Cheung Chau (From Jan 5th)

Wow, what a week/day. The problem is that I cant really remember much from this week because today so much happened. So I will just start with today. 

 

Our zone decided to do a zone activity on Cheung Chau, a little island you have to take a ferry to get to. It is the COOLEST place I have ever been to here. It is pretty small so in about an hour you can probably walk from one side to the other. There are lots of trails, caves, jungles, and other stuff; but there are also some villages that are really cool. They consist of buildings, apartments and stuff with narrow little streets in between. Everyone there rides bikes to get around because there is no room for cars on any street on the island. The police, firefighters, ambulances, etc... are little motorcycle/tractor things that are small enough to go on the roads. Then on the outskirts of these villages are tons of shanty houses made out of tin roofs and things like that. You can look right into the peoples houses and watch them eat or do whatever theyre doing.

Cheung Chau is really well known for being one of the most haunted places in Hong Kong. I guess it started a long time ago when there was some pirate that had a huge fleet and about 50,000 other pirates working for him. he used to hide all of his treasure inside of a cave we went through on the island. There are many legends stemming from that alone. On top of that, besides Tin Shui Wai (they made a movie about it called "city of sorrows", and it is the smallest mission area in hong kong), it has had the most amount of suicides. But most of them have happened since 2000. They also have an annual festival where thousands of people come to the island to watch people do crazy acrobatics and different balancing things.

If mom and dad are able to come to Hong Kong to pick me up, this little island is somewhere we will HAVE TO go to. It honestly is the coolest place I have ever been to in my life.

 

I got the Ward Christmas CD yesterday! It was so great to hear Sam, Kylie, and Madi's voices! The girls did a great job on the song! It was also cool to hear at the beginning when it announces the missionaries and where they are serving. It was so cool to hear the names of all the kids in our ward who are right by my side doing the same work all over the world! I am proud of all of them and hope that the ones who are turning 19 soon will go on missions too. What could possibly be better than devoting all of your energy and time into one thing: Helping other people improve their lives through the gospel!

 

I actually havent put too much thought into my new area, because I am still focusing on the one I'm in. But I had a dream I was going to somewhere on Hong Kong island or in the zone at least.

 

I was talking to the APs last night asking them how to even more effectively help the people we meet with understand the importance of the things we want to teach them. Because we have gotten about 50 new investigators these last 6 weeks, and most of them are doing well, but I just want them all to progress. They told me that I just need to keep doing what I am doing, and not to change at all, especially when I go to my new area. I am a little concerned because there are a few areas that are really slow right now and the older missionaries in those areas would be difficult to work with because for whatever reason they just dont have the reputation for being very motivated. With all of the succuss Elder Palfreyman and I have been having, we have been under the spotlight a lot lately, and I am afraid they are going to send me with a companion who doesnt have the motivation to go out and work. It is difficult while Junior Companion because if your senior comp doesnt want to work, sometimes no matter how much you try and motivate them, it doesnt work. I have been so lucky to be paired up with a companion this move who is willing to work and who has definitely treated me just as much as senior as him. That is how it should be I think. But I will just have to remember that someday when I go senior.

 

Eh whatever, it isnt important to dwell on that. This week we were walking around and found ourselves in a really cool chinese graveyard where we met some really cool kids. But the craziest thing right now is that we have an investigator who is a part of the Triad. He wants to really change his life, but he has not been living the best life up til this point. It is pretty crazy. I hope he gets baptized because he is a really good guy.

 

Well, I dont have much time and I feel really bad because there is a native missionary sitting right next to me. (him and I are really really good friends) and he is a convert so his parents arent very supportive. Well he was only on emailing for about 5 minutes because he didnt have any from anyone. He is now trying to listen to videos on lds.org and write in his journal. But he doesnt speak any english so he really doesnt understand what the videos are saying.

 

Talk to you all next week!!

 

Love, Elder Jordan roe bingham

Happy New Year!

Happy New Years!!

First off, it was GREAT to be able to speak with you all on the phone. I loved hearing about everything from how many presents Sam gave justin to the color of madisons room. In five months I will talk to you all again!

