Life in Hong Kong: 2011

Merry Christmas! It's hard to believe that it is 6 days from Christmas already! Where did the time go? We will miss being "home" for Christmas this year having the traditional Christmas Eve at the Borgs and Christmas Day at the Cloughs.

After attending a candlelight service on Sunday evening at another church, it felt much more like Christmas. We enjoyed singing Christmas carols and hearing the true Christmas story from the Bible on Jesus' birth and that the reason He came to earth to be born was to die on the cross to pay for our sins. I hope you are all taking time to remember and celebrate the REAL reason for this season!

Since I haven't updated our blog for a month, let me back up just long enough to say a few words about our Thanksgiving. In Hong Kong, people don't celebrate Thanksgiving, of course. However, since I was leading the music at my Bible study, I decided to choose songs about Thanksgiving and talk about it a little bit. I took for granted that everyone knew what American Thanksgiving was, until someone said, "So what are they thankful about?" So I backed up and explained the history!
On Thanksgiving Day, some wonderful new friends in Tuen Mun, Hong Kong invited us to their home to spend the day with them and two other families. We took the ferry across the water and then jumped on a bus on the other side. They live quite far out, and I believe they are the only non-Asian families who live in that area! They have a house instead of an apartment, so it was nice to see some space inside a house! We had SO much food! Everyone brought something and we ate until we were stuffed!

John Paul made a homemade apple pie:

See what you can do with a little oven?!

Here's a video clip of our Thanksgiving dinner. You'll see Jonathan, Catherine and their two adorable kids, Sara and "Big Bob," the newlyweds Wade and Robyn (I didn't get her head on the movie though...sorry!), and the pastor and his wife.

After our big meal, we all took a walk.

We climbed MANY stairs,

went by a shrine, (no, Lucy is not bowing - she was looking down!),

and finally made it to the top! From the top, we were able to see from the over look:

the mountains,

the city,

some graves,

and the ocean.

After watching Lucy provide us with a lot of laughs, we took a group picture and then headed back down for pies and pumpkin cake while watching "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving." What a fun time together!

The weeks since Thanksgiving have been filled with many concerts,

Mary Wu - our friend and a wonderful pianist. Taken after one of her concerts.

meeting friends, Bible Study, church, seeing many Christmas displays,

One of my favorite paintings - with a Christmas display model below:

eating, eating, eating...

some sight-seeing, and just settling into life here in Hong Kong. Two highlights this month were 1) having a friend visit us from Alabama and 2) going to Guangzhou for our anniversary.

Marjorie, a friend from our Sunday School class from our church in Alabama (HELLO to our friends in ISF!), came to Hong Kong to visit her family. While here, she kindly brought some Christmas gifts from my parents and took some time out of her family visiting to meet us for lunch and show us the area where she grew up. We had a delicious dim sum meal (she was great at choosing the delicious food items on the menu!) and she introduced us to a baking store (I bought a baking sheet that will fit in my oven so I can make Christmas cookies this year!), a meat store (I might even be able to buy a beef roast there!), an art gallery, and vegetable shops.

The other highlight was spending out third wedding anniversary in Guangzhou, China. By bus, Guangzhou is about 3 1/2 hours away from where we live in Tung Chung. We spent three days there and had a great time. Yao, a friend from Alabama, introduced me via email to a friend of hers, Xiao Min, who lives in Guangzhou. Xiao Min took us to a few local restaurants, to the Baiyun mountain (white cloud mountain), and we met up with her and her husband and almost 2 year old daughter for the circus! They were so nice! Xiao Min's husband said we were his "number one American friends!" We were the first Americans that he had met! Their daughter Xi Xi called us "Aunty" and "Uncle" and Xiao Min said that Xi Xi has been saying "Aunty" every day since we left!

Me with Xiao Min at the White Cloud Mountain

Some strangers who started taking our pictures. This happened several times. I began feeling famous!

One of the girls who asked if she could have a picture with me. Then she said, "So tall! So beautiful!" Aw! :)

Wonderful view of the city.

The anniversary couple!

We hiked all the way up, but coming down we took the cable car. I do NOT like heights! JP and Xiao Min just laughed at me and JP caught my picture!

Our first evening ended with a riverboat cruise. We realized that the lunar eclipse was taking place during our cruise, so we were able to see that as well!

Inside the boat.

The new tv tower. It kept changing colors and was the highlight of the cruise.

The moon....almost covered.

I tried not to drink a whole lot on the trip, though, because I didn't want to have to go to the bathroom when we were out. At the hotel, it was fine, but outside.....um....I'll let the picture explain:

And let me just add - if you go there, be sure to bring your own tissues with you.

Going to the bathroom wasn't very fun, but going to the circus was! We met Xiao Min and her family there and had a great time!

Our last day was spent sleeping in, going to WalMart, going to a safari, and heading home on a scary bus ride. (Driving in China is rather scary).
We were so excited to find the WalMart! - That is, until we went there! It was interesting and fun to go through, but certainly not like walking into a WalMart in the States!

The clothing section of WalMart. If you go to the grocery section, you'll find very fresh fish nicely laid out on packed ice for you to choose from!

