Obrigado

Sunshine, productivity, catch up, new friends, new experiences, flowy dresses, and loads of laughter. I'll take 2 orders, please.

I met my Portuguese friend Christiana, whom I met last weekend, at CuppaCoffee this morning and her, her brother, Ray and I all sat together at church. Steve L. led service as our pastor and his wife are still in New Zealand exploring her health issues--please remember them in your prayers. After church, the 4 of us went to lunch at a local Macau cafe and laughed our heads off being absolute smart alecks...and just because Christiana and I both have a deep appreciation for laughter.

After lunch, Ray and I met up with all the other ETAs for a meeting with our HK orientation director (the orientation we had when we first arrived). Our meeting leader ended up being sick and not showing up, but the 8 of us sat around and chatted for about a half hour anyway.

I went home for about an hour to take advantage of the dry air for drying laundry. I've been told that it's supposed to pour again this week. Ehh. That may negatively affect some potential beach plans toward the end of this week and early next week on vacation. We shall see.

There was definitely a consistent theme of 'go where God leads you' and 'God will make a way' today everywhere. Maybel, a lady at our church from Singapore was saying it when we chatted while she was greeting this morning. One of the TIS teachers shared his testimony before the sermon this morning, and his testimony involved that point. And tonight at the Brazilian/Portuguese church, I went to with Cristiana the message was on how children believe anything is possible and how we are called to have that same faith in Christ (come to Him as little children).

The service at the Portuguese/Brazilian church tonight was in English, and they had translators with headsets for Mandarin Chinese and Portuguese. It wasn't that big of a congregation, but even still they had resources to take care of those that spoke different languages. How great! The service tonight was led by the Y.W.A.M. (Youth With a Mission) group from U.S./Canada so it was in English. One of Cristiana's friends from school, Shiping, came to the service as well. Both of them are Portuguese majors, and he is from mainland China.

After church, I stuck with Cristiana for a bit and talked to some of the football (soccer) players and the pastor. They invited me to come along for pizza at a Portuguese owned pizza place down the street. I'm still getting the names down, but my new friends are hilarious. I never knew that Brazilian culture was one of lots of joking and lots of laughing, but that's both what Cristiana told me and what I've translated on my own. They spoke limited English, but I still laughed a ton and had a good time. They didn't let me pay for my part--I always appreciate the gift, but feel a little awkward accepting. In some cultures, you're supposed to fight hard to pay or it's rude, in other cultures if you fight at all to pay it's considered rude. I never know which one to do...

The pastor and his wife gave me a ride home. Their adorable 3 year old daughter sang in the car on the way home.

I am very blessed to have such opportunities to meet and learn about so many types of people. Today was a good refresher for the week ahead. I think I'm ready for a Monday.

P.S.--"Obrigado" means thank you in Portuguese.