Liverpool, Thanksgiving, and more glorious times!

Happy (belated) Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope your day was nice. I have so much to catch you up on!

I went for a walk with a friend and God treated us to a beautiful rainbow! (notice the wind, you can see it in my coat, cold England weather + wind = very cold English weather! don't be deceived by the momentary sunshine!)

Steve, do you remember telling me how silly and immature your class’ boys were and how they made a list of the prettiest girls at school? Well apparently boys haven’t changed much in 15 years because the boys this year did that too! but wait, there’s more. Not only did they make a list of who they thought the prettiest girls were, they made a list of who they thought the girls would pick as either handsomest or most datable! Incredible! I was just laughing in disbelief when I heard that one…true story though! Thankfully, I don’t think most girls know about it so it hasn’t been a big deal.

One little English tidbit I thought you might appreciate from one of our English lectures: he said that the old phrase “Red sky at night, sailors delight...” in England is actually said to be a “shepherd’s delight” instead of a sailors! Isn’t that funny? It makes sense though, probably a lot more shepherds around here.

And I’m not sure if I ever shared this, but I thought it might be interesting to know that the students here range in age from 18 to 28! The oldest guy is 24…which makes the oldest girl here 28. =) There are actually 2 German, female doctors attending school here, as well as a female dentist (who happens to be one of the doctors’ sisters).

Two weeks ago (the last time I wrote a real post) we had an outreach here on campus for local teenagers. It was a mix of worship, students sharing testimonies, a short message, and a dance! I had a very small part in the dance. It was fun to do and I think the students really enjoyed having something a bit different. One of the students here, named Kate, is really into dance and headed the team up. She choreographed a dance to the song “Jesus Freak” which told the story of 3 different people with various problems or things they were trying to fill themselves with (drinking, popularity, boys/relationships) and how they came to know Christ.

So, just a few highlights of last week (Nov. 16-23) since I didn’t post last Saturday:

We had a Korean noodle fundraiser night on Tuesday to raise money for the starving people of Zimbabwe. One of the students here named Belinda is from Zimbabwe and had presented on the situation there several weeks earlier. In response to this, another student here from South Korea (1 of 3) named Soku decided to organize a fundraiser among the students for Zimbabwe. I helped him, along with a big team, cook noodles in the school’s kitchen and serve almost the entire student body (it was an optional event to attend). Afterwards, everyone retired to the lounge where Soku’s visiting sister who is training to be an opera singer, treated us to a few songs. It was great fun and we raised over £700!!

We also began choir practices for our Christmas program. I have to admit the practices have been trying. It’s hard to blend people from all different musical backgrounds and experiences into 1 choir in only about 3 weeks! Lord willing it will all work-out. We are singing 3 songs as a choir: “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”, “the Hallelujah Chorus”, and a Jewish song, “Shalom” (I have no idea where they picked that one from!).

Also, we finally have Christmas decorations up at school. During work morning last week, I was part of a team that helped take all the decoration boxes down from the attic and dust them off. Then the team this week (working yesterday morning while the other half of school was in seminar) put all the decorations we unpacked up. The place looks very festive =)

Lastly, the overwhelming theme of last week (Nov. 16-23) was a test on personal evangelism and a paper due on 1st and 2nd Samuel. I was so focused on those two assignments, I felt like a hermit that week! But we all survived and were happy to be done. (of course now we have a memory verse test on Monday and a paper due on Ezra on Thursday. But they’re smaller tasks)


Last Saturday (11-22), I went on our school’s weekly, optional day trip. In fact, almost the entire school went! We took a bus to the city of Liverpool, about an hour away (1 ½ hours maybe? I wasn’t paying the greatest attention). The city is famous for being the birthplace of probably the greatest band ever, the Beatles!

A lot of us from school took a bus tour together that went to lots of Beatles spots including Strawberry Fields...

...and the famous Cavern Club.
to see more of my pics, check out the facebook album:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=73204&l=d3f32&id=720019947

Last night, our school put on an improv comedy night. it was really funny!


here's a long promised picture of my family group =)


here's my friend Kate modeling how incredibly green this tree is! if that doesn't give you an idea of how damp it is all the time here, i don't know what will! =)


And last but not least (at least for now), here's my table at our school's thanksgiving dinner on thursday.


I've added more photos from Thanksgiving, the comedy improv night, and other events to this album on Facebook: (if you've already looked at it, just flip to the newest pics at the end of the album)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=70631&l=69f42&id=720019947

Well i have to run now but i will hopefully update this post soon because i have tons more to share!!
Love to everybody!!!!
~Sarah Jordan Hope =D