Snap Shots of a Rainy Sunday

Snap Shots of a Sunday
I.
I grab my over full purse and little plastic bag, that has been warped a little by my heavy Chinese-English bible, quickly slough of my yellow slippers, and open a big wooden door that leads out into a small hallway. Reaching into the cupboard I pick out my white converse shoes and throw them unceremoniously into the hallway closing the door behind me. I feel the outside of my bag to make sure I have the door key safely tucked in the outer pocket. Opposite me is another door with a metal gate over it, and I hear the piano playing a familiar classical tune as I push the lift button and rush to put on my shoes. The lift arrives with a little ding and the sound of the doors muffling open and closed, I breath a little taking in my reflection and then wincing…unfortunately I didn’t wake up as a supermodel today. Then I realize I didn’t want to be one anyways, I like being scruffy…yes that’s right who wants to be on a subway wall for goodness sake.

The doorman says jo sun and so do I, then off I go crossing the car garage to the main lobby elevator into the main lobby, saying hello to the other doorman, crossing the street and loading onto the yellow and green 14M shuttle bus that takes me wricketing down the hill to Yun Ping Road.

II.
Waiting on the corner of Yun Ping Road where I usually meet my cousin Anna to taxi pool to church, swing my hands impatiently. It is over cast and about 25 degrees celcius; the humidity is starting to make me sticky, but not enough to fog my glasses when I step outside. I give her a call and get her voicemail that speaks to me happily in Cantonese. I think she’s sleeping, drat. Five minutes later when I’m shopping around a nearby department store, Anna calls to say she’s woken up late and I’ll have to grab a taxi myself. Yikes. Never done that before.

I climb the escalator back to the street and find a nearby taxi stand, as I cross the street I can’t recall if Anna said to tell the driver, CRC, or CFC. I phone her again and she helps me memorize the name in Chinese. It stays in my head long enough to tell the driver, who nods and says, “Ho ah.” Yes!! Taxis are never smooth, but this guy is honking at every person who looks at him slyly. He calls at least three other taxi drivers, Chee-sheen (crazy!!), and then to a man pushing a full cart uphill he yells to in Chinese, “Hey you, run faster!” He looks over at me and talks in Chinese, I nod and say ho ah even though I’m not sure what he said and I hand him the 15 HK dollars saying m goi sai (thank you). I survived the taxi experience, it’s starting to rain big droplets and I cross the busy street playing chicken with the oncoming traffic.

III.
Greeted by a tall thin glass door and a man at the door I’ve never seen before says to me in a thick accent, “good morning,” I arrive to church fifteen minutes early. Paul, a regular attendee, introduces me to the doorman as “Sampson, our missionary.” Sampson tells me he just returned from Seattle, WA, and I ask what he was doing there. He replies that he’ll try to explain although his English is poor. Sampson is very kind and explains that he was trying to apply for a visa to immigrate to US. His daughter needs some better doctor care, but he feels nervous about his chances of making it over there. He has a high school education, he worked, and his family was poor. Three daughters, two of them twins, but he trusts even if it is impossible God will make a way.
Sampson invites me to go to China if I have a burden to share the gospel. Every Sunday he goes to church here and then goes to a bordering city in china to an underground church to preach. They are laborers too, who find it hard in the city, they are open and need more long term care. I feel elated to hear such news, to hear of people who live on the graces of God, and who risk imprisonment or “monkey business.” Sampson says police will make you pay them off if you are caught having an underground church meeting, this is “monkey business,” he says. Its nice to have a conversation with a missionary, Sampson has faith in his manner; I can see why people become Christians around him.

