Team Hong Kong Newsletter # 4
A Holly Jolly Christmas
December 31, 2007
by Maria Sensenig


Christmas in Hong Kong means time to celebrate. We learned this first-hand, as the church, aka our home, was the location of four parties over the span of four days. We happily joined the festivities and were able to meet many new people, learn new games, and of course sample a great variety of new foods.

Christmas Eve was my favorite of these celebrations because we were able to spend a large amount of time with the youth from Agape and connect with them in a way we hadn't previously. It began when they arrived early in the afternoon and suggested we all go out for tea. When I say tea, I need you to remove the images of hot beverages and pastries from your mind. They ordered a plate of this and a dish of that and were all very excited to watch us sample all the different things, laughing at our chopstick skills and sometimes insisting that it'd probably be better if we finish before they explain what all we were eating. Some of the fare was extremely delicious, some was a bit harder to swallow while still maintaining a smile. But it was all a lot of fun and ended with a rousing game of rock, paper, scissors to polish off the leftovers.

The church was already filling up when we arrived home and was soon packed out. We spent the evening playing games, eating more food, and watching a talent show. It was all quite fun but a bit on the chaotic side most of the time. As the party drew to a close everyone from the church headed out to the train station where we joined several hundred other people in singing Christmas carols and worship songs. By the time the singing was over we were all pretty exhausted but everyone else was still going strong and announced that it was now time to go for dessert. Despite our tiredness we were of course delighted to join them and spent the remaining few hours until Christmas eating tasty (and much less sketchy) treats and talking about everything from our first impressions of each other to why dating isn't allowed in YES. Good times were had by all.


At the Christmas party with Santa Ben

Along with all the parties, we were also able to get out of the city a number of times this week and experience the natural beauty of Hong Kong. We spent one day hiking, another on a bike ride by the sea, and we were also able to go to the beach twice, once for a baptism, and the other time for a BBQ.


There's more to Hong Kong than skyscrapers!


A leisurely and scenic bike ride


BBQ by the beach




May you all have a Happy New Year!


Praises:

- We've been able to spend a lot of time with the youth and are getting to know them better
- We were able to have an enjoyable Christmas despite being in a new place and away from our families

Prayer Requests:

- That we'd be an encouragement to the church here, and especially to the youth as the group seems to be dwindling and many of them are not very involved in the church
- That we could continue to understand the culture and the people and love and appreciate them even more

Team Hong Kong Newsletter #3
Religion and Christmas
December 23, 2007
by Joshua Blank

On Friday morning, Maria, Karen, Ben, and I made the short hike along the winding path through the thick underbrush up the small but steep hill behind Agape Mennonite Church. At the top, there is a huge boulder from which one can command a good view of the surrounding area. The rumble of traffic, the din of construction, and the other noises of the city can be clearly heard from this vantage point. It seems very out of place to me that after climbing a forested hill, I look around only to see that I am surrounded on all sides by city. (Ben posted some pictures below.)

At many places along the path up the hill, there are little pots filled with incense or food items in front of small monuments, set up for the remembrance and veneration of ancestors. Little spots like this are very common, even on some street corners. Larger or more wealthy Chinese families build temples in which they can worship their deceased family members in the hope that their ancestors will bring good luck and fortune to them so that they may become old and rich. The traditions upon which these practices have been built have been around for thousands of years and are deeply embedded into the people -- even with the strong Western influence that exists here in Hong Kong. This depth of tradition becomes increasingly evident as it draws near to Christmas. To the Chinese, this is just one of the many celebrations during which many people have off work and can (or must) spend time with their families. Christmas becomes simply a reason to party.

In contrast, we spent the beginning half of this week finishing up most of the work at the Tuen Mun Center, which is to shine out as a light for Jesus in that community. At the front of the Center is a silver cross, which really does shine out into the community, since the main entrance is all glass and the cross has a light behind it. There is also a path of floor tiles different in color than the rest which begins at the foot of the cross and gradually increases in size as it extends across the room to the main entrance. It is a powerful reminder of the purpose in the work that is going to be done there. Tomorrow night -- Christmas Eve -- is the grand opening, a celebration in the true spirit of Christmas focused on Jesus, His birth and ministry, and ultimately our salvation -- remembering that it is only by His grace and strength that we live and not by those who have gone on before us.