My Companion and I have been a little afraid that I would be moved, because when an area is having a lot of success, they often change the companionship so that others can come in and experience it, and so that those companions can teach others or help other areas out.
Well, this week it was confirmed.
President Chan was talking to me about how wonderful things have been going and the APs and him have been telling me how proud they are of me.
Later that night we got a call from President Chan. He told us that I would be leaving the area and that my companion would be training because the area is doing so well, and there are a lot of new missionaries coming in.
I was not too happy about this, but its okay because I know that wherever I go I will love it and have the opportunity to meet more people and teach them about the gospel.
Monday we helped with International. It was sooo much fun. My companion for it (Elder Carey) is hilarious and mixing that with the Phillipinas who just love to laugh and have fun made it quite the day. We were able to find 4 new investigators, bring them back to the church, teach them, and have them go to church. It was so much fun.

Yesterday I went Sports finding for the first time in a while. We played basketball with some kid for a little bit and then sat him down and taught him. But then we found a group of 6 boys playing soccer and asked if we could play with them. We played for a while without saying much, but then when I felt like the time was right I told them who we are and asked if we could all go sit down on some bleachers while I share our message. It wound up being one of the most interesting lessons I have ever taught. I stood up in front of them and tried to get all of them involved. It wasnt hard because they were all asking really good questions. We were able to give them all Book of Mormons and reschedule them again.
After the lesson, it just amazed me how we were able to take 6 teenage boys off of a soccer field to sit down for 45 minutes and listen to our message. We have not been telling many other people in the mission about these experiences because we are already being put in the spotlight enough from President Chan and the APs using us as an example. But when we go out finding, we have faith that we are going to have success. We pray for it everyday, and our families often pray for it as well. So there is no reason why we shouldnt be ablet to. We went from bringing 1 or 2 books of mormon out with us when we went out for the day to stuffing our bags as full as possible with them.

This experience being a missionary is changing my life in so many ways. I feel like I have been blessed so much while being here, and the blessings just keep coming. I have learned to trust and have faith. If you do everything you can, and pray hard for God to help you out, he will make up for what you fell short on. This can apply to every part of life, not just missionary work.

With the New Year coming up (even though chinese new year will be a lot more fun here), I want you all to think of some specific things you can do daily to change yourself for the better.
I have a paper hanging above my desk with all of my personal goals for this move, and the things I would do daily to achieve them. I am happy to say I have achieved them, and so in a couple weeks in my next area I can do the same thing and figure out what else I want to change. We can never be perfect, but we can always be improving ourselves and progressing. that is the purpose of this life after all.

Well, I love you all and hope you have a great New Years!!

Love, Jordan

Merry Christmas!! (Sorry, I'm posting this a week late...Dad)

Merry Christmas!!

Today we had our mission Christmas party, which one of the missionaries in my group pointed out, marks our 6 months of being on our missions. I feel like I just started a month ago, the time FLIES by. It was really fun because we had a white elephant thing and ate a giant roast pig (they just brought out an entire pig, head and everything like in movies.), then watched a slideshow that they put together. It made me realize how great being a missionary is, especially in such an amazing mission. They are going to order a bunch of DVDs with the slideshow on it for us. I will probably send one home. I feel like when I go home someday and watch those slideshows, it is going to be pretty rough. I know I will miss Hong Kong and being a missionary tons. I really love all the people I am around. The investigators, the missionaries, and the members. I just cant even imagine if I didnt have this privilidge to be here. I would be missing out on the greatest experience in the world.

There was one part of the Christmas party that I could have done without. President Chan got up and was talking about how there was one companionship that has been on fire getting new investigators and helping them progress, and how we all need to learn how to do that. He then asked Elder Palfreyman and I to come up to the stage and show everyone how we do it. We explained a little bit, then did a role play with president chan being someone we meet on the street. While it is nice to know that we really are doing so well, both my companion and I felt that the recognition in front of the entire mission was a little too much. Also, it is not anything we can credit ourselves for doing, as God is putting these people in our paths, and the spirit is the one converting them.

