Anyway, transportation aside, I still made it to church with time to spare. I visited a little bit beforehand and listened to the choir practice before the service. I find it interesting that, although the sermons are (most of the time) in Cantonese, the choir sings a lot of songs in Putonghua...or even occasionally English. I know that a lot of the choir members are native Putonghua speakers so that might be the reason. Of course, I like this arrangement, and I like it even more when even the sermons are in Putonghua--as it was the week before. Anyway, the service was good, with the sermon focusing on the relationships between wealth, charity, and responsibility. As the good book says, "it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." In other words, 'tis better to be a Warren Buffett than to be a Bernie Madoff. Lesson duly noted.
After church we had a little party for the couple who usually arranges the post-service tea time because they're moving to America pretty soon. I didn't get to know them very well, but I wish them luck and a happy life in the States. At the party, I got hunted down by a small middle-aged woman I hadn't met before. She introduced herself as the pastor's wife, and said that she and her husband had seen me several times at church, were delighted to have me come, and so on and so forth. I really like this lady. She's a good bit shorter than me, with very short hair and a personality that simply radiates happiness. She talked with me a bit, and then told me "Stay here." Quickly, she ran off and rounded up some of the other young members of the congregation, insisting that we all go have dim sum with her, her husband, and some other members. We all had a good time and ate well (me in particular because she kept putting little pieces of dim sum on my plate saying "Try this one!").
At 2:00pm, about half the table left to go to Putonghua Bible Study, myself included. It was a very small group this time--only around 6 people--but I felt proud of myself because I understood about 70% of the goings-on. At first, I was a little confused, but I found out that some of the people were actually speaking in a more regional dialect so not understanding was not surprising. We prayed, ate a lot of grapes, studied a little about Abraham, and played with Kitty's guitar. Last week, it was Sterling who brought a guitar, but it seems like a lot of people like to play. I didn't get very far in playing some of my favorite songs because my fingernails have gotten too long. However, I did manage to finish off my favorite blues scale--complete with bends, slides, and hammer-ons. It feels good to get a little bluesy every once in a while. Eventually, I came back to the dorm and spent the rest of my day relaxing.
Monday meant class, but it also meant a classroom-switch. Even though we just switched a month ago, the time was ripe once again. We little nomads picked up and moved over to a more fitting location--the new business building. The University must really be running out of space because the new business building isn't even on campus. You have to go through the MTR station, past the bus stops, and it's on Chak Cheung Street next to a Hyatt Hotel. Unfortunately, this also means that the "Smoke-Free Campus" rules don't apply. As soon as you step through that MTR station, you get confronted with not only smokers, but street performers and peddlers of all kinds. The best thing to do is just keep walking and saying "Sorry, sorry, don't understand" even if you really do. Fortunately, more people believe me when I say that here.
So the new classroom's pretty snazzy, but I forgot to get a picture of it. It's much nicer than our last digs, and we have real desks now. Hallelujah! Han Laoshi even gets a microphone. Too bad we're going to use it for only 2 weeks. That's right, August 13th marks the end of the summer program...and we're celebrating with a giant test and a speech. Fun, right? To be honest, it shouldn't be too bad, but it also means I'm up for another fun weekend of studying.
Today, Tuesday, got off to a less-than-happy start. I woke up to the sound of Nicole quietly and nonchalantly saying "Becca, time to get up." This perturbed me, as I usually awaken either by myself or to the sound of a rather annoying but effective alarm clock. "What time is it?" I asked. The answer: "Oh, about 8:45-ish." Whaaaat? I'm normally IN the classroom by that time! Egads! I don't know what happened, but that alarm clock was ON this time. That sucker just didn't go off. By the way, if you were wondering, the bus leaves at 9:00am. I rushed to get ready, skipping everything that was the least bit superfluous, and I got myself on that bus just in time. I managed to get to the classroom 5 minutes early which, by the way, is late by my calculation. I got there at the same time as Han Laoshi, who also said she was "running late," and I still managed to beat almost all of my classmates. I don't get people. Why is being 10 minutes late to class acceptable? It's a good thing I'm not a teacher.
Other than that, nothing else exciting happened today. The only other item of note is this fun sign at the canteen where I usually eat lunch. I shouldn't laugh at English mistakes because I know I make infinitely more in Chinese, but sometimes I can't help but smile at these things. This is just one of the things that makes China (Hong Kong included) endearing:
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