Leavenworth

Ryan and I invited some international students to go to Leavenworth with us for their Christmas tree lighting festival. They had not seen snow, so we wanted to take them to see it. For those from out of state, Leavenworth is a little town east of the mountains in WA that is designed to look like a village of Bavaria, Germany.

From L to R we have: Kola & Jeremy (from Hong Kong), Ryan, Elizabeth, and Kanita (from Thailand). We enjoy making friends from other countries and learning about them and their countries, while at the same time introducing them to America and our culture(s).

They enjoyed the drive through the mountains saying it was like something from a movie.

Lots of sledders.

Main Street shopping

We had roasted chestnuts from a street vendor. We found out that they are also popular in H.K. and Thailand.

We borrowed our 8 year old friend's sled--thanks Cordell! Everyone got to try sledding. Kanita is behind me, though you can't see her face.

Afterwards we had a German dinner together. It was greasy and not so good. :P Jeremy asked Ryan and I about our beliefs and if we believed in Mary. We weren't completely sure what he meant, but we explained that we believe that Mary was a human like us, who gave birth to Jesus. We told him that that is what who are celebrating at Christmas--Jesus.

We asked if he'd heard about Jesus dying for our sins. He had. (If he hadn't...we probably would not have explained too much at that point.....you've got to give bite sized pieces of information that may be completely new). We said that we believed that Mary was real, but that she is not (or not nearly) equal with God and that we do not pray to her. He said that he believed like we did and wanted to go to a church like we do. We said that he was welcome to come with us anytime.

His mother is buddhist and his father is atheist. I'm not sure where his Christian interest started. He said that he wanted a bible to practice English. I think that he'll be getting a bilingual English/Cantonese one sometime soon! :) I've given out a few bilingual bibles in the past to others. I think it's very important to read the bible in your first/heart language as it's difficult enough like that.