Family Reunion Time

 So you may wonder at the title. Seeing that the reunion took place in Bear Lake not in HK. But I beg to differ -- you guys sent so many pictures and videos that we almost felt like we were there. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I won't lie, being here while you were there was hard on us. Maybe the hardest thing for us in terms of being homesick since we got here. But the pictures helped a lot. We looked at them and watched the videos countless times. 

Next August -- we will be there. Can't wait.

So here's what's been happening here.

Earlier this week Mom and I were running and we got dumped on by a rain storm. It was warm enough that it felt great. But still, we were drenched. If you look closely you can see a drop of water coming off Mom's nose. It took a couple of days for our clothes to dry out.

We still play ping pong every Tuesday and Thursday night. This is Coco, my partner in our doubles tournament. We beat everybody.

But then I got killed by this gentleman who just walked in and showed us how its done.

A couple of nights ago we were hornswaggled into attending this "workshop" and sing-along. This is the sign inviting everyone in HK to come. The GPS stands for the "Golden Plate Singers," a group of local Chinese members who like to just get together (about 25 people) and sing. They put on a concert a couple of months ago that most of the senior couples attended because no one else did. You know, we were just trying to be supportive. Well, lo and behold, they invited us to join them and become part of the "Golden Plate Singers". And this was our workshop. So they got us all into a room, gave us various maracas and other noisy shakers and proceeded to teach us a couple of songs in mandarin. What the heck, none of us speak Mandarin. I don't think the original Golden Plate Singers speak much Mandarin either. This is HK for heaven's sake. And to put us over the top on this one, they had us all shaking maracas and the various noise makers on one of the songs; I felt like I was in an old-folks home. Oh wait, have I arrived already?

Here we are waiting for the train to take us under the harbor and over to the little town where we caught a bus out to Big Wave Beach. It's not the beautiful drive through Logan Canyon but we were determined to spend the day at the beach!

I thought you'd be interested in these climbers. Evidently there is some great climbing here.

And here we are at "Big Wave" Beach. I didn't see a single wave the whole time we were there. But we loved being able to get in the ocean again. BTW, I'm the white guy in the middle out there. We looked stunningly white compared to all the beautiful asian skin.

Here we are at our favorite surf shop/noodle house. I think this is Mom's favorite place to eat in HK.

Here is Mom chowing down on her favorite noodles of all time. I ordered the stuffed french toast. The whole piece was stuffed with peanut butter and then doused with syrup and condensed milk. YUM!

Last night, Mom and I went to our favorite Vietnamese restaurant. We went on a real date to celebrate 47 years since our first date. So hard to believe it's been so many years. Best thing I every did was ask your mom out. I'm the luckiest man in Hong Kong! By the way, it's great food for anyone who wants to join us sometime.

So, this morning we attended a regional conference that was held in six different buildings all over Hong Kong. The purpose of the meeting was to dissolve two of the six stakes in Hong Kong. The church membership here has been going in the wrong direction because of the large number of families that have left HK because of the crackdown from Beijing and the pandemic. Many families don't want to raise their kids in a country that is loosing its freedoms. This is a very sad thing to witness. So many wonderful people here that we are meeting and learning to love and yet so many gone or leaving.

Well, sorry to end on that sad note. We are loving it here. Although we miss you all more than you know; especially this week. Thanks again for all the pictures!

Over and out. 

Dad and Mom