May you all have a blessed celebration of Christ's birth.

Praises:
- We were able to finish all of the major work at the Tuen Mun Center
- We had some time to relax and catch up on some rest this weekend in preparation for the busy week ahead of us
- It's Christmas time

Prayer Requests:
- That God would use the work at the Tuen Mun Center to extend His kingdom in that community, and especially for the opening festivities that will be happening there
- For patience as we struggle with the language barrier
- For guidance as we get more involved with different ministries here and for wisdom in interacting with the people, both those involved in leadership of those ministries and those to whom we will be ministering

Karen's Post

So, I'm the one to finish the blog postings informing all of you about me. In 'the picture' I'm the one with blonde hair and blue eyes. And yes, in HK I'm pretty easy to pick out of the crowd. I really value personal relationships which might be why I find it hard to write a description of myself to people I've never met. If you know any of my teammates I'm sure they'll be able to tell you a lot about me, maybe even more the they or you want to know!

All of that being said, I am 19 years old and from Reinholds, PA - a small community in the northern tip of Lancaster County. My family (whom I love dearly) consists of my parents, my brother, my sister-in-law, my sister, my brother-in-law, and my 2 nephews. Are you confused yet? I graduated from Lancaster Mennonite High School in 2006, spent the summer of '06 in STAT (outreach in Germany), and worked the following year as a nurse aide.

A few of my likes and loves: right up there at the top would be my family, especially those two cute nephews! Music has forever been a love of mine, especially playing the piano, flute, and singing. Here at Agape Church they have a keyboard which is getting a lot of use from myself and my 3 teammates. Hong Kong is turning out to be a big like, maybe even a love. This city is jammed full of beauty and excitement - the people (way more than I can count), the city sky-line (amazing at night), the trees (first time I've seen palm trees in their natural habitat!), the food (I'm well on my way to mastering the art of eating with chopsticks), the indescribable smell of Asia, the 70 degree weather, and so much more.

And to give you a description of the very simple joys in my life, I'll phrase it like this - "I really enjoy my day if" . . . I can have coffee of some type in the morning, see the sunrise or sunset, wear a short-sleeves and flip-flops, bake something sweet, have clean smelling clothes, write in my journal, spend quality time with God, have a good laugh, clean something or throw away clutter, be artistic or creative in some way, and go to bed tired. Many of these things I've come to really appreciate since moving to HK whether they are or aren't a part of my day. So this is me. I guess if you want to know more you'll have to come and visit Hong Kong . . . or continue reading our blog.

Maria (all the titles I could think of were cheesy)

I like to write when I feel inspired and not forced. Alas I was told in no uncertain terms by the members of my team that it is time my biography is posted so today I have no choice.

I am Maria Sensenig (this is the part where you burst into song with something from the Sound of Music, West Side Story or some other random song floating around out there with my name in it) and I am 21 years old and from Ephrata, Pennsylvania. I graduated from Garden Spot in '05, spent the next half year in YWAM (Seattle and Thailand) and then came home, worked for the next year and half and joined YES this fall.

I love to travel (although my list of previous destinations doesn't begin to rival Ben's) and find learning about other cultures very fascinating. I enjoy people, whether it be sitting in a crowded place watching strangers interact, or spending time with those I love most. Speaking of those I love most I forgot to tell you about my family, which consists of some pretty amazing parents, and a brother (also quite amazing actually) who is two years older than me. Some other things I enjoy include reading, writing, food (both making and eating, especially new and unusual things) watching movies, piano, coffee, taking walks, jogging, playing games etc. etc.