But I have been blown away by how much success we are having. We have been getting new investigators and teaching strreet lessons EVERYWHERE. Kids are walking up to us and saying, "Hey I have seen you before talking to my friends, what do you have to tell me that can help my life."

We have not even been trying to get any new investigators because we have PLENTY that we are trying to focus on. But whenever we go to meet with an investigator they bring their friends or someone approaches us, or we feel prompted to go talk to someone on the way.

We are being blessed right now and I am so happy. My comp and I get along really well even though we dont have most of the same interests or anything. But we are both willing to get out there and do what it takes to help these people.

Our two investigators who have given us countless referrals, Tony and Lam, are doing sooo well. We went fishing with them last friday which was AWESOME. I dont have my camera because they used it to take pictures of the activity today. But I am excited to send some pictures from our fishing trip. I caught two little fish. But my favorite part was sitting down on the rocks right on the edge of the harbor and teaching these two kids that have been forever changed because of the book we gave them a couple of weeks ago. They read it every single day and are so proud of that. They want to change their lives and stop doing the things that are keeping them from being baptized.
Their biggest problem has been smoking. But Tuesday we checked up on them and one said he had went from 2 packs to 7 the day before, and the other only had 1! since then the one who smoked 7 has been going down 1 or 2 a day and the other one hasnt smoked at all!

It is important that we call them or meet with them everyday to make them feel accountable to someone, but the best part is that they are using prayer and the Book of Mormon to get through this. When they feel the craving to smoke, they read the Book of Mormon to get rid of it. We have been giving them verses to read everyday, but especially the one who is not smoking anymore just keeps reading and reads page after page everyday.

Who would have ever thought that these two kids we met on some rooftop smoking would develop such a love for the Book of Mormon?

Last night we had a Zone Caroling Find in our area. It was fun because while the Zone caroled on this busy path, my companion, I, and a few other missionaries walked around talking to people. In two hours we passed out over 20 books of mormon and got 8 new investigators.

While I was talking to these two boys, a lady walked up and in Cantonese said to them, "Hey! Kids! Dont you know who you are talking to?! Those people are MouhMuhnGaau! (It is their way of saying Mormon, but is a lot more negative than when people say it in English. Members never say they are MouhMuhnGaau.) Get away from them!" I turned to her and said, "Excuse me? We are here teaching how families can live together forever, and how to find Eternal Happiness through Jesus Christ. So if you want that, I can spend a few minutes talking to you, otherwise dont try to stop other people from finding more happiness in life." She got a horrified look on her face because I dont think she knew that even the white missionaries can speak and understand Cantonese. The two boys were just like, "wow she is crazy." and it didnt affect them at all. But it is just sad when people are misinformed or hear and believe rumors about the church then try to spread it to people who are interested.

Actually, the biggest problem going on lately is that the high schools in Hong Kong have been anti-ing the kids. They will have assemblies where the principal gets up and talks about how we are devil worshippers and how we kill people or whatever the heck they think they can tell the kids to try and keep them away from us. But nothing is stopping missionary work from moving forward here. President Chan takes some stake or area presidents with him and goes to the schools that we find out are doing that and march in and talk to the principals. I am so grateful to have a mission president who is so humble and kind, and pretty quiet. But then when something like that happens he is bold and is not afraid to face those people and tell them what they are doing is wrong.

Love you all!

Love, Elder Jordan Roe Bingham

Starting from Zero

Well I dont even know where to start for this week's email.

Remember how last week I told you how well my companion and I have been doing? Well It has only gone uphill since then.
Last week we taught 18 lessons just on the street, and got 15 new investigators. All of our other numbers such as investigators at church were also consequentially high.

Well a couple of days ago President Chan came up to me while I was on exchanges and congratulated me and told me how happy he is and how well we have been doing. He asked what our secret is for doing so well and my answer was the Book of Mormon.

When my companion and I have been out finding, we will bring around 6 BoMs with us with these little calendar bookmarks that we made that has everyday up until Christmas and a section in the BoM to read that day. They all have to do with Christ's birth or Christmas in some way. We just go out and ask people a little bit about Christmas then tell them we want to give them a present. We then ask if we can explain it a little bit and sit them down and teach the entire restoration focusing on the Book of Mormon. Sometimes we have had to come back within an hour of going out in order to get more Books of Mormon.

