Federwitz in Transitz

It seems word has gotten out that we are living in Hong Kong and have plenty of room for visitors. We were delighted to have some new visitors this week from West Africa: the Federwitz family.

Paul and Ali Federwitz live in Tamale, Ghana with their two children where they work with the Ghana Institute of Linguistics, Literacy and Bible Translation (GILLBT). Paul is an Information Technology Consultant, helping national translators put their work onto the computer, dramatically reducing the amount of time required to complete a translation. Outside of her responsibilities as a wife and mother, Ali uses her passion for teaching to help other missionary mothers in their home-schooling endeavours. You can read more about the Federwitz family here.

Paul's bother David (who is also a missionary in Ghana) and I were in the same class at boarding school in the Ivory Coast.

The Federwitzes only had 26 hours to spend in Hong Kong before flying to Papua New Guinea to visit more family members who are missionaries there. We were so glad that they chose to stay with us, even for a short period of time. They were so exhausted after their long flight, but we did get a few opportunities to hear about their life in Ghana. I especially treasured my conversations with Ali whom I feel is a "kindred spirit" and who has much in common with my stage of life and my situation, despite the fact that we live in very different countries. They have two lovely kids, Hannah (3) and Levi (1) whom I must say were coping extremely well with the change of environments.



Hannah was pretending to call Uncle David on the toy telephone in the indoor playground of our estate. She is a delightful little girl, very inquisitive and friendly.



I tried and tried to get a good picture of Levi, but he is so active!





Our kids enjoyed playing with Hannah and Levi for the short time they had together after school.




Keegan found "Uncle Paul" to be quite the Lego enthusiast.




"I don't think we're in Kansas any more, Toto." (Or in this case, Ghana.) We all took the train to Sha Tin New Town Plaza for some tea before the Federwitzes had to leave for the airport.




It's just as well you can't see Ali's face here because she was seriously drooling over the Godiva chocolates for sale in that store!





We showed the Federwitz family the fastest way to wash up for dinner...




...then we decided on a restaurant.




Waiting patiently while the food was ordered...







Paul was so hungry he didn't bother to remove the wrapping from his burger!






Five quiet children enjoying their food.




After a kiss good-bye from Tirzah for a reluctant Levi, the Federwitz family and I headed off to the airport.




Ali thought she might like to "pick up" this good-looking tourist.




Good-bye Paul, Ali, Hannah and Levi! We're so glad you could spend the day with us here in Hong Kong. We know you'll have a fantastic time in PNG and the States, and we will pray for your ongoing ministry in Ghana.

A Letter for Manou

(You can click on the letter to enlarge it.)

I saw this sign today...

Maybe you live somewhere with a mosquito problem like we do here in Tai Po. Well, you've basically got two choices: buy one of these...

or buy one of these!

I need a good caption for this picture

Sweet Nothing in my Ear

Those who know me well know that there's not much I love more than a good discussion about Deafness. You can understand, then, how thrilled I was to turn on our TV and randomly find a Hallmark movie dealing with this subject dear to my heart. It was called "Sweet Nothing in my Ear", starring Jeff Daniels and Marlee Matlin.


The movie is a family drama about a Deaf and hearing couple who struggle to decide whether or not to give their Deaf son a cochlear implant. I won't spoil the movie for you by giving away the ending, but I think Hallmark tried hard to present a "fair and balanced" view of the medical procedure. The cochlear implant issue is very complicated and controversial, especially when a young child is involved.

I think Daniels did a great job learning American Sign Language from scratch for this film. I also think that Marlee Matlin is a beautiful and talented actress. (You may remember that she won an academy award for "Children of a Lesser God".) This movie deals with many aspects of Deaf culture such as Deaf pride, Deaf history, customs, Deaf education, etc.

You can watch the preview below.


