Zone on Christmas day, and then in the afternoon and evening we hosted the entire Branch at our apartment (those who wanted to come or COULD come).  Everyone brought food and we had several hours of fun together.  It kept all of us from missing home and family too much.  Making phone calls (thanks to Skype!) to family members also helped.  One of our favorite memories will always be Jacob (2 1/2) singing "Happy Birthday" to Grandpa while his big sister, Sarah, played "Joy to the World" on the piano!
We have started January with many forays into the back streets and by-ways of Macau, trying to find less-active Branch members--actually with some successes.  We are getting VERY good at finding streets--NOW, if everyone could spell them correctly (in Portuguese, of course) and then give us the name of their building (in Chinese of course), AND get all of the building numbers, floor numbers, and apartment numbers right, we'd have it made!  That's asking a lot of people whose mother tongue is a dialect from the Philippines or Indonesia.
We had a Mission activity in Hong Kong early in January, and were able to make our first trip to the Ladies Street Market and the Jade Market.  We had a wonderful day to do it - warm and sunny; apparently everyone else in Hong Kong thought it was the perfect day to go there also - it was PACKED!  We enjoyed the experience, and found some neat little items--we'll go back.
One of our "cultural experiences" lately was to watch a Chinese funeral - or graveside service.  I was doing some laundry on our little back balcony, and heard small cymbals and bells.  Our apartment building is in front of a large cemetery; I looked down, and saw a man dressed in a yellow and black hooded robe at the side of a grave.  He was playing the instruments, lighting incense, and throwing pieces of paper in an open grave.  Then, the funeral procession came through the far gates and wound its way to the gravesite; the people wore robes of some sort with hoods - black, white, or yellow.  They put the coffin in the grave, then each person filed by and threw a handful of dirt on the coffin.  The cemetery workers shovelled all the dirt into the grave, and the mourners filed back by, accompanied by the cymbals and bells, this time bowing three times and lighting an incense stick to put in the mound of dirt covering the coffin.  After they'd all done that, they turned around, and filed back by once more, this time lighting a rolled-up piece of paper from the burning incense, bowing three times at the foot of the grave, and throwing the burning paper into a burn barrel.  When they were done, they removed the robes, threw them in a pile on the ground, and filed out of the cemetery in the same orderly fashion they entered.  I need to read more about the customs and rituals of this area--it was fascinating to watch.
We are looking forward to Chinese New Year, which starts Feb. 14 this year.  It's the Year of the Tiger!  HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!  Sanlihn Faailohk!!!

Macau - looking NW out of our 18th floor living room window.  The tin roofs are about 6-8 stories high, so street level is WAAAAAAY down there!

Mission Christmas dinner - along with the Tim-Tam Slams, it doesn't get much better!

The streets of Macau - on a clear day, you COULD see forever; but we haven't had one yet (a clear day, I mean...)  In the background is the Grand Lisboa Hotel/Casino--the "great and spacious building"!

More streets of Macau - this is the REAL thing.

"THE" Barber Shop; Roland says this guy is a real barber. The "shop" is about 3'x7', built onto the side of a

building on the street.

 

An old lady in Taipa; when I asked if I could take her picture, she nodded, then held out her hand for a donation...

We found Waldo - right here in Macau.  (Just in case anyone is still looking!)

IF YOU CAN'T FIND IT IN MACAU, YOU CAN'T FIND IT ANYWHERE!!!