Streetcars, Bubble Tea, Fish Balls, and Selfie Sticks, Oh...and Goodbyes :(

It's Suzy again. I have the privilege of blogging again tonight because everyone else is packing up for our journey home tomorrow.

We had a wonderful final day with our teacher friends. We ended up spending quality time with almost all of them today. Jaqueline showed us her English classroom and brought her Polaroid camera to take instant pictures with everyone. Light took us to her home and introduced us to her husband, David (he is a missionary who she met when he was over here from Florida) and her daughter. Dick and Jason escorted us around Hong Kong Island all afternoon and our whole group got to try fish balls, fried fish skin, and bubble tea. We are fans of bubble tea.

Walking around Hong Kong Island with our friends

Finally, we met up with Principal Ho, Vice Principal Monica, and Betty (the teacher in charge of organizing the VBS) for a very special farewell dinner. During dinner, we discussed the success of VBS. Everyone was pleased and they were very excited when we promised that we would return next year. We brought up the possibility of more joining us from Zion next year and that more children could be invited if more teachers came. Maybe that will happen?

One of the funny things on our trip is a new invention we found called a "Selfie Stick" it is a extendable arm that you attach your camera or phone to and then you can take group photos without asking someone else to take your picture. We really had a fun time taking group selfies all over Hong Kong.

Principal Ho and Tyler with the next big thing-the Selfie Stick

The Chinese custom is to give gifts and we had things to give our hosts as well. Nothing could have prepared us for the thoughtful presents that they gave us. Each of them is special, but Jason gave us something that we believe should be shared with our church family. He painted us a circle painting and wrote a message to us that really says it all. "We are all one cell in Christ".

Jason painted us a Chinese style circle painting

Light found us stamps to share with Sunday School, that say "Jesus Loves Me" in Chinese characters

Praise be to God for the blessings he poured out this week! I am personally thankful also for this team of hard working, fun, and flexible brothers and sisters in Christ and also grateful for a supportive congregation that boldly sends us!

That's all for tonight. It's a bitter sweet entry because I expect we won't post again until July 2015. Tyler already loaded a countdown app on his phone. 353 more days....