The safari was great! We didn't expect to see so many animals. We didn't make it through the whole thing in order to catch our bus back home, so we plan to go back and take Ben when he comes to visit. Besides seeing animals, we saw several shows. Here is a clip of the elephant show:

I was chosen as a volunteer for this show. Unfortunately, our camera had a problem just at that moment, so I don't have pictures from it. I was hoola-hooping against the elephant - and I lost! I was given a stuffed animal as a prize, though!

We had such a wonderful time, but once again, we were happy to be back home in Hong Kong. We thought so many things were in Chinese instead of English here in Hong Kong, but after being in Guangzhou, we realized that there actually is a lot of English in HK. Not everyone can speak English, of course, but we are thankful that so many things are written in both languages so that we can easily get around. It can be difficult to read maps, road signs and instructions when it's not in English!

We hope you have a wonderful CHRISTmas and a happy New Year. We look forward to hearing from you!

Until next time......

Hello Friends!

I have been looking forward to writing another update for you! I have been sick for the better part of this week, so I'm finally getting to it now. I still feel a little under the weather - cold, headache, sinus congestion and sinus pressure - but I'm getting better. Unfortunately, being sick has caused me to miss quite a few things, including a cooking party with some friends making an American Thanksgiving dinner, church service yesterday, and a lecture this evening at Hong Kong University given by pianist Evengy Kissin. SADNESS! I am really bummed out having to stay home, but I have needed the rest. Hopefully Kissin will come to Hong Kong again soon!

Our apartment feels more like home now. We have an oven and our boxes finally came! After five weeks, it feels nice to have my school books and more clothes! I apologize that you've had to see me in the same couple shirts in all of my past pictures! We were told to pack for a week, but it turns out, we should have packed for five weeks since our boxes were sent by boat! Oh well, we made it! At least we have them now.

Our new oven!

Our boxes: safe and sound after sailing here from the U.S.

Clothes, books, extra bags for carrying things, and even Christmas presents from Mom and Dad!

All of the boxes are unpacked and put away now. It feels great!

Since I last wrote, John Paul and I have done an awful lot of things, but I'll try and give you the highlights! (And JP is planning on writing a post soon with some of the neat experiences that he's had without me while working. He has some great pictures, too, so be on the lookout for that!)

Speaking of John Paul, here is a picture of him after flying his first trip as Captain John Paul Clough!

His uniform includes a tie, but apparently he had already removed it.

John Paul and I went to hear Mary Wu play a concert with violinist James Cuddeford. The concert was wonderful! Since we were out on Hong Kong Island, we decided to have dinner there. We found a little local place which only had a Chinese menu. The waiter spoke some English, so we had him explain things to us and ended up with some really delicious food! Here's a picture:

We drank tea with our meal, of course! It's funny because sometimes one of us will ask for cold water, and often the answer will be "No. Hot only." Also, if you want to order some other drink, often you do this at the end of the meal. You drink the tea, and then have lemon tea, milk tea, soy milk, or some other drink once you have finished your meal. We're getting used to it! (Although we do keep some water in our bags and take them with us just about everywhere! My family gave us each a platypus hydration pack as an early Christmas present and we are SO thankful! We use them all the time!)

"Monkey Mountain" - Sum, Jesse, Elijah and Evangeline took us to see the monkeys after church last Sunday. Monkeys - loose - ALL over the place! It was like being in a huge monkey zoo, except that the monkeys weren't in cages! Sum said that local people don't get excited about them. Seeing a monkey for a local is like someone in Alabama seeing a squirrel. She laughed at us as we took pictures and got all excited about seeing them! Sum took pictures of us taking pictures of the monkeys!

Don't feed the monkeys! There are signs in the park, yet some people still feed them. They can be aggressive and attack people. People who take plastic grocery bags into the park with them often get attacked because the monkeys recognize the bags as being grocery bags and think that the bags contain food. Here are just a few of the many pictures John Paul and I took of the monkeys:

Don't feed the monkeys!

People feeding the monkeys in front of the "don't feed the monkeys" sign

I was a little nervous...

Standing in front of a reservoir in the park.

Last week, we finally got our visas! To activate our visas, we needed to leave Hong Kong and come back in. We decided to go up to Went to ShenZhen in mainland China and have dinner. We had an absolutely delicious dinner:

Pumpkin dumplings, Sweet and Sour Pork, and Pork BBQ (Chinese style)

I enjoyed getting a mani/pedi and doing some shopping (and JP got a shoulder, neck, head and foot massage too!) but after constantly being asked for money and "look at this/buy this (fake) iphone/watch/bag" ect. and being followed around all over, it was so nice to be HOME back to Hong Kong! As we went through customs returning to Hong Kong, we were greeted so warmly! The security officer had been to Mobile, Alabama as well as Charleston, South Carolina. He was very friendly and made us feel like we were returning home.

I wanted to take John Paul to a restaurant that I had eaten at with Erica. I found the restaurant, but nobody at the restaurant spoke English, and the menu was in Chinese. I called Erica and told her what I wanted and put her on the phone with the owner. We ordered french toast and fish and chips! A Brittish Chinese restaurant! :)

We were trying to get the store in the background, but the light outside was too bright. It is just a little hole in the wall and you walk towards the back and find tables to eat at.