VI.
It is cold in the little restaurant, the narrow room that falls back from the road. But, Anna puts a colorful turquoise shall around the both of us. Her hands look so tiny… come to think of it…she’s so tiny. All 15 or so of us crowd on stools around three tables. We cannot put out our elbows, but people chat animatedly. I am not feeling socialable, not sure why. I want to talk around and be my silly self, its sort of hard to do that. I eat as much as I can, but my stomach starts to turn a little. Anna asks me what I want to drink, and even though I don’t really want anything I say ling cha (lemon tea). The tea makes my stomach feel worse. I like that six of us at the table are part of my family in one way or another, either by direct cousinhood, or by marriage or girlfriend status. Anna pays the bill and we all calculate how much we need to give her in our heads or on cell phones.

V.

There is an extra ticket to go to a worship concert, I am not sure if I will be able to understand any of it. But, my cousin Rita invites me, so I go. Until that point I was wondering if its better if I go home, I’m not feeling too hot and sort of being mopey. For some reason I say yes anyways. Rita is ecstatic; this is her husband’s favorite thing to do in the world. She joggles my head a little after I tell her she should stay in HK because in the states she’d feel like a midget. Still, I have to bend over in order for her to reach my head.

The concert is a group of ABCs (American Born Chinese) who are originally from Taiwan. They sing and write their own music, there are lots of Christians here who like them. We get there, and the place is swarming. On the stage is a band full of young stylish Chinese people, to the left an enormous choir, and filled in the front are about six lead singers jumping around and singing worship songs. Thankfully there is English translation on the screen for the song words. Sometimes I try in Mandarin when I get tired of trying that I sing in English. Sometimes I say nothing and just take in everything. It’s nice but overwhelming. A violin starts to play and I woman takes to lead mic. She says in English something about God exchanging our bad things for his good things: our sadness for joy, our anger for patience, and our loneliness for comfort. I feel loneliness well inside of me mixed with fear and uncertainty, I want an exchange, I want good things, and I ask for them. Next to me, my cousin Anna is crying too, she’s crying more than me and keeps crying. A couple times she doesn’t catch my eye, I don’t want to embarrass her so I don’t say anything. It is still raining outside when it ends and we walk back into it and off to some afternoon tea.

VI.
It is near seven o’clock when Anna and I arrive at her flat. In the doorway I sigh a big sigh. Anna goes to freshen up her face before dinner and I slump down on the sofa and lean my head back feeling very tired. I hear lots of washing sounds and open my eyes when some piano music comes on. At first, I think its Anna playing her piano that’s been covered in little things over time, but then I realize it’s a CD. The music fills me up a little as dusk starts to suck the light from the room down over the street, and the football fields, the skyscrapers, the ocean and starts to disappear, melting over the horizon. I want to ask Anna about today, but I can’t find an un-intrusive way to do it. Then she appears around the corner with a little shower cap covering the top part of her hair. “I don’t know if you could catch it, but Sampson said some things after the sermon. He said he was glad to see me going to the church because he’d been praying for me for a while to start coming regularly. Actually, I have been hesitating to go to this church for about a month.” She goes on to tell why she wasn’t sure about going, but that she had actually started joining the church on Sunday because of me at first. I ask her, not sure what to say rubbing my head on my arm tiredly, if she is glad she’s going now. She says, “Yes, I am glad you are here,” and disappears again around the corner to do some more freshening. It starts to smell clean and purfumey. I listen again to the music and smile to myself searching out the now darkened window. A couple of my tears fall down onto my lap but I slop them off with my hand. The sad Brenda has disappeared as thankfulness overcomes me. Its nice to know my coming to HK, was a small stone on a scale for Anna, the one that tipped it so it touched down and stayed. This is definitely a miracle, and more gracious than humanly possible. I have no need to ask about her teary day.

VII.
The mini bus shakes as it climbs back up the hill to Uncle Tony’s where dinner and family are waiting. The night sky his hidden by the clouds, but the city lights blink at me like little diamonds as I walk a little ways from the bus stop to the main lobby, back over the car-park, into building J, up the lift to the 25th floor, take off my white converse and step back in through the big wooden door, just in time for 7:30 dinner with the Chung family, some silly conversation and a football game.