However as much as I liked the acting and the themes, "Sweet Nothing in my Ear" disappointed me in one important area. For some reason the producers chose to use voice-overs instead of subtitles every time a deaf person spoke. I found the following comment on a popular deaf message board and couldn't agree more: "The choice to voice-over the signing in the Hallmark Production reminded me of old Disney movies in which you would hear the interior monologue of what the pet dog was thinking. Really, what a poor choice on so many levels. Aside from the insult to the Deaf Community, it just didn't work dramatically at all. It was laughable and it made deaf people look like lesser people. Wow."

In any other movie with a foreign language, there would have been subtitles, not voice-overs. Even more so in this film dealing with American Sign Language as a primary form of communication the director should have made sure to focus on the beautiful and highly visual nature of signing. Instead I found myself getting annoyed with the voice-overs and frustrated that the camera often cut off the signer's hands so I couldn't see what they were signing. How did the Deaf people who were involved in this production allow this to happen?

Anyway, vent aside, I recommend this movie if you wish to learn more about current issues that often arise in the Deaf community. However, in my opinion it has all been done before (and better) in a documentary called "Sound and Fury".




However, if you can't find a copy of "Sound and Fury" to watch, then "Sweet Nothing in my Ear" is better than ... well ... sweet nothing.

Church

Lauren took these photos of us on our way to church in Sha Tin one Sunday. We usually leave the apartment around 9:30.


We catch a green taxi to the University train station, as this is the furthest these taxis are allowed to travel within their boundary.


Then we hop in a red taxi to go the rest of the way to church.



Keegan especially liked this one because the rego matched his initials.



Our church meets in this high school from 10:00.

Sha Tin Church is very different to Woodvale Baptist in many ways. I'll admit that some things have been hard for us to get used to. However, we have also been enjoying the new forms of worship that accompany such a culturally diverse congregation. For instance, nearly every week a team of Filipino women dance to the music with tambourines. I wanted Jacqui to see them, so Craig filmed these short segments yesterday. For my hearing readers, please excuse the poor sound quality and just enjoy the beauty of the dance.

I am reminded of Psalm 150. "Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!"

A Symphony of Lights

Every night in Hong Kong at 8 pm crowds of people congregate along the banks of Victoria Harbour to watch "A Symphony of Lights". Yesterday it was our turn to take the train in to the city to see the nightly spectacle involving coloured lights, laser beams and searchlights performing a stunning, unforgettable show synchronised to music. The multimedia display involves 44 key buildings along both sides of the harbour. According to Guinness World Records, it is the world's "Largest Permanent Light and Sound Show". Apparently the "Symphony of Lights" show comprises five major themes, "taking spectators on a unique journey celebrating the energy, spirit and diversity of Hong Kong". Well, we don't know anything about themes and a celebratory journey...we just enjoyed seeing all the cool lights and lasers shooting out from the skyscrapers!

After the light show we walked along the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront to the Avenue of Stars. Here, commemorative side walk plaques celebrate Chinese singers and movie stars.

We finished up with a soft serve ice cream from Maccas.

The trains are extra crowded on Saturday nights. If you look closely you might see my white freckled arm.

By the way, you'd better go and turn off that light in the back room that you accidentally left on. We all need to do our part to save the environment, you know. Never mind that Hong Kong uses enough electricity with one session of its "Symphony of Lights" to run a whole country!

Nathan Road

You might remember I posted earlier about the book A Hong Kong ABC here and here.

This is the page from the book for the letter N.

"N is for nan yin man, narrator of note,
came down from near Nan King on a small boat.
They nattered of ninety-seven and the noonday gun,
noshed noodles noisily, naughty but fun.
Nathan Road's neon nightlife, not noticed at all,
Nor newfangled novelties on a barrow man's stall."

And here I am on the same Nathan Road in Hong Kong.

The photo does not really capture the abundance of neon on this famous road , but we were in a hurry to get to the lights show.

Tirzah's rules

Tirzah’s Rules


If it is on, I must turn it off.

If it is off, I must turn it on.

If it is folded, I must unfold it.

If it is closed, it must be opened.

