A Trip To Macau Tower - 4th email from Macau

Dear All,

A lot of different cities in this world have a different feel. London has a feeling of ancient meets cutting edge, Hong Kong feels like a desperate desire to be new and tall. Macau has absolutely no desire to be up to date - it's just interested in taking people's money in the very many giant casinos and tourist attractions that can be found here.

Today we all went to visit one of the tallest tourist attractions in Macau - the Macau Tower. One of the Elders here, Elder Robinson (also named Elder 羅) has to leave on Saturday due to visa restrictions, so we all went up to do something he'd never done before. It was expensive - 200 or so Patacas (the currency of Macau which is pretty much exactly the same as the Hong Kong dollar), but it was a fun time. We went to eat at the 360 Cafe, which is a big circular cafe on one of the top floors of the tower. The floor rotates very slowly, meaning that sitting at the table, you very slowly get a 360 birdseye view of Macau. It was a very good meal; a buffet lunch with foods from all over the world. I had some African chicken, some Chinese fried rice, a slice of a roast with a little English mustard - very good. We had a wonderful time, but probably not as good of a time as the bungee jumpers one floor above us, who we could see out the window. That would cost several thousand patacas, and Missionaries are forbidden from bungee jumping, so you don't have to worry - I'm not going to try it.

This has been a tiring week. Things are very busy here at the moment, as we currently have a lot of investigators, all with different concerns, and it's hard to keep track of them all. For example, on Sunday we helped the Wong family to come to church. They have three very energetic children, a very talkative mother, and the father suffered from a stroke a while ago which left him mostly paralyzed. So we went early to their house with their fellowshipper, L C, and helped them attend church by wheeling Brother W's wheelchair and making sure none of the kids went missing along the way. We finally got them to church, only to discover too late that B, who was baptized last week and was supposed to get confirmed this past Sunday, hadn't shown up. Oh dear.

We saw him the next day at our regularly scheduled time. He was so sorry for missing church - I tried to console him, telling him, "It doesn't matter," but he replied, "No, it does matter!" He works very hard as a volunteer for a charity, and as such was just too tired and fell asleep as he prepared for church. But I feel that he was sincerely sorry for missing his confirmation, so I have to fear about him turning up this coming Sunday - maybe we'll give him a call before we head over to the W family though...

Anyway, a little about Buddha - here in China he's always portrayed as a fat, jolly man. I've been told that his weight represents him being full of happiness and joy - a rather nice little message. But last Friday, I mentioned to someone how odd it was that such a large man spent much of his life fasting to the point of death yet was such a fat man. L, who is an investigator who used to live in the Mainland and is being taught by the other Chinese Elders here, who perhaps is rather new to the concept of religion, replied - "He doesn't need to eat because he has special powers." I thought that was an interesting insight into what is generally thought of regarding the Buddha in this part of the world.

A sad experience this week - while finding, we bumped into a BBC (British Born Chinese) from Manchester. I asked is he knew where I was from, and he guessed, "The US?" "No!" I said, "I'm from Berkshire!" He sized me up tentatively, not really certain what to think. I'm don't think he believed me. "Has my accent got that bad?" I asked. Apparently so. So when we have a chat at Christmas, be ready to expect the worst.

Being involved in translating for the Olympics sounds like it'd be a lot of fun, but I don't expect they'll want my Chinese - better to get someone Chinese to do it, as it seems to be a lot easier to learn English when you already speak Chinese, rather than the other way around. Still, there may be something for me to do - not sure what though...

A little about Christmas wishes. I've been thinking about stuff I'd like, and the following comes to mind:
1. a Christmas pudding. If you ask me there is nothing more Christmasy.
2. Fudge. Nice, tasty fudge from home. That'd be good.

I have no idea as far as anything else goes. You can just surprise me - but I'm not too fussed. I'd rather have money waiting for me rather than things here with me now. That said, I do have to ask about the state of my DS Lite and Gameboy Micro - am I going to get them back, or are they now solidly the possessions of other members of the family (such as Mum and Tim...) Because if replacements were needed to keep everybody happier, buying them in Hong Kong would be the better option. Not that I'm trunky for my old toys or anything - it's just that hearing about how much you all seem to be enjoying the XBox made me wonder if I should maybe just leave it with you all when I go off to University. But a handheld would be easily replaced.

Love you all,

羅 長 老