I pretty much had the best Sunday ever. My Chinese coordinator Kelly was here all the way from China! This was so exciting because I thought I might not ever get to see her again and I just love her so much. She was here with a group of about 32 other Chinese students who are here exploring Western America through ILP's summer program. Mindy and I met up with them to go watch the Tabernacle Choir preform their Sunday broadcast of Music and the Spoken Word. It was wonderful. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir wowed me just like they always do. I was also cracking up the whole time because most of the little Asians were falling asleep. The poor things were so exhausted, and the beautiful music put them right to sleep! When we were done, they had the most adorable Chinese speaking missionary give them a tour. It was so fun and it was definitely a unique way to experience Temple Square.
After Temple Square, we got to go to the Asians favorite, KFC. We went to the world's first KFC and I swear they were more excited about taking pictures with the statue of Colonel Saunders the KFC guy than they were with the Temple. They sure do love their KFC. My favorite part of the KFC experience was when the kids found out that that they could go get ice cream. There was this huge mob of little Asian kids who all congregated in front of the ice cream machine. They thought that how the ice cream was formed into a tall swirl was just about coolest thing they had ever seen. Then, they found out they could have chocolate syrup. All of them started yelling, "CHOCOLEEEE CHOCOLEEE!!" They were excited to say the least. It was the cutest thing.
Our last stop of the day was to Fashion Place Mall. The kids had to get their American shop on. While we were there, another girl from my China group stopped by. It was so good to see Kandis. It was especially good to see Kandis and Mindy at the same time! We sure did have a lot of catching up to do since we haven't been all together in months. It was even more special cause Kelly was there too. It was just an all around good time. After Kandis left, Mindy and I spent the rest of the time trying to help a little girl name Keiko find a purse for her mother. She really wanted a 500$ Michael Kors bag from Nordstroms, but we told her that was "tai gui le" or in other words: way way too expensive. We ended up finding her a nice bag in another store and she was happy with her purchase. We were happy too because now Keiko has a nice present for her mama.
Sadly, at this point our day had to come to an end. The children had to go meet up with their host families and I had to say goodbye to my day of China in America. Mindy and Kelly were going to have a sleepover at her host family so, the only thing that they had left to do was take me back to my car. It was sad to leave Kelly all over again. I gave her a huge hug and she told me to come visit her in China one day and bring my babies. I am definitely not opposed to that!! Until we meet again Kelly, WO AI NI!
XO Mikele