Happy New Year from Hong Kong

2016 goes out on a high note!!  This week we were able to help the mission office out by visiting a few apartments and looked at a few new one to relocate the sister on their expiring lease this coming January.  It was nice to be among peoples instead of just looking at the computer all day!  We got to travel to Kowloon Bay, Sai Wan and Yuen Long.  We will also be doing some minor fixing up of the Elder's apartment.  I wish there is a Home depot here we could do a one stop shopping but there isn't, We need to replace a washer on a leaking shower head, we thought the washer is a universal size but the shop told us it is not, now we have to figure out what brand the shower head is before we could get a little washer to fix the leak!!!  I love the American system where parts usually are interchangeable!!!

We attended two wards' church meeting today.  Elder Mark White is going home this coming Friday so we attended the Victoria 1 ward to listen to his talk.  He did a wonderful job at sharing his experience as a missionary and is looking forward to start the next chapter of his life.  It is amazing to see what a mission does to young man:  the maturity they gained as they lose themselves in the service of other and God.  The experience he gained is priceless and will help him in whatever he wants to pursue in his life!

We had a wonderful Cafe Rio dinner at the office on New Year's Eve.  We played some games; I don' usually like playing games because I am too competitive but the games were fun last night.  The first one was "Finishing the proverb".  We were given a card with part of the proverb, such as A Nigerian proverb said Joy is ..., The reader will read this part of the proverb and write down the correct answer on a sheet, the rest of the team will write down what they think the proverb should say on their sheet, then pass the sheet to the reader.  The reader will read the answer while an opposite team will guess what the correct answer to the proverb is.  The team would have three chances to guess: correct answer on first guess worth 3 points, second worth 2 points and third 1 point.  I think some of the wrong answers were better proverb than the correct ones!  The answer to this proverb on Joy is:  Joy has a small body. I think my answer was better:  Joy is priceless!

We finished the dinner and clean up around 9:30 pm, we would have love to take the ferry across the harbour and walked home as we usually do but elected to take the bus instead.  We were lucky we decided to take the bus because the pier along the promenade was already filled with people waiting for the midnight firework.

We did stayed up to watch the firework on the television.  We could feel the firework on our glass windows and see the reflection on the windows across from us!

We were able to facetime Brenda and Jessica around midnight Wiscousin time after we came home from church.  I was informed the Hong Kong fireworks was the best they had seen!  It is on youtube if anyone interested to see it.

We took a walk on the promenade after church today and noticed there were lots of people fishing.  One gentlemen got a big founder that is at least 3 feet wide but he lets it go because he doesn't like the fish!!!

This is the HungHom Club, they do this light show every night around  p.m.

This Thai lady was taking picture on the Promenade, Elder Beckstead and Ted just has to take a picture with her!

Saw someone writing on the tile using a foam brush and water.  He was kind enough to write something for us when he saw our name tags.  "Elder Yan"

God loves the people on this earth.

"Elder Beckstead love Hong Kong:

One way to prevent people to climb over the railing is to put rocks on the outside of the rail

"Thankful to God"

Made Chinese beef stew for the first time with a two person vacuum cooker.  Put this in the morning and has stew at night when we come back. It was delicious!