There is indeed a well-kept secret on campus about the Sunday morning menus in the dining halls. To my knowledge, Sunday morning is the one and only time that the cheap places offer dim sum, which is the pinnacle of delicious Hong Kong food. Really, that's the thing you should try if/when you ever visit this place. Dim sum is amazing, and it's more amazing when you get the meal pictured below for the equivalent of US$2.50. My tea there is Jasmine Hot Tea, which was so hot it scalded my tongue. I'm trying to get used to drinking hot tea, but I'm a little bit of a wimp. As you can see, I usually pair it with iced lemon water. Look at the food, though. The menu listed this as "pork bun and chicken roll." Is it just me, or does that sound like "one pork bun and one chicken roll?" Clearly, I misunderstood, but I still ordered what turned out to be the smallest possible breakfast. Wow. Still, I guess it is the most important meal of the day. I highly enjoyed my dim sum, especially the pork buns, which are perhaps the most delicious food on the face of the earth. Those and siu mai are easily my favorite things here.
Anyway, I finished breakfast and went to church. The service was enlightening, as usual, and (even better) the usual translator was back so the English was a whole lot easier to understand. We had communion, which is done a little differently from back home. I don't know how all the different churches y'all attend do it, but at First Methodist we all lined up and waited to kneel at the altar. Once you got there, the pastor gave you a glass of grape juice and a little piece of bread. You ate it, prayed, and quickly returned to your pew. At Chung Chi Chapel, the pastor called for everyone who's been baptized to rise (so I rose) and come to the front. The communion-receiving constituent of the church swarmed the front of the sanctuary like a mob, and somehow the pastor managed to get everyone a tiny glass of grape juice and one of those styrofoam-like communion wafers. Still, people didn't return to their seats, but instead just stayed at the front of the church however long they liked. I think that overall the experience was more "real" religion-wise, but the organization was completely chaotic and motivated me to quickly return to my pew.
Also that morning were two baptisms, both of elderly women--one of them 94 years old. When they shared their testimonies, I don't think there was one dry eye in the room. Of course, the service eventually ended and we went to have tea in the lower lounge. The people I had been hanging out with (Chen Chen and Veronica) weren't there so I ventured out and met some new people. I'm so glad I did! I met three awesome girls: Corinna, Agnes, and Pin Ko (I'm not sure about the spelling). I hung out with them for quite a while, and they invited me to lunch. Apparently, a large portion of the congregation always goes to the Orchid Lodge for lunch on Sunday and they wanted me to come. Unfortunately, the Orchid Lodge is currently undergoing some renovation so we ended up back at Chung Chi Canteen. My food that time was awful, but now I know not to order it again. At least the company was fantastic. Corinna, Agnes, Pin Ko, you guys are so great for being patient with my Mandarin and not trying to speak to me in English alone! Naturally, they had to translate a good number of things for me, but I asked that they please feel free to use Mandarin with me since I want to learn. I was probably pretty amusing to listen to, but I'm OK with that. After lunch, we all walked to the train station and actually ran into Veronica (who it turns out is also friends with these girls). It's a small world, after all.
Anyway, they told me that next week after lunch, the congregation is celebrating all the June birthdays with a party in Ma On Shan. The church has a minibus (just like home!), and they're busing the congregation over there and back. I'm pretty excited because, as always, I love meeting and getting to know new people. I'm going to be living in Hong Kong for a long time, and even after that long time I'm coming back for another long time. I don't think of my life here as a temporary and fleeting moment. This is a real and important part of my life, and I intend to really live here--not just pass through. In other words, I want to make friends, not acquaintances, and make Hong Kong my home, not just some big hotel.
Corinna got my phone number before she had to run to catch the train to Hung Hom, and I said goodbye to everybody. On my way to the bus, I snapped a "weird Hong Kong sign" picture for your viewing pleasure. This one make perfect grammatical sense, but I believe it falls into the category of "Why is there a sign for that?" By the way, no one follows this bit of...wisdom.
So nothing else too interesting happened on my 4th of July. My 5th had a sense of accomplishment, though, because finally I was able to journey back to Fo Tan to pick up my (not temporary!) Hong Kong Identity Card. Want to know what's awesome about that? Now, whenever I go through Customs to get back into Hong Kong, I can get in the "Permanent Resident" line instead of the "Visitor/Tourist" line. What did I just say about making Hong Kong feel like home? Thank you, Hong Kong government, for recognizing that I'm not just passing through.
Of course, the Immigration Department is located in the strangest place. I'm sorry, Jubilee Court, I know you're trying to be an upscale shopping center, but you're failing...miserably.
I mean, this shopping mall is so run-down it apparently can't even afford a 2nd floor. At least the Immigration Department was clearly labeled.
To make a short story shorter, I was in and out in no time and even made it back to class early (which I previously thought was unheard-of considering the nature of government offices). Plus, I am now the proud owner of an official PERMANENT Hong Kong ID Card. Life is good.
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