The best part? Most of the people have been reading! That has resulted in us being able to reschedule them and teach them more.

Well one day we were out finding at night on some roof of a random tower in Tsz Wan Shan. I have no idea how we got there because we were trying to find the bus station but somehow ended up on the roof of a tower... Well we were walking around and found two boys and two girls smoking. We went to talk to them and ask them what they were doing. They looked pretty guilty and just said, "smoking".  We kept talking to them and got the two boys' phone numbers then left. They didnt seem super promising. But that was a bad impression.
The next day we called them and they suprisingly rescheduled for that night to teach them. We showed up and they brought another friend. The day after that we taught them again and they brought two more friends. The day after that they invited us to go hiking up monkey mountain with them.
We had a really good time, and saw tons of monkeys. They are EVERYWHERE up there. It is really scary because they are the same Rhesus monkeys from Puerto Rico, and they just stand in the middle of the path and will not move for you so you have to try and walk around them. But if you get too close or look at them in the eyes they will start making noises and opening their mouth and lifting their hand up like they are gonig to hit you. There are a lot of little baby monkeys, but if you look at them the older monkeys will run or swing at you.
Well anyways, we taught these two kids (Lam and Tony) up in the mountains and committed them to be baptized. We told them we would have to teach them a lot of things including commandments before they could be baptized though.
Sunday they came to church and were able to stay after to watch a baptism. That just made them want to be baptized even more. But we knew it would be difficult and we had to bring up the Word of Wisdom in the next lesson. The hard part about Hong Kong is most of the teenagers here smoke and drink. These kids are only 16 but have been smoking since they were like 10.
A few nights ago we met them at a soccer field and were about to teach them but then 2 more of their friends showed up who we had never met before. We talked to them and they were interested in our message so Elder Palfreyman taught them and I went to a different bench with Tony and Lam. I was a little nervous because I was going to teach them the Word of Wisdom all on my own. But it actually went really well. They both said they knew they had to stop drinking and smoking. Tea and coffee were probably the biggest shock to them. Tony's mom makes him homemade tea everyday and he was nervous about telling her he couldnt drink it anymore because of his new religion. But I talked to them about the blessings and in the end we agreed they would stop drinking tea and coffe right away and that next week they would stop smoking and drinking.

They were both pretty down about this, but I think it went okay because they invited us to go fishing with them tomorrow. Well I called last night and they are both not drinking any tea or coffee, but next week will be the real test.
They both have so much faith though. They both say they know the Book of Mormon is true, and they say they know the Word of Wisdom is a commandment from God.
Lam's dad died a little while ago. It makes me so happy to have met him because he is sooo happy to know he can see his dad again, and he prayed once that his dad would accept the gospel in heaven.
I see miracles daily, but these two boys have really stuck out lately. Not only are they awesome investigators, but they have been giving us referalls left and right. It is good too because they are both really popular kids in their school, so nobody judges them at all and everyone respects them a lot.

I found some graffiti on a wall that says "Start from Zero". This is graffitied all over around an area in Lok Fu, and I am not sure what it is supposed to mean, but I took a picture with it. I was thinking about how the times that we have had the most success is often after we have the least. Part of it may be God humbling us, but I think part of it is that we realize we need to work even harder and step it up more. Now that we have had a great week that the entire mission has heard about (everyone is calling us or when they run into us they are mentioning they heard we are on fire and asking how we are doing it), I dont want to just sit back and relax. I want to mentally always be starting from "zero". Always be working and focused as I would if we had no investigators or no lessons that week. Never to stop once we reach our goals, but to keep going.

Well, have a GREAT week! Good luck with finals!
Love you all!

Love, Jordan

Got the Christmas Package. Thanks!

Thanks everyone for the Christmas package! A lot of the things in there will be very useful, and there were a lot of good food that you cant get in Hong Kong. (Like Snickers).

