Malone Service Learning - China

Safely at our gate in Toronto, with exhaustion setting in...

At our gate at the Hong Kong International Airport!  See you all soon!

Yesterday was our last full day in Hong Kong, spent at a beach with Dave and Cindy AuFrance.  Afterwards we had a massive amount of pizza at their house, and then found our way back to High Rock on our own. Today will be a 36 hour day due to the 12 hour time zone change.  We plan to get dim sum on the way to the airport before our 14-15 hour flight to Toronto, then on to Cleveland.  This will be a LONG day!!! We are leaving with fond memories of Hong Kong and China, with new friends made and lessons learned about other cultures, our own culture, ourselves, and what God is doing in our lives and in the world.  Looking forward to seeing many of you soon! The 2012 Hong Kong Team

Greetings, O ye followers of the Malone team's progress through Hong Kong and China! T-minus two days until we board our Canadian Argo and set off on the 14 hour Odyssey back to the good 'ol U.S. of A! Today was quite a day, folks. We started out with a kind of sociological sampling of  a couple neighborhoods of Hong Kong. In one area, we observed a group of protesters roughly equivalent to the "Occupy Wall Street"/"99 Percent" movement in New York. These people were literally camped out (in tents) on the open bottom floor of a local bank which has apparently been engaged in some shady dealings with the citizens of Hong Kong (a.k.a. Hong Kongers). It was eye-opening to realize how global these financial troubles can be. We also had a bit more time to explore the local mosque and city park area. Apparently, goldfish around here are HUGE! So there's that... Around noon, we had the opportunity to lead worship at a local establishment of organized religion. ...

Saturday, June 02, 2012 It has been another full day for our team in Hong Kong today. As our time comes to a close here, I think a lot of us have come to enjoy the city and culture that surrounds us. I know I have enjoyed our time here and all the people and organizations we have worked with. Today, our team spent the whole day volunteering for a nonprofit organization in Hong Kong called Crossroads. It is a really amazing organization that takes advantage of the surplus of resources in both Hong Kong and other places across the world. They have storage unit after unit of anything from mattresses, to desks, to clothing. We did a number of things while there today. In the morning, half the group helped pack up a giant storage unit that was going to Uganda. They helped load it up and did an amazing job. They definitely put in hard labor and sweat, but the reward in knowing that all these items are going to people who truly need it is incredible. The rest of us did a simulation, called th...

Greetings from Hong Kong!  We have been going straight out since we left the States, with our only “down” time mostly taken up in travel.  It’s amazing to think about all that we have packed into these last eleven days.  We have had opportunities to talk to adolescents in an intensive drug and alcohol center, held babies and young children in an orphanage for abandoned and terminally ill children, spent time with mentally and physically disabled children in a workshop, seen the beauty of Zhangjiajie, and – most recently – returned to Hong Kong on a bullet train traveling upwards of 300 kph.  We are back at High Rock.  Tonight we will have dinner and some free time, and then we have a service project tomorrow.  Those of us who were sick with fevers and sore throats are much better, and no one else seems to have gotten ill.  One of us will provide a more detailed update later on, but, for now, please know that we are safe and well.  Blessings to you all, Dr. E. and the China Team