In the course of human history, it is often only the major culture-shifting paradigms or major historical events which are deemed worthy of recording; however, this past week I experienced something that was but a blip on human history, but for me was so much more. Even though it will never make it to the textbooks, it is worthy of recording here. This Friday, I experienced a life change in the form of a microwave. That’s correct: on Friday morning, Sister Good and Sister Street became the proud owners of a brand new microwave delivered directly to the apartment. For those of you who can actually remember what life was like before the microwave was invented, I salute your health and longevity; those of you who have trouble remembering what the letters “VHS” stand for may have a bit more sympathy for how significant this event was for us. Suddenly, our frozen dumplings that took eight to ten minutes to steam on the stove can be cooked in seconds. Our leftovers that had to be heated for twenty to thirty minutes in the oven can be ready in one. Not enough time to finish my tea? Not a problem—we have a microwave. In all actuality, my month without a microwave was not that bad and I could have easily gone the next two months without one. Nonetheless, I was overjoyed to receive it and several days later I am still marveling about what this means for my life (microwave popcorn, frozen dinners, and lots of other things with too many additives and artificial flavors but lots of convenience).
On a more serious note, the other major change that happened this week was that Margaret and I began teaching our English Sunday School Class. We are teaching on “hidden treasures” of the Old Testament and focusing on some of the lesser known characters. I started us out this week by teaching about Mephibosheth from 2 Samuel. (We called him “Big M” to simplify; “Mephibosheth” is a difficult word even for native English speakers!) We started the Sunday School hour by gathering in the sanctuary with all of the Sunday School classes from youth through adults to sing some songs and listen to one of the ministers say a few words regarding a passage of scripture. After about fifteen minutes of the large group gathering, we separated into our individual classes. We had about fifteen students in our class this week; I think some of them came out of sheer curiosity, and I admire their courage. Attending an English Sunday School class must surely be intimidating, because not only is it not in the students’ native language, but it is also taught in a different style from that with which they are familiar. I favor a discussion-oriented Bible study, whereas some of our students told us after the class that they were used to a lecture style of Bible study (although they seem open to something new). It will be a trial and error process, but we are excited to continue to learn from it as we teach. We appreciate your prayers as we continue in this process.
Aside from those major changes, life is proceeding as it normally does here in Hong Kong. Our Thai women continue to be a joy to work with on Saturdays in our Thai English class, and we are so grateful for the opportunity to work with them. We are still enjoying our work at Pooi To and getting to interact with the girls. Last week we started helping some of the form 1 students (about 11 or 12 years old) who are participating in a speech contest, and we will continue to work with these students once a week until the contest takes place in November. They will be reading a poem for the contest, so we are helping them with their pronunciation right now, and we will eventually help them with their delivery style as well.
Random Updates
* We had a public holiday on Wednesday of last week, and Margaret and I were able to join the children’s ministry in a boat trip to Lantau Island. We visited a fishing village called Tai O and went to a new park on a different part of the island. We even got to see some pink dolphins while we were on the boat ride! Pink dolphins are very rare and I believe they are only found in this region, so that was a special treat.
* We did manage to catch a random English news broadcast one evening last week when we arrived home later than normal. Lesson learned: if at first you don’t succeed, don’t start doing your homework! Just keep sitting in front of the TV and hope for the best! Alternately, do homework and turn on the TV again in an hour. That being said, when we tried to get some information about the torrential downpour occurring outside last night, all we could find were Chinese broadcasts. Apparently it was only rain.
* When we got the English broadcast last week, we heard some terrible news: the most recent products recalled because of the dairy crisis are Cadbury chocolates and MnM’s. I actually thought the sky was falling when I heard that; my two favorite candies could be potentially harmful! I’m sure there is an object lesson in this, but I am going to ignore it and just look for chocolate imported from somewhere other than China, Indonesia, or, really, anywhere in Asia until the dairy scare is behind us.
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1 comment:
Thanks for excellent blog updates, with insightful reflections on what is being learned in the midst of 'doing'. Blessings, Emily. -- Terry
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