We heard the exciting news at breakfast
that one of the BYU teaching couples were able to go to the Vietnamese Branch
yesterday afternoon. They had just gone
around a corner when they saw the Humanitarian Service couple, Elder and Sister
Perry, just saying good-bye to someone and they asked if the Bjorkman’s wanted
to go along with them. They immediately
agreed and wished that there had been time to go get the rest of us and go, but
the Perry’s had to leave right then in order to make it on time. They got in a taxi and followed Elder Perry
on his scooter to the place where they meet (It was a "follow that scooter" moment).
It would have been impossible for any of us to have gone to the park and
tried to find our way from there they said.
They had a wonderful time at the meeting and were very impressed by the
people that were there. The Branch
Presidency are all Vietnamese. The majority
of the members seemed to be young single men and there was just a wonderful Spirit
there at the meeting, they said. Once
again, it was one of those chance meetings that brought a wonderful blessing!
We all met in the lobby at 10 a.m. and got
on the bus for the ride to the airport.
Going through immigration was easy and we had our tickets for our second
to the last flight of the last 23 days.
The flight landed in Guangzhou and after we went through immigration
there, we got our tickets for our flight to Ji’nan.
After landing in Ji’nan, we were met by Mr.
Zhang that we had pre-arranged to pick us up from the airport with the Pace’s
and made it home by midnight. A very
long day and we were so happy that Mr. Zhang drove us right up to the gate of
the Foreign Teacher’s Complex so we didn’t have to lug our suitcases halfway across
campus on a very cold night. It had
snowed and gotten very cold in Ji’nan while we were gone!
We had a hard time sleeping because of how
cold the apartment was. We have no
control over the heat and I think they decided to turn it down with the majority
of the teachers gone during the break.
David finally turned on the space heater and then we were warmed up
enough to get up and get the day going.
After a short video chat with Caleb,
Bethany and Aleeyah, we got our coats on and bundled up for the shopping we
needed to do. First we went to the Apple
Store and got a new power cord for David’s computer. Then we caught the bus to Carrefour and got
some groceries. Eva said she was coming
to get us, so we waited for her there and after she took us to lunch, she
brought us home.
She was here for the next 3 hours looking
at our pictures from the trip and just visiting. We told her of our decision to not come back
next year and the reasons why. She understands
the reasons, but I know she is sad about it.
It is going to be hard to leave her behind!
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