It is a strange feeling to be in Hong Kong. Many times I still wake up and wonder what exactly is going, how I ended up here and what God wants to do with me in this place. But I'm really beginning to love this city, with its millions of people, long crowded bus rides, over-the-top Christmas decorations, laundry hanging from every window in the high rises, the fact that the grocery store consists of an aisle of rice, an aisle of noodles, an aisle of oil, an aisle of soy sauce, and if you're lucky maybe a few other things, that I can wake up with birds chirping and a pleasant breeze blowing over my face and realize that I am sleeping on a roof and the list goes on.

I hope that gives you a bit of an idea who I am.



I thoroughly enjoyed this sign. If Hong Kong's cuisine could be captured in one phrase, here it is.

The Surrounding Area

Hello all,

A couple days ago, Joshua was exploring the hill behind Agape and found a big rock at the top that offers a terrific panoramic view of the surrounding area. It was a beautiful day here on Friday, so we all went up. Here are some pictures.


looking north (roughly)


looking west


looking south (Agape is behind the trees at the bottom)


looking east

Team Hong Kong Newsletter #2
Journey to Tuen Mun
December 16, 2007
by Karen Martin

Traffic roars past me as I stand in line at the bus stop. The sidewalk is crammed with people waiting for the next bus. There’s a perpetual smell of exhaust that fills the air. In a matter of minutes I’ll be on a double decker bus headed for Tuen Mun. I like to sit on the top level of the bus, in the very first row. From here I can see all the action. There’s a never ending flow of traffic which is mostly taxis, busses, work trucks, and more busses. The store fronts catch my attention too with their large brightly lit signs flashing - yellow, red, purple, green - it’s a never ending rainbow. As we near the next bus stop another long line of people wait to board the bus. Several people run along side the bus waving there arms to alert the driver to wait for them to board before it pulls away. My journey continues and I begin to notice the apartment buildings. These are 40 or 50 story buildings lined up one after another. There are more than I can count. I have to wonder what it would be like to live on the 30th floor, never being able to fling open my window and see the clouds floating by. As the bus nears Tuen Mun I stand up and clumsily make my way to the exit. I have yet to learn how to gracefully walk on a moving bus. In Tuen Mun my teammates and I walk through a maze of buildings and shops until we reach the Center. Now it’s time to start our day of work.

(This is a view of Agape from the street.)

For the past week our team has been helping to renovate a building in Tuen Mun. This facility will house a dream which has been on the hearts of people in Hope Mennonite Chuch for many years. They plan to provide various classes as an outreach to the community and eventually develop a church. Our team has been working hard at painting the building. We’ve completed the largest room, the medium size room, the office, the bathroom, and the outside wall. Maria and I have also learned how to put in flooring. And yes, it looks quite good! We are happy with our progress, considering that they plan to have an opening party on Christmas Eve. Our work is cut out for us this coming week as we continue with the flooring and other fix-up jobs. In the coming months we hope to help with some of the classes. I think a real sense of satisfaction will come when we can walk into this building and see it filled with people from the Tuen Mun community.

Here's a little visual aid to prove how hard we're working. This is especially for those who doubt Maria's and my ability to install flooring!




Praises:
- Our first week of work at Tuen Mun was successful
- We are over jet lag and sleeping quite well
- We have gained some independence and are able to do things on our own, like riding the bus and eating out

Prayer Requests:
- Continued patience and wisdom as we soak up Cantonese
- That God will guide and bless those who are leading activities at the Tuen Mun Center
- We spend Saturday evenings with the youth of Agape Church. We are excited to see how God is working in their lives.

Some things about Joshua

Okay, I guess it’s my turn. I’m Joshua, as you probably already knew by use of clever process of elimination since I’m the only other guy on the team. I’m the shorter guy seen on the left on the prayer cards or on the right in the blog picture. Of course, being the intelligent people that you all are, I’m certain you also already knew that, since I am a guy and not Ben. Joshua is not a good girl’s name, no offense to anyone who thinks otherwise. Of course, if you are reading this post before reading “A Bit About Ben” (the post immediately below this one) this paragraph may have been rather confusing, but since I said nothing important, please feel free to proceed with reading the rest anyway.