This week so far has been the most successful week I have ever had. We have been meeting really great investigators left and right. Yesterday we taught 7 full lessons on the street. That means 7 new investigators, 7 Books of Mormon passed out, and just in that one day we met the entire Zone's numbers for last week. In total the zone had 7 new investigators, 4 of which were ours and 2 that were the AP's. Tuesday we had 3 lessons and 3 new investigators, Monday we had another 3 with some other lessons with existing investigators. We have the opportunity to work hard from the moment we wake up until we go back at night to make calls.

We have been doing tai chi in the mornings for excersize ( I dont remember how to spell that word so it might be wrong..). I decided that probably tomorrow I am going to bring my camera and take pictures of the place we do it at and stuff so that when I send the memory card home with the package, you can see.

Speaking of the package. I realized there is no way it can get there before Christmas, so maybe it will be more of a Chinese New Year package. But I will send it ASAP so expect it sometime in the future.

We had a really cool experience on Saturday. We were in the chapel and a member came up to me and asked if I could come talk to some random kid that walked in.
I started talking to the kid and found out he is 18 and came down from mainland to take the SAT because he is applying to BYU for next year. He is from Nanjing which is up North and has a friend who is at BYU right now. I asked if he knew a girl I know from Nanjing and it turns out it is the same person. Crazy! But he decided to go to BYU because he says that he does not want to go to a school where everyone just parties all of the time, but he wants to go to one with morals. He already doesnt drink, smoke, drink tea or coffee (which is really rare for a chinese person, they LOVE their tea and cigarrettes.), and wants to go to a schoo lthat has his same personal standards. He looked up a lot about the church at home before coming to Hong Kong and then found where the temple was and wanted to go in and be taught all day Saturday. Unfortunately, he didnt understand that only members could go into the temple, so they sent him across the street to our chapel.
Well he had researched EVERYTHING he could about the church, he even was reciting the Missionary Handbook from memory to us. He told us that his mother did not want him to go on a mission but that he thinks it would be a good idea for him to serve one. He went to the Distribution Center with us and bought every single book there, and left with bags and bags of church books. He had never come into contact with the church at all, not even his friend from Nanjing is a member, but he researched it on his own and said he thinks it is one of the greatest things ever, and that it is right for him.
When he met us he acted like we were celebrities, he kept saying how amazing it is to meet us because he had read about us and knew we were called elder, and everything.
We were shocked, but it was really cool. Then we got in contact with the Mandarin Elders and showed him the Restoration and stuff until they got there. Later that day they told us he had cancelled his plane back to Nanjing so that he could go to church the next day in the Mandarin branch.
It was really random, but really cool to meet this kid. So next fall if you meet a Chinese kid at BYU whose English name is Franklin, tell him you know me.

Along with all of the really prepared people we have been meeting, we have met a lot of... other people as well. My new companion makes fun of me a lot because the first three days we were together, everytime we went finding something weird would happen, usually including a group of girls coming up to me and going on and on and on about how much of a lengjai I am. It is usually really good when people contact missionaries, but in these situations the best thing to do is just run. Just kidding, but we definitely have been avoiding all girls we see, because something about the weight I have gained or something has made me quite the attractive gwailouh (just kidding again). I also learned that Tagalog has a lot of similarities to Spanish. We always talk to Phillipinas because they are always so wililng to listen and come to church in the English branches. 
So now my companion is always giving me a hard time about being a lengjai. But soon I think I am just going to be a feihjai (fat boy). Because after 12 weeks of being in Hong Kong I have gained 15 pounds! (I may have already told you that, I cant remember.)
I think I may have acquired rice cheeks since I got here. People told me before my mission that I would get them, but everyone has been saying my cheeks have been getting fatter since being here. I am just going to come back a little chubby.

My Cantonese is getting pretty good.  And with all the work we have been doing, we have been talking a ton.

Well, I hope that you all have a great time finishing this last stretch of work and school (finals for madi and kylie) before Christmas Break.

Love you all!

Love, Jordan

New comp, new camera, and christmas stuff bought

Wooohooo! Today has been a grrreat day!

