First Sunday in China

We did not have to worry about setting an alarm---the sun was shining brightly into our bedroom by 5:00 a.m. We had enough time before church to get unpacked. David and Sandi Stathopulo, from Richland Hills in Ft. Worth, are the people that we will work most closely with on our LST project. They will also do the follow-up teaching for our readers after we leave. The following photo is of them standing in front of flowers that are on the grounds of our apartment complex.


They invited us to go with them to the International Church that they attend every Sunday. We left at 9:30 to go there by taxi. The church meets in a big multi-story building on the 25th floor. It's a good thing there was an elevator! The service was well-attended (250+) by people of many nationalities --but not Chinese. Though different from what we are used to, the service was good. David was one of the praise team singers--he has a really good bass voice. The following are photos of the view out of the windows ---looking out over the location of the sailing Olympics scheduled for this summer.


After the church service, David and Sandi took us to a huge store much like Cosco or Sams. It was amazing how many products were familiar to us! The selection of foods that are like home was much better than in the English stores that we went to while in England. One of the things we bought was a box of small Moon Pies, only they call them Orion Pies in China. We purchased quite a bit of food as well as an iron and a small ironing board. Because David and Sandi also purchased a lot of food, we had to take 2 taxis back to our apartment. (David and Sandi live in an apartment in the same complex.) Then we walked to a store called Jusco and ate at a Chinese restaurant. We were surprised at the low cost of our meals---about $4. each.


At 5:oo p.m. David and Sandi host a small group Bible study in their apartment. It was attended by Sun Woo and his wife Serena (the Korean couple who own the English language school where we will work), Sun Woo's teenage daughter, Tim and Reggie (a young couple who teach English in an international school--he is of Chinese heritage but a Canadian citizen and she is from Malaysia), Claire from So. Africa, and Nicole (a single Texas girl who is teaching English at Sun Woo's school).
The first photo shows Serena's daughter and Serena on the left, and on the far right is Sun Woo. In the middle is a visiting couple from the States. Notice that everyone has shoes off!


The last photo is of Tim and Reggie.