You may call me "Josh," but I think "Joshua" looks nicer which why it is usually written like that on this blog.

Like many people in the world, I have a family. My parents are Ervin and Donna. My dad thinks he is pretty cool and my friends agree with him, which I find to be a little scary. My mom is one of the most amazing cooks in the world and the most normal one in our family. I also have one sister, Lindsay, who is now married to my brother-in-law (it’s amazing how that works), Nathan Hoy. If you are interested in playing the Mennonite game look for connections to Hursts or Stauffers. We are not, however, related to Keith Blank just in case you were wondering like everyone else I have met from the Lancaster County area. This fact is probably to his credit.

Although Hong Kong is my current residence, my home for the previous 6,826 days of my life (give or take a few) was/is/will be outside Milton, Pennsylvania, which is about 1 hour north of Harrisburg, very close to Lewisburg (not to be confused with Lewistown). Of course, no one who just read that actually cares except the people who already knew that and they don't really care either. I wrote it only because it was expected. Sometimes I wonder why the world is the way that it is. Then I go inside and curl up on the couch with a book that will take me somewhere else. Also not of interest: I am 18 years old, 2 days younger than Ben and the youngest on this team. I graduated this past spring from Meadowbrook Christian School.

As you’ve probably noticed by now, I enjoy using some dry humor every once in a while. I also like math, just in general. Climbing things like trees, rock walls, and fences is also rather fun. Although I know very little, I like to pretend that I know something about computer software stuff and enjoy trying to figure things out. So far I have managed to not crash any computers and I think that means success. Like everyone else on this team, I play the piano. Unique to myself though, I play the accordion. In fact, I have it along with me here in Hong Kong. I wouldn’t recommend carrying an accordion around for anyone out there who is considering it. They do get rather heavy after a while. They are great to have. Just try to avoid traveling with them for long distances. Around the world may be a little too far.

Since Ben stole most of my favorite books, I will name some authors: Stephen Lawhead, C. S. Lewis, Frank Peretti, God Almighty, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Mark Twain.

Hmm... I’m trying to think of other things that you don’t care about and might like to not know. I’m drawing a blank, and I’m not good at drawing -- especially people like my family so I’ll just stop while I’m ahead, or rather a person with a head.

A Bit About Ben

We have decided that each of us write a little bit about ourselves so that those of you who don't know all of us have an idea of who everyone is. Since I wrote the first newsletter, I'll go first.

I'm Ben Herr, the tall one on the right without any hair if you're looking at our prayer card, or the one with long legs on the left if you're looking at our blog picture. My parents are James and Carol Herr and I have an older brother, Jonathan, and a younger sister Christyn. I'm 18 years old, and graduated from highschool this spring after being home schooled all my life. I attend Mountville Mennonite Church. My hobbies include sports; especially soccer, football, and church softball; playing music; hunting, I can tell many hunting stories, most of which are misses, mis-cues, or buck fever; imitating John Madden; trying new things; finding difficult ways of doing simple tasks; and doing anything and everything to make myself or someone else laugh.

Favorite books: The Oath, The Lord of the Rings, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Favorite sports teams: The Philadelphia Eagles, whoever is playing the Dallas Cowboys or New England Patriots (these teams are a very close second and are collectively doing very poorly this year), and the Baltimore Orioles.

Favorite Quote: "At the end of the day, whichever team has the most points is going to win the football game." -John Madden.

Second Favorite Quote: "The United States and Japan have been friends for over 150 years." -George W. Bush (apparently he forgot about a little something called World War II)

This bugs me: The birthday question, "So what does it feel like to be (insert age here)" because one day really doesn't make any difference.

Countries I've been to: Canada, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, HONG KONG, Nepal, India, Thailand, Singapore, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Italy, The Vatican, France, The United Kingdom, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Kenya.

