A Christian philosopher story

"I'm sorry, I can't get dinner with you tonight. I'm going to hear a Christian philosopher speak in Hong Kong central."

Not an excuse I thought I'd hear myself utter. Ever.

After class on Wednesday, one of my friends from class told me about this philosopher who was coming to speak in Hong Kong. My friend was helping to organize the event so he had some extra tickets to the talk. Would you like to come? he asked.

And that's how I found myself, on a Thursday night, on the subway heading to central Hong Kong and not totally sure what I was heading towards. I got off at the predetermined station, found the exit, and met up with my friend. "That's where we're headed," he said pointing. ICA, International Christian Assembly. Oh, it's a church.

Oh. It's a big church.

It was an auditorium style church with three large screens at the front displaying scenes from the stage they were hanging over. On the stage there was a band, complete with electric guitar and backup singers, playing songs that were a cross between Christian rock and hymns. I found a seat in the far back corner of the first floor and spent the following half an hour listening to songs and hearing a few prayers from various people.

When the the philosopher, Ravi, did get up to speak it was less of the lecture I had been expecting and more of a sermon. Makes sense considering the setting. I'm not totally sure where the philosophy came in, but the Christianity was certainly prevalent throughout the talk. He was a very engaging orator and shared many entertaining stories. Overall though, I had difficulty following his arguments. One in particular that stuck with me was evidence for a God. He cited that there was a 1 in 10 to the 40,000th chance that all of the enzymes necessary for life came together to form life by random chance. That's wicked small. So because that probability that life could arise by random chance is so small, QED, there must be a God. Honestly, I'm more fascinated by how one would calculate those odds.

I took the entire train ride home to internalize the experience. I'm still not sure what to call it besides an experience.

Besides that experience, we had our first typhoon warning! Mainly it entailed a bit of rain and wind and canceled morning classes; the actual typhoon missed us.

Excellent way to save energy.

Fresh, packaged corn anyone? It's even still slightly squishy!

Yesterday I took a hike up Victoria Peak in the evening and we were rewarded with this view from the top. One of my favorite buildings isn't pictured here. It's just to the left of this photo and it creates moving images up its sides with white lights. That sounds like I'm describing a television screen to somebody who's never seen a TV. But it isn't exactly a television. There's no screen, just the white lights and it's more subtle then a screen. Still, wicked cool and definitely worth the hike.

Hong Kong from the top of Victoria Peak. It's best at night.