If it does not open, I will exercise my freedom of screech.

If it is a pen, it must write on every blank page in Mummy’s diary.

If it is full, it will be more interesting emptied.

If it is empty, it will be more interesting full.

If it has a flat surface, it must be banged upon.

If it is stroller, it must be for my dolly not for me and must be pushed by me instead of by Mummy.

If Mummy's hands are full, I must be carried.

If Mummy is in a hurry and wants to carry me, I must walk by myself.

If it has buttons, they must be pressed.

If it is a drawer, it must be pulled open.

If it is a phone, I must talk on it.

If it is shoes, I will protest about wearing them even though I liked wearing them yesterday.

If I like it, it's mine.

If it's in my hand, it's mine.

If I can take it from you, it's mine.

If I had it a little while ago, it's mine.

If it looks just like mine, it's mine.

If I think it's mine, it's mine.

(Yes, I have been struggling a lot lately with my toddler who just wants to rule the world.)

For George and Jacqui

Cold snap

Today was quite cool compared to the weather we've experienced in Hong Kong thus far. At 9 o'clock this morning it was around 18 degrees Celsius in Tai Po.

Now Chinese people, it seems, are notorious for dressing themselves and their children in layer upon layer of clothes to ward off a chill. After dropping the two older kids at school, I went for a walk with Tirzah in her stroller and got many an evil eye from the older women we passed in the street for apparently under-dressing my baby in such wintry conditions. One wizened old lady pointed at Tirzah's bare arms and muttered to me crossly in Chinese. Another bravely stepped out of her market stall and told me it was "too cold for baby today". So I explained to her that we were really enjoying the cool breeze and the chance to turn off the air conditioner, that we loved the reduced humidity, and that today's weather wasn't particularly cold by Australian standards.

No, I'm kidding. I just smiled and nodded and kept walking for about ten blocks without breaking a single drop of sweat. And that's a record for us here in Hong Kong.

A few more school photos

Walking to Keegan's school


Exploring some sort of machine while on a field trip to the Hong Kong Science Museum as part of the Candy Unwrapped special exhibition last month



Jemilla (pink hat) playing flag football


Making Chinese lanterns for mid Autumn festival


Jemilla's class


Keegan's class

The Pet Dragon

One of my extra lovely and loyal blog-readers sent me an unexpected parcel last week from my favourite online bookstore. It contained a wonderful children's picture book called The Pet Dragon by Christoph Niemann, an illustrator for The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine.



Besides the obvious elements of Chinese culture, the story cleverly integrates 33 written Chinese characters into the illustrations.


The author/illustrator explains in the preface that he never intended the book to be a means of learning Chinese. Critics complain that he should have included a pinyin pronunciation guide for each character introduced in order that the book might be considered bilingual English-Chinese. Niemann admits to a simple fascination by the pictographs and the iconicity of the Chinese language, that is the way the written form of the word conveys the meaning of the word. For instance, this means person 人, and when you put a box around the person you get 囚 prisoner.

Auslan has many iconic signs as well. When you think of a house, of course it makes sense to do this sign, or this sign for banana. I could elaborate more, but this post is supposed to be about the Chinese language, not Australian sign language.

While I have struggled with many aspects of the spoken languages here in Hong Kong, I too have become fascinated with the written Chinese characters to the point where I find myself analysing the names for each of the train stations to try to understand why they are written in such a way. For instance, this was the first character I learned. It means big.

Now can you find it in this gorgeous fireworks display which is the final page of Niemann's book?


The Pet Dragon has made me feel more intrigued by the written Chinese language, and maybe a shade less intimidated about learning it. I also love the fact that Jemilla straight away took the book up to her bedroom and copied down all the Chinese characters. She has informed me that she will take it to school tomorrow to show her teachers as well. Mission accomplished, Niemann. And thank you to the kind gift-giver!

Proverbs 12:15

Now you're going to have to look up that verse, aren't you, before you die of curiosity!