Something difficult about living in Hong Kong: Putting aside the obvious things like language barrier and such, I'd have to say being 6'1". So far I've found plenty of things to bump my head on in a city built for shorter people.


















This me almost getting run over by a floor sweeper car while sleeping in Toronto airport

Team Hong Kong Newsletter #1
Travel, Arrival, and Orientation
December 9, 2007
by Ben Herr

Greetings on behalf of the Hong Kong team. It has almost been a week since we left Harrisburg, and we are excited to have arrived in Hong Kong to begin the adjustment to a different culture, language, setting, and time zone. Starting from the beginning of our travel, our flight from Philadelphia to Toronto was delayed due to bad weather in both places. Since we only had an hour layover in Toronto, we were going to miss the flight from Toronto to Vancouver. This turned out to work for the best, because we got a flight from Toronto straight to Hong Kong, so we actually saved about five hours of travel time because of the delay. We did have to spend 12 hours in the Toronto airport, but we were going to have to do that in Vancouver anyway, so we weren't unpleasantly surprised. We did have to laugh, though, that twenty hours after we had left Harrisburg, we were still only in Toronto.

us trying to catch some sleep in Toronto

We were met at the Hong Kong airport by Glenn and June Kauffman, long term missionaries and the EMM (Eastern Mennonite Missions) Area Representative to East Asia; Shelly (I haven't heard her last name yet), another missionary; Pastor Jeremiah Choi, the pastor of Agape Mennonite Church; and Wincy Wan, the EMM office assistant here in Hong Kong who also attends Agape Mennonite Church. We took a bus to Agape, where we'll be staying for the next eight months. We have two bedrooms that are about 6 1/2' by 9', a bathroom, a shower room, a roof top, and a kitchen. Everything but the kitchen and the roof are on the second floor of the church.

our view from the roof

The first few days Glenn Kauffman gave us an introduction to the mission vision for East Asia, something he does for every missionary or team that comes to serve in this part of the world. We also talked about Hong Kong customs, cultural taboos, and other related topics. We've had a crash course in survival chopstick use, and considering that I never really used them before, I've reached the conclusion that they are easy to use, but difficult to use well. Or even somewhat well. On one occasion, Pastor Jeremiah playfully scolded me for playing with my squid, after my attempt to get a piece of squid from the serving dish to my bowl only succeeded in getting it onto the table and under another dish. We've been offered several "cheats," such as serving spoons, forks, and assistance, most of which we, especially Joshua, have tried to refuse. While I'm on the topic of food, we had heard that Chinese people will eat anything that walks, crawls, or moves. We are finding this to be true, but not only that, they eat just about every part of it. Some of us view this as an interesting opportunity to try new food; others wouldn't agree.

downtown Hong Kong

view of Hong Kong from The Peak

front and center: Chicken feet!

We are also trying to get a hang of the transportation system. This is difficult because the only part of a bus sign we can read is the number of the bus. So far we can get from Agape to the EMM office. That brings up the topic of language. We knew we didn't know much Cantonese, but that is becoming more and more evident as we are surrounded by it. Occasionally we'll catch phrases like "8 o'clock, okay?" or "I don't know," but for the most part, it all sounds new and strange.

For the next two weeks, we'll be working at a center in Tuen Mun where they have English and other classes for kids. We'll be working on fixing it up a bit -- scraping paint, sanding, and painting -- to get it ready for the start of classes. Friday night we met with Susanna Yang, our outreach coordinator, and other members from churches and talked about other possibilities for things we may be involved with. You will definitely be hearing about some of these things in the future.


Praises:
-safety in travel to Hong Kong from Pennsylvania.
-good connections with local church members.
-a relatively smooth recovery from jet lag. I'm not sure I've completely recovered, but I'm certainly well on the way.


Prayer Requests:
-for continued adjustment to a new culture.
-to be able to learn enough Cantonese to communicate.
-for good communication with the churches as we begin to set up different aspects of our outreach.

-Ben Herr