Tsz Shan Monastery

Welcome to Tsz Shan Monastery!  We had to reserve tickets weeks in advance and the tickets are always gone within about three minutes of them being offered so this was a real treat to be able to go there.

We'll include some of what it says in Wikipedia and the monastery website:  "The monastery is overlooked by the world’s tallest bronze statue,Guan Yin (Goddess of Mercy, also known as Kwun Yum) which is 76 meters (about 235 feet) tall."

You can check out this legend if  you are interested:  (The Legend of Guan Yin)

"Tang Dynasty-style buildings and landscaped gardens are a feature of the monastery which is set against the backdrop of the Pat Sing Leng mountains and overlooks Tolo Harbour."

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 "As a Chinese Buddhist monastery established for the inheritance of the teaching of the Buddha, Tsz Shan Monastery is a sanctuary for the purpose of spiritual purification, and endeavors to open the door to compassion and wisdom for the public through various activities."

"1.7 billion was donated by Li Ka-Shing, the richest man in Hong Kong, chairman of the Cheung Kong Group and the Li Ka Shing Foundation, to benefit society through the propagation of the Dharma."

There were some beautiful Eucalyptus trees there, too.
Here, Elder Yan is demonstrating how a water offering is made.  You can read about it below:

This big pot was where the water was taken and poured.

Here are some of the wooden bowls that are used.

Here's Sister Ferguson also demonstrating a water offering.

The grounds were beautiful everywhere. Some of the big trees were brought in from China, too.

"The monastery is run by Tsz Shan Monastery Limited, set up in 2009, whose chairman is The Rev Sik Kwok-kwong, who is also chairman of Hong Kong Buddhist Association, and whose board of directors include Hong Kong’s richest man, Li Ka-shing, chairman of Hong Kong multi-national conglomerate Cheung Kong (Holdings), members of his family and three managers of Cheung Kong. The whole project has been funded by the Li Ka Shing Foundation which will also fund the day to day operational costs of the monastery."

We saw a big group of monks there, too.

Here the monks are climbing up the stairs to the golden statues.

How's this for a door knocker?  

The water lilies and other flowers were gorgeous.

They had posters with these captions:  In the family, there should be acceptance rather than sufferance.

In the family, there should be support rather than control.

The family should confide in, but not complain to each other.

This one said something about discipline rather than indulgence.

Of course, there were the ever present guards at the entrance.

The flowers were so beautiful there.

You might enjoy this link, too: (As seen from the air)

We stopped at a Vietnamese restaurant at the train station on the way home.  Gary's food is pictured in the front. He had lemon grass pork with glass noodles and I had spring rolls.

The whole day was rainy as you can see as we walked the final few meters home.  You haven't really seen rain until you've seen the rain in Hong Kong!

We enjoyed our day off but we enjoy very much serving here each day in the Asia Area. By the way, if you haven't seen this short film, we think you will enjoy seeing it by clicking on this link:(The Vision)
We love you all and we do know that Joseph Smith truly saw these things and the gospel is true.

Happy Father's Day

We hope all you great Dads have a great and happy Father's Day!

Here's a great man who is a great husband, father, grandfather, English teacher, self-reliance missionary, etc., etc.

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How's this for a serene playground photo?  These is another photo from the park where we sometimes eat and relax before going to the temple on Tuesdays.

Here's a couple of great guys, too!  On the right, a great returned missionary and on the left, a great new missionary going to Tonga to serve!  We love and are proud of all of our wonderful grandchildren, too!  Someday, they will be wonderful husbands, fathers, wives and mothers just like their great parents.

We wanted to throw this photo in, too, of this Dad and his little girl.  We often walk behind them as he walks his daughter the half mile or so to the bus to go to school.  He always carries her backpack and talks to her along the way and he seems like a really kind and caring father.  This seems quite appropriate since it's almost Father's Day.  Actually, there are quite a few Dads that we see around who are so kind and caring with their children.

To end the post, we thought you might like to see the bus line that went on forever when we had to leave the office early because of the tropical storm warning.  We were able to be the last people on one of the buses and we were happy to get on even though we were packed in and standing all the way home.  It's that time of year and, who knows, next time it might be a typhoon.

Great hats for this kind of weather!

It seems right to end the post with photos of our great parents- shown together as they were always together and helping us together.

Anyway, Happy Father's Day to all you great fathers out there!
The link below shows a good father's day video, too:
(Good Fathers' Day video)
Here's one more:(One More great video)
Just one more: (ONE MORE!)

Another baptism and a busy week!

Probably the nicest thing that happened this week was the baptism of Sister Grace Ann Amaro.  She asked Elder Chandler to baptize and confirm her and he did a wonderful job.

Here she is with the Sister Missionaries who taught her the lessons.  On the left is Sister Molina and on the right is Sister Caluza.

Click on the link below to hear one of the songs at the baptism:

Group performing at the baptism

Here's a few members of the group that were present at the baptism.

You can click on the link below to hear some of the sister missionaries at the baptism:

Sister Missionaries singing

The very same day of the baptism, we were in charge of the dinner to feed all of the members of the branch. Notice the boxes of oranges in the background.  We also were getting ready for a big meeting with Elder Michael Ringwood and others from Salt Lake so there are lots of handouts and other things we are working on in our office, too.

We're getting quite good at throwing a meal together for 120 people, although it is quite a production and lots of work. We do most of the work on Friday or Saturday and then put the food in crock-pots to cook during the day for the meal.  Last Sunday we made Hawaiian Haystacks over rice served with oranges and homemade cookies, and the sisters loved the food!

When we are shopping and storing the food for the meal, our office looks more like a grocery store than an office!

On Tuesday we had the big meeting with Elder Ringwood and others who came in from Salt Lake to teach the priesthood and relief society leaders, and the self-reliance committee leaders here in Hong Kong.  Here's Brother Au, the Hong Kong self-reliance manager, setting up for the meeting.  Since there were English speakers and Cantonese speakers and English and Cantonese listeners, there was a lot of translation going on so that's why there was a need for lots of headphones.  There were about 175 in attendance which was a pretty good percentage of those who were invited.

So, after a pretty busy week, some of the senior missionaries went out to eat last night.

After the dinner, some of us went to the play, "My Fair Lady".

We took advantage of the props set up for photos.

It was a pretty clear night so we took a few photos.

Awhile back we got quite a good video of the light show at TST and thought you might enjoy seeing this, too:

TST light show

Light show from our apartment

If you're not sick of the light show, here's one last video.  We can watch this every night from our apartment window, but we're too far away to hear any music:
More of the light show


We're wishing you all a great week with lots of "light"!!!!