Yum Cha

My last Sunday in Auckland. Wow. I'm having a hard time believing it is all dwindling down to the end. We went to church for the last time in the West Harbour ward today. Everyone was so kind and appreciative to us. Many people expressed their gratitude and spoke many kind and encouraging words to us. We felt very loved. :) We'll definitely miss these wonderful people!

Here is the primary class we've been teaching. Kayla, Adeeva, and Braun. Yes, we realize this picture is quite obviously self-timed, but we really wanted to get a picture of all us. :) They are just so great!

Adeeva and Braun were quite a comical pair in class, always giggling and trying to impress each other. Too bad we won't be here to see what happens when Braun has a growth spurt ;)

Sweet, sweet Kayla was always so willing to participate and tell fun stories and ideas. I was glad we didn't have to say goodbye to her today because we get to have dinner with her family (the Olson's) again tomorrow night!

Ever since we first got here, the Lords have wanted to take us to Yum Cha. Whenever they talked about it I thought they were saying Yum Chow, but today I realized it is actually Yum Cha. Funny how accents can make words sound so different than what I'm used to. Anyway, it is one of their favorites and one of those things we just HAD to experience. When we realized our time in Auckland was quickly coming to an end, we figured out that today was the only day the whole family would be able to go. I'm so glad we figured it out, because it was such a fun experience! We sat down at the table, and lots of Asian waiters and waitresses constantly walked by with trays and trolleys of new foods: pork or prawn or cabbage or spinach dumplings, pork buns, duck, chicken, pork, veggies, sesame balls, etc. Whenever we saw something we wanted we pointed and they put it on our table for everyone to enjoy. Even though I've never been, I would compare it to those Brazilian steakhouses like Tucanos or Rodizio Grill. It was fast paced with little time for talking. My favorite part was the ice cream balls that we ended with. They were literally balls of ice cream wrapped in a semi-sweet rice dough or something like that--kind of hard to explain, but absolutely delicious. My least favorite part (really the only thing I didn't like) were the chicken feet. Bleh. Yes, I tried chicken feet. They were cold and slimy and boney--SO gross. Kerry said they are much nicer hot, but I'm not too convinced...

Yuck. It looks like we're eating fingers.

My face may be a little deceiving, but I had not yet fully tasted it. Even though it was not necessarily enjoyable, at least I tried it and can say I've eaten chicken feet, right?

After such a lovely meal, we finally got a picture of the whole family! From the left: Raewyn, me, Anna, Sheryl, Alexis, Kodie, and Kerry. They are just some of the kindest people, and I feel so blessed to have gotten to know them!