An Eye-opening experience

 Today was are first full day on our mission trip.  After being up for a while we went to church, which was just a matter of steps away from where we were standing.   Singing familar songs it reminded me of back home except the unusual "ahems" mixed into thre.   Showing that no matter where we live, what color we are and what are economic structure is, we are united by a common theme, love for Jesus Christ.  After that we headed to New York by subway. (This was written by David Hartwell).

We had a little bit of an issue with the blog tonight, so I (Kristin) am going to finish this one up, so I apologize that this is not more from the kids. I will try to have them repost tomorrow. So after the church service, we headed to NYC! It was a warm day, with lots of water drinking, but it was a phenomenal day! We did a lot of subway riding from place to place and here is group picture waiting for one of the trains.

Hanging out on the subway

We took the Staten Island Ferry from Manhatten to Staten Island, and then back to Manhatten to get a good view of the Statue of Liberty and also of Manhatten and the surrounding islands. It gave us a very different perspective of NYC from the water!

             

One of our goals was to go to the NBC Observation Deck! We weren't able to go up until 8:00, but that actually ended up being okay because we were able to see the lights of Manhatten then!

The view was absolutely stunning and breath-taking! Breath-taking especially for those who are afraid of heights (which would be me!) This was a well-worth it goal! By the way, Mike Klunder deserves all the credit for our day - he was the one who planned it and guided it!

We had to walk back to the subway station, which led us through Times Square again! But this time it was at night! Seeing the lights of Times Square was AMAZING! It felt like it was morning because it was so bright! Times Square is not a place for those who do not like crowds - it was so crazy when we were trying to walk back! Plus, we were very tired! If you asked the kids if they had fun, they would look exhausted and worn out, but I think tomorrow it will sink in with everything that we did!

Before we went to NYC, we had to grab some lunch. Dan and Mike headed to Domino's and we thought about going to a park to eat, but we thought our cars would be cooler with the air conditioning while we waited for the pizza. We decided to just eat it on this sidewalk - yeah we got a few weird looks, but I suppose I would stare too!

Before church we had a little bit of free time, so the game of choice was Kemps. As you can see, even us spectators loved that game!

Here's a picture of the Staten Island Ferry that we took!

One funny story, we were looking for Mike K. - he had gone off and tried to figure out our next step after the ferry. Well, while we were waiting in line to get onto the ferry, we wondered how Mike would find us. Alex made the point that we kind of stick out. A woman next to us just started laughing as she looked up as us tall giants :). I forget her exact words, but they were something along the lines of - how could he miss you guys? We were definitely a minority when it came to height. There we a huge crowd of people, then a pocket of REALLY tall people. It was rather hilarious - just picture it in your head.

Again, I apologize for the lack of Roots postings here, but we will try to have them repost tomorrow. Hope this just gives you a little glimpse of our day today!