Church: A 12-Hour Ordeal

Yes.  Church was a 12 hour ordeal today.

We woke up before light, 5am to be exact.  We met our group (about 15 of us wanted to go to church) and we were out by 5:40am.

First we walked to the bus stop.  Luckily yesterday's adventures prepared us with the knowledge that we needed to get everyone to the right stop.  And luckily Rachel (seriously the best person to travel with) had done the research on what stop to get off for the railway station.

We got off our stop and started walking... we walked for quite a while then learned from the locals that we were probably going the wrong way.  Of course, we couldn't know for sure because we don't actually speak Chinese, but in the end it turned out that the station was much closer to where the bus dropped us off than we thought.

We found the right train tickets to buy without much problem, and were soon on a bullet train.  It was super nice and went 175 mph!  It was crazy fast!  It was fun to watch out the window, but when other trains passed us coming from the opposite way, missing us by no more than an inch, I seriously thought we would fly off the tracks.

After we got off the train we headed to the subway station.  We were stuck at the machines there for a little bit, once again held up by our lack of Mandarin speaking, when a gift from the heavens appeared to us!  Brother Keebler (I think that was his name), a member from our international branch, spotted us, a group of dressed up white kids, and knew exactly what to do.  He helped us get our tickets, took us on the two different subways, and then on a little bit of a walk.  At 9:30 we found ourselves in a nice home in beautiful Suzhou, sitting down for sacrament meeting!

Church was very interesting and enjoyable.  There is no intermingling of Chinese Nationals and foreigners allowed when it comes to religious affairs, so it was just a whole bunch of people from around the world in there.  A girl from Thailand spoke as did a woman from the Phillipines.  It was a very cool experience to be there with members from all different places, and very comforting to have a meeting just like the ones we have at home!

After church we got the subways, train, and the bus back home.  It was an extra long journey because places tend to be busier in the afternoon than at 5am...

But of course, taking the time to travel back and forth from church was worth it.  I actually can't wait to go back when we have more time to explore Suzhou!