Our house of guests

This is a catching up post:

While we were waiting for our India visa and patiently waiting for India to get all the counselor called, we have some down time.  We thought we should focus on our YSA assignment.  We have quite a few YSA engaged and married after FSY in Hong Kong but seems we need to provide more opportunity for our Hong Kong counselors so we decided to have a reunion of the sort.  We could only hold 12 people in our small 600 square feet apartment.  12 came and we have a grand time making personal home made pizza.  We played 5 crown afterward!

The next morning, we got up very early and a few of us walked from our apartment from Hung Hom to TST at 5 am to get tickets for this year's Chinese New Year Parade.  We are not going this year since we already went last year but 36 other missionaries and Area Presidency want to go so we volunteered to go stand in line for tickets.  It was cold but very fun.    It went mush smoother this year because we let the ticket agent know that we are buying 36 tickets with 8 people totaled.  By nine o'clock we got our tickets and was heading home!

Brave souls, waking up at 5 a.m. and walking to the Star Ferry (20 mins walk): Me, Sister Joyce Cory, Steve Roskelley, Marion and Dan Sellers, Kathy Ferguson, Ted, Stan Parry and Tim Cory.

We were helping out the mission with zone conference from Thursday to Saturday.  On Friday we ran into Shawn, my nephew's wife Rebecca's brother.  He is visiting his fiancee in Hong Kong.  We were glad to see him.  After finding out he has no place to stay and will have to stay in a hotel, we invited him to come stay with us for a few days until he leaves the following Wednesday.  We had a great time with both Shawn and Rebekah.  We are so happy for them and happy we are able to help them out. 

Sunday dinner with Shawn and Rebekah, Ikea salmon, stir fried veg, coleslaw and Red Lobster rolls.

Ted's sister Alice came into town on the same day Shawn left to go home.  We will have a busy house for the next months or two.  After Alice left, Quinton and Dave will be here and then Jennifer and David will be here till May.  We love companions here because it feels like home away from home!

FSY India 2018

It has been months in the working!  After the success of FSY in Hong Kong and Taiwan in 2017, the Area Presidency came up with a proposed FSY schedule for the next 4 years in the Asia area.  Mongolia and Indonesia was supposed to be in 2018.  They were so stoke when they learned of the plan.  Mongolia is ready to go because Elder Ben Tai was the Seventy overseeing both Hong Kong and Taiwan last year.  But we were disappointed to learn from Church Headquarter that translation of the FSY material to local languages will not be available in time for Mongolia and Indonesia to have FSY in 2018!  The Area Presidency did not want to not have one so after consulting with Elder Robert William (Area Seventy in India) they quickly made a decision to have FSY in India because no translation is needed.

It took a few months to get everyone on board in India; there is the logistic of getting all the youth from India into one central location because it was not possible to hold FSY in the different area due to the lower number of youth; calling of In-session couple; calling of coordinators, assistant coordinators and all YSA counselors.  We were very anxious as we were working on a very compressed schedule:  14 months verses 5 months!!!  Finally, after much prayers and patients, all are set.  We made our first trip to India for training.  This trip will last about two weeks so that we can visit as many stakes and branches as possible.  We hope to have all registration done by next weeks so we could start ordering T shirts and materials.

Here are some pictures:
Our first meal in India (New Delhi) is good old Mcdonald - most dependable for the taste and feel of home except of course they adopted their menu with spicy!!!

Traffic in Hyderabad is like China but 30 years ago.  There are two lines on the road but there are five lines of traffic driving on them.  The drivers are constantly honking on the road and you drive on the oncoming traffic if you want to pass somebody on your side of the road.  I am amazed they don't have accident every other seconds!!

India is very colorful, from the food of all spices to the clothing.  I just fall in love with all these wonderful color.  Even the temple around the church building is painted with very vibrant colors.  We enjoyed being here and I am staying away from all the spicy food!