The Absent Uncle: It is a small world ...

As I read last week’s Brandon Valley Journal, I found myself smiling at a memory that came out of Editor Jill Meier’s column about her confirmation in her St. James, Minn., home church.

While I have plenty of my own confirmation memories, this memory took me back to my U.S. Navy days on the USS Kitty Hawk in 1972.

During one of our infrequent breaks from being on Yankee Station (off the coast of Viet Nam) we visited the port in Hong Kong. It was at the end of June and the first week or so of July.

Hong Kong was in the countdown of the end of British rule and subsequent reunification with China. It was a bustling city – bigger than any city I had ever seen – and filled (and overcrowded) with traffic, buses, bicycles, and foot traffic. A large ferryboat shuttled across the bay between the two sides of the city – Kowloon and Hong Kong Island.

The Kitty Hawk was anchored at the entrance to the harbor, too large to be docked, necessitating an almost 45-minute ride by small ferry boats that ran almost continually between the ship and the shore.

This was a scene I never could have imagined. From the barge tied to the side of the ship to accommodate the small boats (and on that barge, almost any kind of vendor you can imagine, from personal laundry to souvenir trinkets and food) to going ashore and being swallowed up by the city as soon as you got off the shore docks. Mind boggling!

It was suggested to me that a technique to having a bit of an advantage navigating around, was to contact local missionaries that might be able to give some guidance (spiritual and local). I thought I would give it a try.

I was fortunate enough to be introduced to Ken and Karen. They were a young married couple, about my age, and had been placed in a Christian Mission on the Kowloon side of the city a few months before my arrival.

They proved to be a wonderful resource for me. Helping me to get around, advising which buses to take, how to avoid being crushed when walking the sidewalks, and simply explaining what I was seeing and experiencing. They also took me places I would have never found (or know about) plus introducing food and the use of chopsticks, which I can still use quite handily to this day.

They let me know some of their frustrations with the move to Hong Kong, which mostly centered on the scarcity of American kitchen supplies. Simple things: things that were either very expensive or just weren’t available. Wheat flour, granulated sugar, oatmeal, chocolate chips. And for Ken – shoes that fit his size 13 wide feet. 

I figured I could help, or expressed more clearly, that the USN could help. I had friends onboard who appropriated some supplies, gave to me for transport, and we all were rewarded with the best fresh-homemade chocolate chip cookies when we pulled up anchor and departed Hong Kong!  

It still makes me smile remembering my time with them. Just wonderful people.

Editor’s note: Ironically so, Ken was the son of Editor Jill Meier’s pastor in her home church at that time.