First, I got my new companion. I am staying in Sham Shui Po, and am now serving with Elder Palfreyman. He is a really really nice, kind of quieter kid. But I have heard he is willing to work hard. He actually went to BYU the first semester I went there and lived in Heritage Halls! He has only been here a few moves more than me, but he has been in international, so everyone told me i am going to probably have to help him with his Chinese. :S That makes me a little nervous, but I am pretty confident that everything will go well.

This next move will be amazing. I have a companion fresh out of international who is willing to work hard, and I set some personal goals to help myself improve as much as I can. So I have faith that we will see a lot of miracles.

Last Sunday a white guy showed up to sacrament meeting. He is from Suncrest in Draper and is in grandma and grandpa's stake! he said he will be coming to church again on sunday, and then he wants to take us to eat on monday. If he shows up, I will ask his name because I forgot it, but yeah.

It is SO LUCKY that you guys put money on my card. Thanks a TON. I got really sick this past week, and the mission doctor is in Thailand so I went to the hospital doctor. It wound up being really expensive. I had to pull my money out of my personal funds to use for the rest of the week. But now I got a refund from the mission for it. With that money I originally was going to buy an iPod because they are SUPER useful. But unfortunately my camera has been deleting pictures automatically, and although it is amazing for videos and underwater stuff, it doesnt have a flash, and cant really take pictures at night in Hong Kong (which are the coolest pictures). So I decided it was more important that I buy a new camera than an iPod. So I bought a very, very nice camera and Hopefully soon I can send some cool pictures from it. Maybe in the future I will think about getting an iPod. But I also bought some stuff to send home. It wont get home in time for Christmas. But hopefully not too far away. It is nothing special. I think next Christmas will be better because I will have more time to figure out what I want to buy. But I just got some stuff you can put up in the house and some Hong Kong shirts.

This move I have so many plans that will completely change the way missionary work is going in this ward. Before it was considered a relatively hard area. But that will all change soon. 

I have not gotten your package yet, but hopefully I will soon. We actually have been getting mail for a sister that already went home that was sent in May 2010! We think it must have gotten lost in the mail system somewhere.

I got my new suit! It is really really nice, I will have to take a picture with my camera and send it to you next P-day.

I have been really inspired lately to work harder than before. I now have a new companion, and at least 6 (maybe 12) more weeks in my area. So even though I was able to see success before, I want to put everything I have into missionary work now. Because when I am working hard, I have this feeling of happiness, like everyday is Christmas. 

Today has been pretty interesting. I am still sick (it is just a really bad bronchitis and a sinus infection), but me and Elder Palfreyman wanted to go to the market in Mong Kok to go shopping to buy stuff for our families for Christmas. Well he has been serving far away so he has no idea how to get around. I was able to find the market and then somehow by picking a random direction and walking in it, found the mong Kok library to email. I feel pretty confident right now because Mong Kok is super crowded and big, and I somehow have been able to navigate around it. 

I hope you are all doing well. I lately have found a real love for the Book of Mormon. I am noticing things that I never knew existed in it before. I hope you are all reading it daily. I am convinced that whether it is through something you actually read, or by a prompting from the spirit, you can receive an answer to pretty much any question you have if you have a daily habit of opening with a prayer, reading the book of mormon, then closing with a prayer. It just makes your whole day go so much better. Also, I cant believe I rarely used to say morning prayers when I woke up. The first thing I do when I wake up is role onto my knees and pray. This combined with scripture study just makes everything in the day go smoothly and gives me a peace that I dont think would be there otherwise.

The Hong Kong lifestyle is FAST. If you think that you are busy, you need to look at a Hong Kong person's schedule. They kids literally go to school all day, then pay tons of money to do tutoring at night and on weekends all day. When they dont have tutoring, they are working. Adults work work work. However, I have seen people with the BUSIEST lives ever make time to read their scriptures and do these easy things every day. Some of them eat 2 meals a day and only spend 20 minutes doing that because they need to get back to work. But somehow they make it work. I hope I never try to make the excuse that my life is too busy to do these simple things that0 give me peace and daily comfort.

Well, Have a fantastic first week of December! Also, Remember that you are all sons and daughters of a God! You have so much to look forward to in this life and the next if you keep the commandments and repent daily. No matter what situation you are in, the truth of who you really are and what you can someday become never goes away.

Love you all!

Love, Jordan

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!

I hope you all eat a lot of turkey, pie, and everything else that is on the table.

 

Yesterday we had our mission thanksgiving party. It was a lot of fun. I got to hang out with my group from the MTC and eat all of the normal thanksgiving food. It wasnt as good as when mom makes it, and there werent any gluten-free pies, but it was still fun to have thanksgiving on the other side of the world.

 

The other day I went on exchanges to Tung Chung again. I may have already explained, but Tung Chung is the area that covers the entire Lantau Island and all of the surrounding islands. It is probably the biggest area, but is definitely one of my favorites. It reminds me so much of puerto rico because the little villages arent full of giant skyscrapers.

Elder Creamer and I had a lesson scheduled for pretty early in the morning, but when the investigator got there, our lesson plan changed.

 

Kelsie is a girl who is getting baptized on Sunday. She is about to graduate in accounting, and is SUPER HYPER. She speaks faster than I ever thought possible, and has more energy and is more random than anyone I have ever met. Well she showed up to the branch meeting house for the lesson then told us to go outside. Luckily Elder Creamer grabbed a Book of Mormon, because we wound up following her up some trail in the mountains in our suit to a place in the river where there is a big, clear pool of water. It turns out she wanted to take her graduation pictures at the Tung Chung baptismal font (nicknamed the waters of mormon). She threw her graduation gown on and procceeded to run around telling us to take pictures in the most random places. Some of the areas included her pretending to be praying on a rock in the middle of the river, then her about to fall off the rock into the river. It was super random, but actually wound up being cool because we were able to read some things from the Book of Mormon to her. We read about Alma and the waters of Mormon, and some other stories that were relevant. It was probably one of my favorite lessons ever.

 

On the way back from Lantau Island, we got off the bus on Hong Kong island. Elder Creamer told me to prepare myself, and took me into some little alley and down a staircase into a random basement. But in this basement I found THE AMERICAN STORE. It is like a mini costco with random american foods. They have Peanut butter M&Ms, cocoa pebbles, and YOO-HOO! There was one box of Yoo-Hoo and I bought it. The only problem with the store is it is all pretty overpriced. But I did not think it was possible to have Yoo-Hoo in China. I was obviously wrong.

 

Oh! So I have some pretty exciting news. Remember last week I talked about going to do Tai-Chi? Well we went on Monday morning to a park and were lookign for someone to teach us. We saw a guy under a pagoda who looked pretty good so we went up and asked him. He then set up a schedule for us for which days of the week to come and for how long. It turns out he was actually a legit teacher. The only problem is he wanted to charge us money for it.

But we were still willing to do it. So we returned the next day, only to find that he was not under the pagoda, but instead a different man was. This man walked up to us and said in Cantonese, " I know what you want. You want someone to teach you to do Tai-Chi. My student saw you talking to the other man yesterday, and because you are willing to learn, I will teach you for free." Then a lady showed up and called him Si Fuh. If you remember, the kung fu master thing in kung fu panda is called Master Si Fuh. That is because in chinese, Master is Si Fuh. So this guy was legit.

Well, needless to say, we have gone every morning and are learning how to achieve inner-peace and energy transfer through Tai-Chi under a Pagoda in China with a river looping around us, full of swimming fish and turtles. Pretty cool. I will have to have someone take pictures of us one of these times, because it is unbelievable how legit the entire thing is.

 

Moves are a week from yesterday, and soon we will find out who is going where. 

Most likely I will stay in Sham Shui Po ( I hope I will at least). But there is also a chance I will go somewhere else. I guess in a week you will find out.

 

I have SO many pictures I have to send. I think I will hurry up and buy a memory card so I can just send you the one I am using.

 

Well have a great week, and an amazing thanksgiving!

 

Also, Congratulations to Kylie for getting into BYU-I!

 

Love, Elder Jordan Roe Bingham